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Visualising with eyes closed & relaxation

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Visualising with eyes closed & relaxation
#1
Hello,

Sorry to be back with only questions instead of answers...

When palming and trying to visualise blackness, do you mentally think of black objects or should you really try to see them with your eyes closed?

The same question goes for the visualisation of Snellen letters: I am standing in front of the Snellen card, I look at the same Snellen card which I hold in my hand and look at a letter I can see very well, I trace the outlines, consciously moving my head while doing so in order to relax my neck muscles. Then I close my eyes and trace the outlines of that letter again. Should I try to see that letter on the blackness of my closed eyelids? Or is thinking about that letter and mentally seeing it sufficient? I then open my eyes, look at the Snellen card on the wall, and try to trace the outlines of that same letter, which is actually blurry but I try not to notice or care about that.

I am a bit disappointed that none of the exercises I have tried resulted in relaxation of the eyes. They keep feeling strained, especially after computer work. The only thing that feels "good" (but not particularly relaxing) is warming my hands on a cup of tea and then palming with hot hands.

Any advice is so welcome...

Kind regards and perfect vision to you all.
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#2
The both options you consider are wrong. You should not try to see the letter on the back side of your eyelids.  If you "try to see" anything, you draw even more attention to the eyes, which is the main source of strain.  Nor you should "mentally see" them by mentally (or even verbally) tracing the outlines of the letter and trying to reconstruct the image from that. This is a strained surrogate imagination incident to people with imperfect sight, who totally forget how to simply imagine things. 

When the imagination is perfect, you see the entire image instantaneously when you think about it, and totally without effort. It feels like if you perceive the visual sensation by the visual center of your brain, but it doesn't come from the eyes. Like if the image originated from another source than the eyes, but is still a visual impression.

The perfect memory and imagination cannot be obtained by any kind of effort, exercise, or "trying". It only comes when you are relaxed. It is not the cause of the relaxation, but must be preceded by it. You can measure the degree of your relaxation by your ability to remember/imagine black, but you can't get more relaxation in this manner. You should just notice the conditions when you are more able to remember black, and when you are less able to remember black, and look for the recent and avoid the latter. For myself I call it "invite the memory of black and wait calmly until it comes".

Currently the way you practice seems to me to be mostly wrong. You should read the original Bates book more carefully. It is no surprise to me that so far you don't have any improvement so far.
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#3
I commend you for being thoughtful about it and explaining in some detail what you're stuck on - usually we get posts that aren't much more than "I can't visualize, what am I doing wrong?"

What Oleg said is right on. Do NOT try to reconstruct or see an image on the inside of your eyelids, in the dark field you "see" with your eyes closed. That is the place that you want to get away from. It took me a long time to learn to stay away from there, and I kept jumping back to it as soon as I would try to visualize. But that isn't the place where it's possible to remember or visualize at all. What I do when I close my eyes and recalling an image is I place it way in the back part of my head. That's actually where the visual cortex of the brain is, but maybe it works just because it's far away from my eyes and sends the message that my eyes will not be involved in it at all. As soon as I move my point of attention like that, it suddenly becomes possible to visualize.

Tracing is ok. But when you do it, don't push at the outlines of the letters as if you're drawing them with a pencil, and don't make an effort to go in a straight line. Your inclination might be to do that, so just watch for it and not at all trying to push at the outlines with your eyes, just hopping very lightly around the edges.

The same kind of mistake has to do with trying to ingrain the image in your head. You might have a tendency to push at the letters with your eyes (what I mean by this is simply straining your eyes) to ingrain the image in your mind so that it can be recalled later. But memory doesn't work like that, it works the opposite way. The lighter you look at something, the less you try to remember, the easier you will remember it afterward.

David
Site Administrator

"Half of our funny, heathen lives, we are bent double to gather things we have tossed away." - George Meredith
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#4
Quote:Sorry to be back with only questions instead of answers

Haha, don't be. Your questions are a great benefit to the other readers of this forum. There are many other people stuck with the same problem as you; but too shy or lazy to write about it  Wink and it takes some courage to start posting on this matter which can be hard to describe. The more questions asked the more the benefit, and you should commend yourself for taking this time and helping others who will now feel just that much less alone in their journey and barriers to perfect sight.
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#5
Thank you very much for your replies. I appreciate it so much that you are putting your time and effort into helping us.

Oleg K., I must admit that I was initially saddened by your post. It gave me the impression that I didn't understand a thing about Bates and was never going to succeed. However, if I am doing the wrong things, it's best to be told when they haven't become a habit yet, so I am thankful that you pointed it out to me.
Also, I may misinterpret your tone because English is not my mother tongue.

David, your suggestion to stay away from the black field seen with closed eyes and to use the back part of the head instead is most helpful. I just tried palming like that and it instantaneously made my eyes feel all warm and "bubbly". I didn't visualise like that yet because I didn't feel mentally ready for it. I palm at work in the toilet and that isn't the best place to feel mentally calm, is it.  Big Grin
I reread many times what you wrote about tracing but I'm afraid I still don't understand what you mean by "don't push at the outlines of the letters as if you're drawing them with a pencil". What do you mean by "push"? I indeed imagine to have a pencil or small paintbrush attached to my nose and I move my head so the nose pencil/brush writes the letter or follows the outlines of a building, car, tree, person, ... I read about it in Tom Quackenbush's book. Is it wrong? I don't remember Tom mentioning anything about avoiding sticking to the straight lines. So is it better to quickly go around the edges instead? I notice that when I do that, my eye don't glide along the object but jump from corner to corner. I think that is not the way it is supposed to be, am I right?

Kazekage, thank you for your encouragements. You make me feel very welcome on this forum. I have another question for you: I read in an old post of yours that Bates advises us to sleep on our back. If I do so, my head rolls to one side. Is that OK or not? Also, I would like to read the section where Bates recommended this. Do you remember where you read that? Many thanks.

I notice that I strain the most when doing computer work. Too bad I work in IT.  :Smile I tried the Swing Windows but that doesn't seem to help me. Any other advice you can give me? Again, thank you.

Kind regards and perfect vision to you all.
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#6
I don't understand why I have saddened you. In fact, I intended to encourage you by telling that you don't have improvement NOT because Bates method doesn't work for you as you might be suspecting, but because you haven't yet thoroughly understood Bates method and do things wrong. All you have to do is read the original Bates book (<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.iblindness.org/books/bates/">http://www.iblindness.org/books/bates/</a><!-- m -->) and practice in the right way. Then you will succeed.

As Kazekage said, and I myself wasn't an exception and asked the same question at the beginning.
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#7
As far as sketching, I'll try to explain it more. The way your eyes move naturally is jumping from point to point. They can also follow a moving object, but in doing so you don't force them along a predetermined line. The object of the Bates method is to let your eyes go, to stop overcontrolling them, because this overcontrol is what leads directly to strain. The correct way is to mentally regard something in your visual field and your eyes will follow and do the work of looking at it all by themselves. If you look at something and try to force your eyes along a line to trace it, you are probably not giving up enough control. When you give up enough control, that is what allows your eyes to relax. So you can certainly follow around the edges of something, but do so in a sort of "hands off" sense, allowing your gaze to jump around as you eventually follow a rough path around the edges of the object.

Practice this first by tracing something close up, or at the distance you see clearly (without glasses). Look around the edge of a letter. There are two general ways of accomplishing this. Try both of these. One way is by forcing your eyes very rigidly along the line, not allowing them to stray, keeping them moving in a smooth continuous movement all around the letter. The second way is by tracing the letter by looking casually around the edges of the letter, taking your time, letting your eyes jump around the letter to see what they will. You'll find that the second way is much easier and quite a relief compared to the first way. So the object of the Bates method is to get you to see in the second way all the time.

I don't know how Tom teaches sketching or tracing, but he isn't here. Moving your head is just fine, because that's what you do so that what you're regarding is in front of you and you don't have to strain your eyes by continuing to look at something that's slightly off to one side. In other words, it's much less tiring to look at something directly in front of your face than something that's several inches to the left, you know? That's really the point of moving your head around - to put what you're regarding directly in front of you as much as possible. Once you're facing the object and can regard it easily, your eyes are able to move on their own to take it in. The eyes stay under too much tension when they have to keep looking even a little bit to the side.

David
Site Administrator

"Half of our funny, heathen lives, we are bent double to gather things we have tossed away." - George Meredith
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#8
Don't worry too much about it, Oleg K. To me it sounded very discouraging that I haven't understood Bates. After all, I have put quite some effort into reading his texts, paying attention to the details, etc. Once you think you have understood something, it is hard to go back and interprete the text in a different manner. You say: "all you need to do is read the book and practise the right way."  Well, I thought I did, otherwise I wouldn't be practising, of course.

Therefore, it is extremely helpful if someone explains the principles in another way. Or points specifically to the mistakes made and offers a suggestion how to avoid making those mistakes. I also learn a lot from reading how others managed to improve their eyesight, especially if they go into a lot of detail.

Kind regards and perfect vision to you all.
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#9
You mentioned Quackenbush, but I think you haven't read the ORIGINAL Bates book. This is a MUST that you have to read it. Do it once, then one more time and one more time and so on periodically from time to time as you practice. Each time you will discover new detail and answers to all your questions you have been asking so far. It's ok if you don't notice some things in the book at first - it's because you are not ready to understand them, but you will become able after a while, so this is why the book should become your handbook.

Personally I find re-reading chapters from the Bates book very inspiring and always find some new information. I am not ashamed to admit that I haven't totally understood Bates, because if I would have, I'd be completely cured already.

Although this forum is indeed emotionally encouraging and supporting, it's not a really trustworthy source of information. Even if someone is speaking the truth, his words usually boil down to exactly the same words that Dr. Bates wrote in his book. Nobody generates any new and true information here.
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#10
David, thank you for explaining sketching in further detail. I was doing it all wrong, forcing my eyes to follow the line properly, instead of letting them "dance" over the object. I followed your suggestion and tried both ways: the rigid one and the freeflow one. During the rigid sketching, I hardly blinked because I didn't allow my eyes to break loose from the object, I clang to the edges too much. During the freeflow sketching, I feel more liberated and don't pay attention to my eyes. How could I have been so mistaken to think that I was sketching in the correct way?  ???

In Tom's book, it is mentioned that moving your head when sketching is also good to loosen the neck muscles where tension from straining can build up.

I feel that with your finetuning help "Bates" will finally kick in and I will get there one day!  Smile

Oleg K., I haven't read the entire original Bates book but I have read, reread, reread, ... most of the chapters. I hardly discover anything new. I only am reminded again of things that had slipped my mind. Written language is not always clear and sometimes I wish I could talk to Bates himself and ask if he meant it the way I understand it. Therefore, this forum is very useful because Bates's ideas are explained in other terms, which can help you understand them better.

Kind regards and perfect vision to you all.
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#11
I'll be borrowing the book from my local library because I actually notice myself straining on my computer.
Hopefully once I read it, I'll understand the Ba tes Method better.
Cheers, xavier
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