Transformed Ostrich

Last week I finally dusted off a book from my bookshelf that I had been meaning to read for years now.  I hadn’t read it before since I always thought I had more important things to do; I wanted to make more money, I wanted to be better with people, I wanted to travel, I have a girlfriend to spend time with, I have food to prepare and eat… well you get the idea.

Who has time to improve their eyesight?  I mean, I’ve worn glasses my whole life anyway, and as much as I don’t like them, and contacts are annoying and expensive; is it even possible to improve my eyesight without surgery?  Can reading a book really give me some simple exercises to improve my eyesight at home without any special training or equipment?  Why have I never heard of this before, and why does my optometrist just keep prescribing more and more powerful eyeglasses to me every year, if it’s actually hurting my eyesight?!

I put all those ideas aside and started reading the book, “The Power Behind Your Eyes”.  While I was thinking it would be full of charts and exercises and daily routines, it went quickly into talking about how my iris patterns are the combination of my parents’ genetics, and my formative years growing up with their (or parent-figure) influence, and the interpretations I made from these events.  It made some summaries of the characteristics of people with those types of iris patterns.  These hit the nail on the head completely for me, and I was starting to think I had ended up with a palm reading book for eyes, rather than a practical guide to improving my vision.

Since I’m working on this new thing to finish what I started, I continued on… Some of the exercises involved watching a candle, letting eyes cross or uncross to make separate images on the page merge in a particular way, and patching one or the other eye to see the world through a different context (especially if one eye is dominant over the other).  However, other exercises included open ended questions dealing with my life, goals, eating patterns, caring for my physical body, what my relationship is like, do I spend time relaxing, and do I regularly play sports?

Just taking some time to think about these questions, to really give an honest answer to myself, I noticed I was writing and saying things like, “Well I have work to do, I can’t stop and go outside all willie nillie…”, “Play sports?  I’m an adult!  How am I going to fit a regular sports practice into my schedule?  Everyone is a pro by the time they’re my age and I haven’t thrown a ball in years”, “And what do you mean by ‘live in an environment that supports my life purpose’ anyway?  Where do I find this life purpose you’re speaking about?”

My prescription is approximately -4.50, with a large astigmatism in one eye.  It was only a couple years ago it was even possible to get a contact lens that could handle the astigmatism so large.  (For more information on how to read your prescription, see the article on Wikipedia here.)  With my glasses off, I couldn’t see the channel guide on a large LCD TV, nor the time on any clock in the room, and had to hold my iPhone rather close to my face (and squint) to read/send text messages or make calls.

Now I’m really anxious to live life without glasses.  Wake up the morning and see the time on my bedside clock clearly, pick out clothes and find the right socks, and not miss any notes or other things I’m supposed to remember in the morning before heading out the door.  All without glasses or contacts.  And be able to read or email with cheaters at the most.  So I immediately went cold turkey and stopped using my glasses unless absolutely necessary.  I would stop work around 5pm, take off my glasses and navigate the rest of my day with my naked vision.  Also, in the morning I would not use glasses until I needed to use a computer.

At first, things were indeed blurry, and uncomfortable.  But I was surprised at how well I functioned with this, previously intolerable, “blurry” vision!  I made dinner, cleaned dishes, walked to the grocery store (I don’t think I’ve ever done this before), looked out the window at the trees and buildings, cleaned my apartment, did laundry, and called some friends I hadn’t talked to in a long time and kept meaning to call, or returned calls from people I’d been putting off one day at a time.

I’ve been getting tired and going to bed around 10-11pm, started waking up (naturally, with no alarm) before 8am every day, and going for a jog in the morning!  If you knew how much I complained about sleeping in, through every alarm I set, and watching TV or whatever else until wee hours of the morning, despite my resolve to change this, you’d really appreciate the triumph here!  I was now preparing a full meal from scratch every day, where I previously ate frozen chicken pot pies, and doggie bag left overs from restaurants.  I spend the first half hour or so cutting up fresh fruit, which I didn’t eat before, drinking water, and sitting on the deck enjoying the morning air.

So far, the first week has been a success!  What started out as a far-fetched and skeptical attempt to improve my eyesight, despite how busy I was, and how necessary it was for me to use my glasses all the time; turned into a quick, unexpected but immediate, non-coercive, positive transformation of my day-to-day life!  I can already see 1 line further up the chart than when I started!  When something starts like this, how can I not continue?

Stay tuned for the next update…