My practice has taken an interesting, engaging, curious turn the last couple months, after reading Aldous Huxley's book 'The art of seeing'. I started reading it because I've been having trouble with my vision, then quickly found how the book can be applied to insight as well. I've been practicing some of the eye exercises (taken from the Bates method), and the effects on vipassana have been surprisingly positive.

The exercises help one break habits which are detrimental to healthy vision, two important ones being straining and staring. The tendency is to be unconscious of the act of seeing, so the process of re-educating the eyes is basically one of making vision a conscious experience. It's certainly been true for me that my vision has been just about entirely unconscious. This is changing, and now it is becoming more automatic to be aware of the process of seeing. It's been very cool, very fun, and very freeing. At this stage just moving around feels at times like being in a live ultra-HD video game. Motion is very apparent. There's a pce-esque quality to the world, and sometimes it seems I am some kind of probe, moving about on the earth, registering all this visual input. Who or what force is turning my head, directing my eyes this way and that, collecting the data - can't answer that.

The exercises encourage one to become 'blink conscious', and to become aware of breathing, as when one unconsciously stares, or fixates on something, breath tends to become constricted and shallow. So this is direct progress in vipassana. And working on breaking the habit of unconscious staring is very freeing to the faculty of attention, which has become noticeably more nimble and mobile. So now, whenever my eyes are open, it's much easier to note seeing, which in turn makes it easier to note the body or thoughts or whatever. I've been finding myself noting these things at times I would not had the wherewithall to note previously, during a sudden conversation with a person I'm attracted to for example.

Whether the Bates method actually improves eyesight or not is controversial, and I have my doubts, but will find out, as I took an eye exam right before I started these eye exercises, and will take another one later this year. In any case, my appreciation of vision has increased significantly, and the habits of straining and staring are steadily diminishing. Being relaxed is an important aspect to the method, and is a direct result of the exercises as well - this is always a welcome thing in my book.

One cool fact (according to one book): the retinas are actually outgrowths of the brain, and seem to contain their own intelligence. The strong sense of 'I' in the eye area comes to mind regarding this. Richard mentions something similar, that the eyes are extensions of the brain, connected by stalks. This really feels to be the case. I'm just starting with this, but there seems to be much more to it. The eyes and vision are such a big part of consciousness. (One book said vision is 80% of brain activity.)

ps - if anyone has experience with the Bates method, I would be very interested in other good books to check out.

This sounds really interesting. It seems to be a really good way to get you to pay more attention to your moment-to-moment experience, i.e. attentiveness of the eye-sense. Excerpt from the Wikipedia article on the Bates method:


Could you go into more detail on exactly what exercises you do, how you do them, how you messed w/ them, practiced w/ them, what worked well and what didn't, etc? It sounds like a useful practice for helping one to wander into the senses.

Hi John,



I have little experience with the Bates method, and I have had no succes in improving my eyesight. I did look into the Bates method as I do have quite a bit unpleasant sensations emanating from the areas around my eyes.

I found a discussion group and website called I-See. It's basically about the Bates-method. There's one person on the discussion group who has included strengthening excercises and who has claimed success using that approach. He wrote an article about this approach, which can be viewed here:

http://web.archive.org/web/20080216074610/http://www.i-see.org/bershak.html

I realize that the above link might no be what you are looking for, because as you stated, you are interested in books about the Bates method (and thus not necessarily in an article about the Bershak Method).

To me this method looks promising, more promising than the Bates method, in regards to improving eyesight, but I'm not able to pursue the method for the length of time that is required, as the outcome is uncertain (it's an unproven method). I expect people with well developed concentration skills to be the most likely candidates for success and I'm curious for their results. That's why I'm posting here on this forum, as a response to your post mainly to just introduce the concept to anyone else here, also interested in the matter.

Did you have clear flashes? (Some people using the Bates method report to have glimpses of clear vision.)

Bart

Hello BCDEFG,

"This sounds really interesting. It seems to be a really good way to get you to pay more attention to your moment-to-moment experience, i.e. attentiveness of the eye-sense". For me it really has been. As vision has become more conscious, so have the other senses.

Regarding exercises - there are so many. If this interests you, I recommend Huxley's book, as his take on it fits so well with vipassana. But to get a taste, one very basic and helpful one I was doing: just sitting, noticing that vision is happening, not concerned with what is being seen, noticing breathing as well, the relationship between the two. Some blinking can also be added. Just explore these things. The cool thing about open eyed meditation - it can happen anywhere anytime.

I would also suggest checking out the Tibetan eye chart http://www.wellnesshour.net/tibet.htm

Many of the eye exercises increase mobility of the eyes, by breaking down the unconscious habit of staring. I have noticed a significant difference in eye mobility. But the reason I'm posting this thread here, is because I have found that with increased eye mobility, my mind has become much less sticky. It doesn't grab on to things like before. My attention moves around noticeably more freely. Yes, there is a noticeable and welcome freedom in all this. Not to mention an increased richness of the world visually.

I should add that these exercises may not be the best ones for actually improving vision, though they all claim to. As Bart mentioned, there are more up to date and effective methods for that, which I have no experience with, but the link he posted looks very interesting, as does this one: http://gettingstronger.org/2010/07/improve-eyesight-and-throw-away-your-glasses/#more-1158

what do you mean by eye mobility? something i noticed is that i can become really attentive to the act of seeing - i think similar to what you described with being conscious of seeing and not particularly of what is being seen. instead of me looking out at things, it's more like things are there and they are being scoped out by this eye-sensor (your probe analogy resonated with me). doing this i can kind of apprehend the boundaries of my eyesight more directly - they frame the vision in a particular way. being aware of this, when moving my head rapidly back and forth, i could perceive the motion with more fluidity. since it was more of seeing what is already there (and not looking out at things) and not being concerned with what exactly it was, it wasn't so tiring, and it was kind of neat.. like a more direct experience of eyesight. is that what you're getting at by eye mobility?

i also could observe how my eyeglasses distort my visual field ever-so-slightly.. the brain is pretty good at compensating, but the shape of the lens influences stuff at the edges so it kind of distorts as i move my head around. noticing that made me want to get back into contacts again.


ah i'm not in this for improving my physical vision (as in physically altering the shape of my retina, i.e. improving my prescription), but thanks for the links. i'll check out Huxley's book as he seems to frame it in a way that i'm looking for.

Yes that's what I'm getting at. But if you do check out Huxley's book, you'll have a much fuller understanding of what is meant by eye mobility. This understanding has for me been very helpful. Basically the eyes can be very sticky, meaning they tend to grab on to things in the visual field. When they do there is typically unconscious staring involved, along with unconscious thoughts and mental processes, all of which obscure reality.

There's another basic exercise called swinging, sounds like another version of what you described. In this one you simply stand and swing your upper torso from side to side a full 180 degrees, feet shoulder width apart, let your arms move freely, eyes open, just letting the visual field pass by. You might see how sticky the eyes are here. Try it with one eye covered and then it's more apparent. I am finding that as I become more aware of seeing, there is less mental noise, perception is more direct. The experience of body, emotions, feelings, thoughts has changed with this perception. I don't feel immersed in these things like before. They just arise out of nothing, its very strange, and they seem so flimsy and tenuous, and certainly short lived, plus they are obvious to witness. I'm not sure where this is heading, but it seems to be towards a dzogchen like mode of perception. Or maybe AF, I can't tell.

as a kid i did always wonder how, in a car, if you stare at a pole and follow it, your eye moves perfectly smoothly. yet if you want to scan the inside of the car from left to right, either you do it so fast you can't see anything (just move the eyes back and forth really quickly), or if you do it slowly, its like impossible to do a smooth scan, moving the eyes at a constant rate - it's more like they pick out things slightly spaced apart to look at. so you are getting better at scanning smoothly?


i was wondering what triggers thoughts, sometimes. it usually seems to be me reflecting on things that aren't here. but i wonder if i'm just missing tons of visual triggers. i'll keep an eye out.

thanks again for sharing. i'll try the following:
* blink-consciousness. it's funny.. when i started meditating, breathing got weird cause when i would focus on it it would get messed up. by now i've gotten over it, but preliminary attempts at being conscious of blinking causes blinking to mess up in the same way. definitely something to improve, here.
* stare-consciousness. i think this is a great way to catch oneself wandering into thought, as when you do that you just fix on a point.
* getting contacts

also, try doing similar things with the other senses (like just being aware of sound happening, just being aware of touch happening). maybe every time you blink, check in with your hearing - personally i often notice that i'll have been walking along and had not really been paying attention to anything i was hearing. it might help to go into whichever direction the vision exercises are getting you into.