You probably know that seeing takes place in the visual cortex of your brain.
It used to be thought that the brain receives signals from the eyes as a complete picture, rather like a camera.
But neuroscience has shown that 80% of the signals going into your visual cortex actually come from other parts of the brain, not directly from your eyes.
There are some complex processes going on here. Memory and imagination, as Dr Bates discovered over a century ago, play a huge part in good vision.
On top of this, stress and strain have a noticeable effect on how well you can see, because a brain under strain just doesn't work properly.
DR BATES CALLED HIS METHOD 'NATURE'S WAY'
It's all about re-training your brain to use your eyes in the way nature intended them to be used. This is the way babies naturally learn to see - with curiosity and passive observation.
Babies have no prior expectations about things like sharpness of focus or interpreting what they see.
The techniques of Bates method are designed firstly to take away the strain that accompanies poor vision, and then to mimic the processes that go on quite naturally for someone who has good eyesight. They are a way of reminding your brain what it's supposed to be doing."
EXERCISES, BUT NOT AS YOU KNOW THEM
When you hear the word 'exercise', you normally think about something visible that you do with your body. The kind of exercises you do in Bates method are invisible: they are mental exercises.
For example, you might think a good eye exercise would be to look from left to right x number of times, to exercise the muscles.This would be fine if it was the muscles that needed exercise - but do they? You move your eyes every time you look at something. They are always moving.
A good brain exercise would be to close your eyes and pretend you can scroll everything sideways without even moving your eyes.
The point is to break the chains of habit that force your eyes to do the wrong thing, and then to start a new habit centred in your imagination.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Do I have to stop wearing glasses?
Dr Bates variously told people they should discard their glasses entirely, and that wearing glasses would slow down their progress. I suggest that safety and comfort are paramount here.
Yes, if you wear glasses, you won't improve your eyesight - but on the other hand, if you don't wear glasses, you can be breaking the law and putting yourself at risk in certain situations.
I have observed that a blanket ban on glasses can also lead to an increase in strain and imbalance, if it means you have to cope without clear sight in situations where you absolutely need clear sight.
So my advice is to go without your glasses while your are practising Bates techniques and while it is safe and comfortable to do so.
But wear glasses for driving, operating machinery, and at any time when you feel you can't cope without them.
How long will it take?
A quick fix is always a possibility - there are many examples described in Dr Bates' magazines - but what is required is no less than a complete change of outlook and habit. For most of us, this is quite a challenge. It can bring up emotional issues, depending on the reasons why you got into glasses in the first place. You need to be prepared to allow emotions to come out.
You can look at it as a two-stage process. The first stage is to practise the method until you begin to get results. I'm talking about any increase in visual clarity, even if it only lasts for a few seconds. You can get to this stage in days or weeks, once you understand what you're doing.
The next stage is simply to keep practising the techniques that bring the results, but all the time focusing on the process rather than the goal. As soon as you lapse into trying to achieve a result, you lose your hold on the process.
What about a reduced prescription?
It is true that some people have managed to work their way down in stages from strong prescriptions to weaker ones. Personally I can see all sorts of problems with it.
How are you going to decide by how much to reduce your prescription? Will it be so that everything is still a blur, but just a bit less of a blur? How do you calculate it? What if one eye is a lot worse than the other? What do you plan to use the prescription for - everyday use, or just to help you practise Bates? Is it really necessary? Is there any chance that it will increase your strain factor? You aren't going to use it for driving, I hope?
If your current glasses are overprescribed, then you may be able to persuade your optician to reduce a smidgin. Otherwise you are going to have to prescribe for yourself and get them over the internet. The advantage of this is cheapness. The disadvange is that it's hit-and-miss.
I have short sight / long sight / astigmatism / squint / lazy eye / a combination of these - can Bates method help?
Yes. Learning to use your eyes properly can only do good. Dr Bates found that it was improper use of the eyes that caused these problems in the first place. If you have eye diseases such as cataract, glaucoma or macular degeneration, you should of course seek proper medical advice. But you can also relieve the strain which might aggravate these conditions, by practising Bates techniques.
What do you think of pinhole glasses?
I think the claims made for them by some of the people who sell them do not stand up to questioning. They do not exercise your eyes, and even if they did, as was pointed out above, eye exercise is not what is needed.
What pinholes do is to remove the need for the eye to focus. You get clear focus without having to do anything for it. This can be very relaxing and helpful if you need to see clearly and don't want to put glasses on, but it also severely reduces your visual field and it only works in a constant strong light.
If you practise the Long Swing using pinholes, it will give you a good sense of the movement you are supposed to experience with this practice.
Pinholes do one other thing - they make you more aware of where you are looking. This can help with an important function of good vision, known as central fixation.
So I think pinholes have their uses, but are no substitute for Bates method.
Who was Dr Bates, and why isn't he more widely appreciated?
William Horatio Bates (1860-1931) was a well qualified and highly experienced eye doctor in New York at the end of the nineteenth century.
His research papers were published many times in the New York Medical Journal, and he taught medical students at the Post Graduate Hospital and Medical School for five years, from 1886 to 1891.
He observed that the facts (about the way eyes behave) did not fit the theories of eyesight then current. The new theories he put forward annoyed the medical Establishment, because they turned the accepted theories upside down.
As far as I know, no one in the medical establishment has seriously set out to test these theories, as opposed to dismissing them out of hand.
The reason may be partly that it’s a lot easier to prescribe corrective lenses than it is to teach people how to change their habits. It may also be partly due to the hostility which Dr Bates’ behaviour seems to have engendered.
He describes towards the end of his book, how the Head of the School became annoyed that he persisted in curing the students of myopia. The Head asserted that everybody knew that myopia could not be cured. When Dr Bates offered to prove it by curing a few more students, the Head flew into a rage and fired him from his post.
However, Dr Bates carried on teaching people to use their eyes differently. He ran a clinic at Harlem Hospital from 1907 to 1922.
He and his last wife Emily published vast quantities of material describing the work they were doing and the successes they were achieving. "
Source and More on the Bates Method
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