Vision therapy can be very intimidating for people who has just begun. Where to even begin right? In this article, I want to introduce you to the basic concepts of natural vision therapy and end with one basic eye exercise for you to try out. With that said, let’s get started.

Unlike traditional vision theory, natural vision improvement involves relieving stress out of your eyes. Stress on your eyes originates from bad vision habits that you may have unconsciously learned. Some of the bad vision habits include staring, refusal to blink or prolonged period of usage despite the need to rest.

These bad habits places strain on your eyes. Meaning, your eye muscles have to exert itself, much like your biceps have to strain itself when you’re carrying weights. When the strain is continuously placed on those muscles, the muscles soon become chronically strained. That means it went out of your control. No longer can you relax it when you want to.

Unlike traditional approaches, the objective of natural vision therapy is to relax those eye muscles by correcting your vision habits. Once you’re back to seeing the way your eyes is meant to be used, those eye muscles will naturally go back.

But you and I know both know that habits are difficult to kick… especially those we are not even aware of. This is where eye exercises come in.

The term “eye exercises” should not be interpreted literally. The meaning is more like “breathing exercises” – they don’t strengthen your lungs, they merely teaches you how to breathe properly. When you perform eye exercises religiously, over a period of time, you’ll once again learn how to see correctly. These eye exercises, of course, are specifically designed to simulate how healthy eyes see.

That is the gist of vision therapy. Here, try this eye exercise:

Close your eyes and place your palms on them so that you block all light. Be careful not to press on your eyes though. When you’re “palming”, breathe abdominally and think of the most relaxing scenery you can imagine.

What you imagine – you literally see. To your brain, there’s no difference. Brain scans showed the same neurons are activated when you imagine and when you see. Thus when you imagine a relaxing scene, you’re actually relaxing yourself – including your eyes.

This vision therapy is great not just to improve your eyesight, it’s also great when you’re under a lot of stress and you just want to “chill out”. Instead of watching TV, try this instead. Palm at least for 10 minutes, 3 times a day. Once right after you wake up, once during your break from work and another one before you go to bed.

To be frank, vision exercises are nothing new. It was invented decades ago and the man who invented them – Dr. Bates – passed away a long time ago.

Yet most of us have heard of such things. We have been told that  glasses are the only way to go if you have trouble seeing or if you’re desperate enough – fork out a couple thousands of dollars and get a LASIK surgery.

Have you ever wondered why vision exercises are so… suppressed? Here’s my answer: Greed.

You see, I don’t car if “science” couldn’t explain why it works. Fact is, thousands have used it successfully. That’s all I needed to know. But the fact that science could not prove it was used as an excuse to keep you from it.

The way I see it is if you were to be dependent on glasses, the more money that could be made from you. Think about it. How many pair of glasses are you going to buy in your lifetime? How many jobs would that generate and how much money would be going into the industry?

Think about it.

But if vision exercises were to be publicised, imagine how much would all these large corporations lose? How many optometrist would have to change occupation?

So if you’re looking for an alternative to glasses, and you’re feeling a little skeptical, know that I was right where you are just two years ago. But I took into account all these factors and I “just do it”. Guess what? I now no longer need glasses for my daily life.

Rebuilding your vision needn’t be such hard work. In fact, it’s as easy as letting go of control of you eyes. Let me explain.

Have you ever wondered why you can control your eyes, what to see, how to see (squint, stare etc etc) and even force it to open when it wants to close but you don’t any control over any of your other senses?

You can’t control the sense of touch. You just FEEL whatever you touch… just as you smell any fragrances that reaches your nose. And you hear any noise that your ears and you taste whatever you place in your mouth. There is no such anything as trying to feel, smell, hear or taste. Even you do try, you can’t.

But vision. Vision… or sight is a very special sense. As humans, we are mainly a visual creature. Bats, for example, are auditory creatures. If you remove their ears, they’d die in the wild even though they are not blind. If you remove somebody’s eyes… they couldn’t as well as if you remove their sense of smell. Am I right? Sight is crucial to survival.

More so than any other senses. That’s why evolution (or God) has made us, humans, be able to control sight. But with control, also comes a curse. Because you see, too much effort on your part to control what you see, you place strain on your eye.

Of course, this sort of strain is a reasonable price to pay if it means you can survive a predator’s attack… but if you place them on your eyes day in and day out like most people do today by straing into the monitor, your eyes inevitably deteriorates. To rebuild your vision, therefore, is to let your natural body function to once again regain control of your eyesight.

It manages all your other senses well, so why not sight? But it’s easier said than done, isn’t it? Because after years of placing strain on your eyes, that strain has become chronic. It’s like a backache – your muscles have involuntarily clenched itself. It has become a habit and your body has adapted to your “needs”. But it’s not all doom and gloom.

If you would like to find out how to let your body regain control of your eyes and rebuild your vision, click here.

Since this is my first post here, I would like to start with what can be argued as the most important eye exercise. If there’s any eye exercise that you would not only help you improve your eyesight but would also relax your whole body, it’s palming.

Palming is one of those activities that looked deceptively simple. Most of the people who I tell this to looked at me like I’m out of my mind. It couldn’t be this easy, they always say.

Trust me. Just try it when your eyes are really tired from hours of staring into the monitor.

To palm, simply place your right palm on your right eye and your left palm on your left eye, in such a way that your right fingers are laying on top of your left fingers. Close your eyes when you palm and there should be not light whatsoever that passes through your palm.

Dr.Bates, the one who invented this, once told a story of an old man who improved his eyesight in 24 hours just by doing this continuously in that time. Now, it’s one of those extreme cases and you probably wouldn’t see the same result but it’ll definitely benefit your eyes if you do it religiously.

Here are the best times to palm:

1. Right after you get out of your bed.

2. Every 3 -4  hours of intense eye activity – such as straing into the monitor, reading and watching tv.

3. Just before you go to bed.

There’s no need to palm for a few hours straight. I normally plam for 10 -20 minutes, depending on how tired my eyes were. So there, simply right? Go ahead and try it. It’s so beneficial, in fact, that if you’ve just started wearing glasses, you could probably see improvement in a matter of days if you do this religiously in that time.