Eye Exercises - Boost The Power of Your Optic Muscles

The eyes contain many small muscles, and there is no doubt that eye exercises can do little harm to your eyes, but can they actually be of benefit?

A New York ophthalmologist called Dr William Bates, developed a series of eye exercises to improve eyesight without resorting to lenses or surgery. Dr Bates felt that many eye problems had their root causes in stress, tension and laziness of the eye and he thought that because of these causes, the eyes could be treated without correction such as lenses, spectacles or even surgery. Dr Bates' methods were first devised at the beginning of the 20th century, but many people still practice them today.

Dr Bates' theory revolved around the notion that the muscles of the eye became fixed on a scene causing strain to the eyes. Dr Bates felt that the eyes could be re-trained to relax and improve the link between the optic nerves and the brain.

Dr Bates' theories have been largely ignored by the world of medicine. However, many people around the world have claimed remarkable improvements in short sight, long sight, astigmatism, squints and lazy eyes using these methods. Even young children are able to practice the exercises and people with normal vision may improve concentration, reading skills and co-ordination by following the routines suggested by Dr Bates.

In essence, you can expect to perform some simple exercises for about half an hour a day. These can involve some of the following:-

• 'Palming.'
To rest and relax your eyes, sit comfortably in front of a table, resting your elbows on a stack of cushions high enough to bring your palms easily to your eyes without stooping forward or looking up. Close your eyes and cover them with your cupped palms to exclude light, avoiding pressure on the sockets. Breathe slowly and evenly, relaxing and imagining deep blackness. Begin by doing this for 10 minutes, two or three times a day.

• 'Swinging.'
Relax and keep the eyes mobile. Stand up and focus on a distant point, swaying gently from side to side. Repeat 100 times daily, blinking as you sway. Blinking cleans and lubricates the eyes, which is especially important if you spend a lot of time in front of a computer.

• You may be asked to have a 'colour day.' Choose a colour and look out for it throughout the day. When you see it, be aware of the colour rather than the form. For example, if it's a red truck, experience the shade of red, not the truck.

Why not try some of these exercises yourself?

See Clearly Method
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The See Clearly Method is another popular series of exercises and training to help with vision correction. Similarly to the Bates' method, you are required to do 30 minutes of eye exercises a day to strengthen and enhance the flexibility of the eye's muscles. This would usually involve making the eye change it's focus from near to far for example. One simple way of doing this would be to hold a small object in your hand and slowly move it away from your face, ensuring that your eye follows the object and retains focus upon it.

One exercise which is know as "tromboning" has you hold a small object again, starting at arm's length. Then you need to breath in and move the object slowly closer to your face, until it touches your nose. You are then required to breath out, looking at the object as you again move it away from your face. Hence the notion of "Tromboning".

The See Clearly Method also employs a number of techniques which are aimed at accelerating progress or improvement. For example, there is a technique referred to as the "blur reading" technique, which asks you to turn a magazine upside-down at a distance where the words are not distinct. Then, you are supposed to choose one word and focus your attention around it, to see if you can identify any of the letters.

As with the Bates' Method, the eye exercises suggested in the See Clearly Method are certainly worthy of a go to see if they help you at all.

Your Eyes Needs Exercise Too!

The study, published in the Journal of Aging and Physical Activity, found that exercise, particularly strength training, affected mood in individuals over 62. According to Arent, one reason for that is what strength training does for seniors' self-esteem. "Strength training prevents loss of muscle mass and bone density, conditions that can interfere with the independence and quality of life of an older person," he says. "Mundane tasks that were once difficult, such as grocery shopping, are no longer an issue." And when an older person can resume abandoned physical activities, like playing with grand-kids or gardening, it's amazing how quickly his or her depression lifts.

Eye Exercise
Rub your hands together to make them warm. (You can shake them or hold them in front of a heat vent if you prefer) Then close your eyes. Cover your eyes with your warm hands. Make sure your hands do not touch your eyelids and that you do not rest your cheekbones on your hands. If you want to place the weight of your head on your hands, put the weight on the forehead. Then look at the dark. If you see spots or zaps of light, wait till you see the dark. Don't hurry. Do this at least twice a day for 5 to 15 minutes.

Exercise also helps lower your blood pressure. Your lungs will also benefit from exercise as they become better conditioned so that activities such as climbing stairs will not make you out of breath. Muscles that are not used become small and inelastic, but aerobic exercise will help tone your body by increasing muscle size, strength and flexibility while burning calories. Exercise can also help alleviate stress and make you more productive, so choose something that you enjoy and stick with it.

Arm Exercise
1. bend your arms so that there is a 90 degrees angle at the elbow
2. swing the arms forward and backward so the elbow is high at the back
3. try not to swing the arms to high or across the body in the front (hands should not be above shoulder height nor should they cross the midpoint of your body
4. keep the angle at the elbows at 90 degrees throughout the swings

It seems that almost everyone from time to time will use family life as an excuse for not having any time to exercise, missing out on even a single exercise benefit.

Can I Wear Contact Lenses If I Need Bifocals?

As we age, the lens in our eye starts to lose its elasticity, and the muscles that control the lens shape get weaker, resulting in a form of farsightedness called presbyopia. There are several other factors besides age that can accelerate the onset of presbyopia, including eye injury, diseases such as diabetes or multiple sclerosis, drug use, gender (women tend to get it at a younger age than men), and occupation (if your job requires a lot of close up work, presbyopia may occur sooner). While you may be able to control some of the risk factors, there is no known way to prevent presbyopia and it is considered part of the natural aging process. If you find yourself having to hold books and other reading material farther away from you to read it, you may be developing presbyopia and need bifocal vision correction. Contact lenses are now available for people who need bifocals and after a discussion with your eye care professional, you can decide if contact lenses are the right choice for you.

Bifocal contact lenses are available across the whole range of contact lens materials, from rigid gas permeable (RGP) lenses, to traditional soft contact lenses, to the new silicon hydrogel soft contact lenses, which allow much more oxygen to reach the eye. They are also available across the spectrum of wear schedules, from the RGPs which can last several years, to daily disposables.

The location of the distance and near correction in bifocal contact lenses varies with style. Some, called aspheric, have near and distance correction dispersed around the contact lens, and the eye will learn to use the part it needs at the correct time without you being aware of it. In others, called concentric, one type of correction is found in the middle of the contact lens, while the other kind of correction encircles it around the outside of the lens. Translating lenses work much like bifocal glasses, with one type of correction on the top, and the other on the bottom. Another option for people with presbyopia is to have the different corrections in different eyes, called monovision. In other words, in one eye you would wear a prescription to correct nearsightedness, and in the other, you would wear on to correct farsightedness. You will probably not even notice the difference, and because the lenses are less specialized, it may be more economical to purchase contact lenses this way if it is a style that works for you.