Eyes, as W.H. Bates saw them?

After more than ten years since I first became acquainted with the work of Dr. Bates, I am finally returning to the issue of the eyes, which actually started my interest in how the mechanisms in the human body work. At the end of 2012, I put away my glasses, which I had worn almost constantly until then. Since childhood, I have had excellent vision in my right eye, but my left eye is amblyopic. I wore the glasses so that my left eye would not turn off completely, so that the strongly blurred image in the left eye would be at least as large as in the right eye. In fact, I had seen very well all my life, but a few years before that, my eyesight began to deteriorate.

I also had eye inflammation almost every year. During one of these, my diopters and astigmatism in both eyes suddenly changed. I was very surprised by this and even more surprised that the ophthalmologists didn't care at all, they would simply prescribe you different diopters and that would be the end of it. Then my diopters came back, but my vision, originally healthy in my right eye, gradually started to deteriorate. So I tried to find new ways and I found the work of Dr. Bates. My view of things is completely subjective, I don't impose it on anyone, read and criticize it according to your needs. Everyone has the right to his own opinion. That's all for the introduction.

Dr. WH Bates' idea that virtually anyone could see well up close and far without glasses at any age is so fantastic that everyone must at first consider it completely absurd. But it would be nice, wouldn't it? So why did he think that? What led him to do it?

Let's go back to the roots of his theory and practice, to the beginning of the last century, when in 1920 a book called "The Cure of Imperfect Sight by Treatment Without Glasses" was published. It was at a time that we still consider to be the time of healthy eating, but when dentist Weston A. Price had already observed changes in the shapes of the face and jaws caused by an inappropriate modern diet. While in isolated communities he did not observe any negative changes, he saw healthy teeth and wide skull shapes with enough space for all the teeth, in communities connected by trade to civilization he saw a problematic degradation in the shape of the face and in the quality of the teeth. Are these two phenomena related? The quality of the teeth and the quality of vision? Could changes in the shape of the skull also impair the quality of vision? Can poor vision be a manifestation of a poor diet?

But Dr. Bates didn't think about that. From his perspective, it was about the mechanics of how the eyes work, but he significantly expanded this view, adding the work of the brain to this system. His view was ultimately that the mechanics of the eyes always adapt to what the brain requires. And this correction process works constantly, to our benefit, or often to our detriment. So the quality of the brain's work is what determines the quality of vision. That's a very revolutionary view of things. I don't think that even today you will find many eye doctors who would have a similar view of vision deficiencies. Was he right?

Dr. Bates himself began to study human and animal eyes because he disagreed with the ideas about vision of the time, and indeed today. He conducted thousands of experiments in which he measured the accommodation (focusing) capabilities of the eye with a simple device called a retinoscope. He stimulated the muscles and nerves around the eye to determine the consequences and causes. Most of them would probably not even pass an ethics committee today. I will not bore you with a long description of the experiments, those interested can find it in the book, which is freely available on the Internet. It will suffice to state only the basic facts found:

• By measuring the curvature of the anterior and posterior surfaces of the lens of the eye, although Dr. Bates performed them very carefully, he failed to confirm the usual textbook claim that accommodation of the eye is accomplished by changing the curvature of the lens of the eye.
• On the contrary, he managed to prove that eye defects (myopia, hyperopia, astigmatism, etc.) can be induced and eliminated by stimulating and relaxing the muscles around the eye. These muscles have the ability to shape the eyeball.

His entire method of correcting his eyes is based on these findings. Dr. Bates discovered right from the start that his eyes could focus on the object being observed, but they still wouldn't do so and focused in front of or behind the object, so the image was out of focus. This actually sparked his interest in why this happened when there was nothing mechanically preventing him from seeing clearly.

Nowadays, we very often use our eyes in a way that creates stress, strain, tension in the brain. This causes tension in the eye muscles where it should not be. The eye does not have a skeleton and if we activate the eye muscles that work against each other with this stress, we change the shape of the eyeball. This subsequently leads to the development of eye defects and further stress on the brain. In other words, a typical vicious circle. If we manage to release this tension, to relax the eye muscles so that they do not work against each other at the same time, the vision defects will be eliminated, sometimes even in the case if you have been using glasses from a young age or perhaps when you get older and find that you will need reading glasses. 

I will include a few paragraphs of quotes from the book here so that you can get an idea of ​​Dr. Bates' groundbreaking ideas.

Vocabulary

• hypermetropia - farsightedness, blurred near vision 
• myopia - nearsightedness, blurred vision at a distance
• retinoscope - a handheld medical instrument used in ophthalmology and optometry to objectively measure the refractive error of the eye
• emmetropia - an ideal state of vision in which the eye, when at rest, has a perfectly balanced refraction of the optical apparatus (cornea, lens) and anteroposterior length.
• amblyopia - "lazy eye", one (or rarely both) eyes do not achieve full visual acuity because the brain does not process their images correctly
• presbyopia - presbyopia, a natural aging process of the eye, when the lens of the eye loses its elasticity. 
• the Snellen test chart, also known as the ⁠Snellen chart, is the most well-known tool for measuring visual acuity (visual acuity). It contains rows of letters or symbols that get smaller as you go down, and is used by an ophthalmologist or optician.

Quote

It is as natural for the eye to see as it is for the mind to acquire knowledge, and any effort in either case is not only useless, but defeats the end in view. You may force a few facts into a child's mind by various kinds of compulsion, but you cannot make it learn anything. The facts remain, if they remain at all, as dead lumber in the brain. They contribute nothing to the vital processes of thought; and because they were not acquired naturally and not assimilated, they destroy the natural impulse of the mind toward the acquisition of knowledge, and by the time the child leaves school or college, as the case may be, it not only knows nothing but is, in the majority of cases, no longer capable of learning.

It has been demonstrated in thousands of cases that all abnormal action of the external muscles of the ; eyeball is accompanied by a strain or effort to see, and that with the relief of this strain the action of the muscles becomes normal and all errors of refraction disappear. The eye may be blind, it may be suffering from atrophy of the optic nerve, from cataract, or disease of the retina; but so long as it does not try to see, the external muscles act normally and there is no error of refraction. This fact furnishes us with the means by which all these conditions, so long held to be incurable, may be cured.

It has also been demonstrated that for every error of refraction there is a different kind of strain. The study of images reflected from various parts of the eyeball confirmed what had previously been observed, namely, that myopia (or a lessening of hypermetropia) is always associated with a strain to see at the distance, while hypermetropia (or/ a lessening of myopia) is always associated with a strain to see at the nearpoint; and the fact can be verified in a: few minutes by anyone who knows how to- use a retinoscope, provided only that the instrument is not brought nearer to the subject than six feet.

In an eye with previously normal vision a strain to see near objects always results in the temporary production of hypermetropia in one or all meridians. That is, the eye either becomes entirely hypermetropic, or some form of astigmatism is produced of which hypermetropia forms a part. In the hypermetropic eye the hypermetropia is increased in one or all meridians.

When the myopic eye strains to see a near object the myopia is lessened and emmetropia may be produced, the eye being focussed for parallel rays while still trying to see at the near-point. In some cases the emmetropia may even pass over into hypermetropia in one or all meridians. All these changes are accompanied by evidences of increasing strain, in the form of eccentric fixation.

In the course of time I discovered that myopia and hypermetropia, like astigmatism, could be produced at will; that myopia was not, as we have so long believed, associated with the use of the eyes at the near-point, but with a strain to see distant objects, strain at the near-point being associated with hypermetropia; that no error of refraction was ever a constant condition; and that the lower degrees of refractive error were curable, while higher degrees could be improved.

In seeking for light upon these problems I examined tens of thousands of eyes, and the more facts I accumulated the more difficult it became to reconcile them with the accepted views. Finally, about half a dozen years ago, I undertook a series of observations upon the eyes of human beings and the lower animals the results of which convinced both myself and others that the lens is not a factor in accommodation, and that the adjustment necessary for vision at different distances is affected in the eye, precisely as it is in the camera, by a change in the length of the organ, this alteration being brought about by the action of the muscles on the out side of the globe. Equally convincing was the demonstration that errors of refraction, including presbyopia, are due, not to an organic change in the shape of the eyeball, or in the constitution of the lens, but to a functional and therefore curable derangement in the action of the extrinsic muscles.

Of twenty thousand school children examined in one year, more than half had normal eyes, with sight which was perfect at times; but not one of them had perfect sight in each eye at all times of the day. Their sight might be good in the morning and imperfect in the afternoon, or imperfect in the morning and perfect in the afternoon. Many children could read one Snellen test card: with perfect sight, while unable to see a different one perfectly. Many could also read some letters of the alphabet perfectly, while unable to distinguish other letters of the same size under similar conditions. The degree of this imperfect sight varied within wide limits, from one-third to one-tenth, or less. Its duration was also variable. Under some conditions it might continue for only a few minutes, or less; under others it might prevent the subject from seeing the blackboard for days, weeks, or even longer. Frequently all the pupils in a classroom were affected to this extent.

When the eye regards an unfamiliar object an error of refraction is always produced. Hence the proverbial fatigue caused by viewing pictures, or other objects, in a museum. Children with normal eyes who can read perfectly small letters a quarter of an inch high at ten feet always have trouble in reading strange writing on the blackboard, although the letters may be two inches high. A strange map, or any map, has the same effect. I have never seen a child, or a teacher, who could look at a map at the distance without becoming nearsighted. German type has been accused of being responsible for much of the poor sight once supposed to be peculiarly a German malady; but if a German child attempts to read Roman print, it will at once become temporarily hypermetropic. German print, or Greek or Chinese characters, will have the same effect on a child, or other person, accustomed to Roman letters. Cohn repudiated the idea that German lettering was trying to the eyes. On the contrary, he always found it "pleasant, after a long reading of the monotonous Roman print, to return 'to our beloved German."' Because the German characters were more familiar to him than any others he found them restful to his eyes. "Use," as he truly observed, "has much to do with the matter." Children learning to read, write, draw, or sew, always suffer from defective vision, because of the unfamiliarity of the lines or objects with which they are working.

A sudden exposure to strong light, or rapid or sudden changes of light, are likely to produce imperfect sight in the normal eye, continuing in some cases for weeks and months.

Noise is also a frequent cause of defective vision in the normal eye. All persons see imperfectly when they hear an unexpected loud noise. Familiar sounds do not lower the vision, but unfamiliar ones always do. Country children from quiet schools may suffer from defective vision for a long time after moving to a noisy city. In school they cannot do well with their work, because their sight is impaired. It is, of course, a gross injustice for teachers and others to scold, punish, or humiliate such children.

The phenomena associated with strain in the human eye have also been observed in the eyes of the lower animals. I have made many dogs myopic by inducing them to strain to see a distant object. One very nervous dog, with normal refraction, as demonstrated by the retinoscope, was allowed to smell a piece of meat. He became very much excited, pricked up his ears, arched his eyebrows and wagged his tail. The meat was then removed to a distance of twenty feet. The dog looked disappointed, but didn't lose interest. While he was watching the meat it was dropped into a box. A worried look came into his eyes. He strained to see what had become of it, and the retinoscope showed that he had become myopic. This experiment, it should be added, would succeed only with an animal possessing two active oblique muscles. Animals in which one of these muscles is absent or rudimentary are unable to elongate the eyeball under any circumstances.

Primarily the strain to see is a strain of the mind, and, as in all cases in which there is a strain of the mind, there is a loss of mental control. Anatomically the results of straining to see at a distance may be the same as those of regarding an object at the near point without strain; but in one case the eye does what the mind desires, and in the other it does not. 

These facts appear sufficiently to explain why visual acuity declines as civilization advances. Under the conditions of civilized life men's minds are under a continual strain. They have more things to worry them than uncivilized man had, and they are not obliged to keep cool and collected in order that they may see and do other things upon which existence depends. If he allowed himself to get nervous, primitive man was Promptly eliminated; but civilized man survives and transmits his mental characteristics to posterity. The lower animals when subjected to civilized conditions respond to them in precisely the same way as do human creatures. I have examined many domestic and menagerie animals, and have found them, in many cases, myopic, although they neither read, nor write, nor sew, nor set type.

A decline in visual acuity at the distance, however, is no more a peculiarity of civilization than is a similar decline at the near-point. Myopes, although they see better at the near-point than they do at the distance, never see as well as does the eye with normal sight; and in hypermetropia, which is more common than myopia, the sight is worse at the near-point than at the distance. 

The remedy is not to avoid either near work or distant vision, but to get rid of the mental strain which underlies the imperfect functioning of the eye at both points; and it has: been demonstrated in thousands of cases that this can always be done.

Fortunately, all persons are able to relax under certain conditions at will. In all uncomplicated errors of refraction the strain to see can be relieved, temporarily, by having the patient look at a blank wall without trying to see. -To secure permanent relaxation sometimes requires considerable time and much ingenuity. The same method cannot be used with everyone. The ways in which people strain to see are infinite, and the methods used to relieve the strain must be almost equally varied. Whatever the method that brings most relief, however, the end is always the same, namely relaxation. By constant repetition and frequent demonstration and by all means possible, the fact must be impressed upon the patient that perfect sight can be obtained only by relaxation. Nothing else matters

Most people, when told that rest, or relaxation, will cure their eye troubles, ask why sleep does not do so. The answer to this question was given in Chapter VII. The eyes are rarely, if ever, completely relaxed in sleep, and if they are under a strain when the subject is awake, that strain will certainly be continued during sleep, to a greater or less degree, just as a strain of other parts of the body is continued. The idea that it rests the eyes not to use them is also erroneous. The eyes were made to see with, and if when they are open they do not see, it is because they are under such a strain and have such a great error of refraction that they cannot see. Near vision, although accomplished by a muscular act, is no more a strain on them than is distant vision, although accomplished without the intervention of the muscles. The use of the muscles does not necessarily produce fatigue. Some men can run for hours without becoming tired. Many birds support themselves upon one foot during sleep, the toes tightly clasping the swaying bough and the muscles remaining unfatigued by the apparent strain. Fabre tells of an insect which hung back downward for ten months from the roof of its wire cage, and in that position performed all the functions of life, even to mating and laying its eggs. Those who fear the effect of civilization, with its numerous demands for near vision, upon the eye may take courage from the example of this marvelous little animal which, in a state of nature, hangs by its feet only at intervals, but in captivity can do it for ten months on end, the whole of its life's span, apparently without inconvenience or fatigue.

The fact is that when the mind is at rest nothing can tire the eyes, and when the mind is under a strain nothing can rest them. Anything that rests the mind will benefit the eyes. Almost everyone has observed that the eyes tire less quickly when reading an interesting book than when perusing something tiresome or difficult to comprehend. A schoolboy can sit up all night reading a novel without even thinking of his eyes, but if he tried to sit up all night studying his lessons he would soon find them getting very tired. A child whose vision was ordinarily so acute that she could see the moons of Jupiter with the naked eye became myopic when asked to do a sum in mental arithmetic, mathematics being a subject which was extremely distasteful to her. Sometimes the conditions which produce mental relaxation are very curious. One patient, for instance, was able to correct her error of refraction when she looked at the test card with her body bent over at an angle of about forty-five degrees, and the relaxation continued after she had assumed the upright position. Although the position was an unfavorable one, she had somehow got the idea that it improved her sight, and therefore it did so.

The time required to effect a permanent cure varies greatly with different individuals. In some cases five, ten, or fifteen minutes is sufficient, and I believe the time is coming when it will be possible to cure everyone quickly. It is only a question of accumulating more facts, and presenting these facts in such a way that the patient can grasp them quickly. At present, however, it is often necessary to continue the treatment for weeks and months, although the error of refraction may be no greater nor of longer duration than in those cases that are cured quickly. In most cases, too, the treatment must be continued for a few minutes every day to prevent relapse. Because a familiar object tends to relax the strain to see, the daily reading of the Snellen test card is usually sufficient for this purpose. It is also useful, particularly when the vision at the near-point is imperfect, to read fine print every day as close to the eyes as it can be done. When a cure is complete it is always permanent; but complete cures, which mean the attainment, not of what is ordinarily called normal sight, but of a measure of telescopic and microscopic vision, are very rare. Even in these cases, too, the treatment can be continued with benefit; for it is impossible to place limits to the visual powers of man, and no matter how good the sight, it is always possible to improve it. Daily practice of the art of vision is also necessary to prevent those visual lapses to which every eye is liable, no matter how good its sight may ordinarily be. It is true that no system of training will provide an absolute safeguard against such lapses in all circumstances; but the daily reading of small distant, familiar letters will do much to lessen the tendency to strain when disturbing circumstances arise, and all persons upon whose eyesight the safety of others depends should be required to do this. 

Generally persons who have never worn glasses are more easily cured than those who have, and glasses should be discarded at the beginning of the treatment. When this cannot be done without too great discomfort, or when the patient has to continue his work during the treatment and cannot do so without glasses, their use must be permitted for a time; but this always delays the cure. Persons of all ages have been benefited by this treatment of errors of refraction by relaxation; but children usually, though not invariably, respond much more quickly than adults. If they are under twelve years of age, or even under sixteen, and have never worn glasses, they are usually cured in a few days, weeks, or months, and always within a year, simply by reading the Snellen test card every day.

Temporary conditions may contribute to the strain to see which results in the production of errors of refraction; but its foundation lies in wrong habits of thought. In attempting to relieve it the physician has continually to struggle against the idea that to do anything well requires effort. This idea is drilled into us from our cradles. The whole educational system is based upon it; and in spite of the wonderful results attained by Montessori through the total elimination of every species of compulsion in the educational process, educators who call themselves modern still cling to the club, under various disguises, as a necessary auxiliary to the process of imparting knowledge.

In the same way you may temporarily improve the sight by effort, but you cannot improve it to normal, and if the effort is allowed to become continuous, the sight will steadily deteriorate and may eventually be destroyed. Very seldom is the impairment or destruction of vision due to any fault in the construction of the eye. Of two equally good pairs of eyes one will retain perfect sight to the end of life, and the other will lose it in the kindergarten, simply because one looks at things without effort and the other does not. The eye with normal sight never tries to see. If for any reason, such as the dimness of the light, or the distance of the object, it cannot see a particular point, it shifts to another. It never tries to bring out the point by staring at it, as the eye with imperfect sight is constantly doing.

Whenever the eye tries to see, it at once ceases to have normal vision. A person may look at the stars with normal vision; but if he tries to count the stars in any particular constellation, he will probably become myopic, because the attempt to do these things usually results in an effort to see. A patient was able to look at the letter K on the Snellen test card with normal vision, but when asked to count its twenty seven corners he lost it completely. It obviously requires a strain to fail to see at the distance, because the eye at rest is adjusted for distant vision. If one does anything when one wants to see at the distance, one must do the wrong thing. The shape of the eyeball cannot be altered during distant vision without strain. It is equally a strain to fail to see at the near-point, because when the muscles respond to the mind's desire they do it without strain. Only by an effort can one prevent the eye from elongating at the near-point.

The eye possesses perfect vision only when it is absolutely at rest. Any movement, either in the organ or the object of vision, produces an error of refraction. With the retinoscope it can be demonstrated that even the necessary movements of the eyeball produce a slight error of refraction, and the moving pictures have given us a practical demonstration of the fact that it is impossible to see a moving object perfectly. When the movement of the object of vision is sufficiently slow, the resulting impairment of vision is so slight as to be inappreciable, just as the errors of refraction produced by slight movements of the eyeball are inappreciable; but when objects move very rapidly they can be seen only as a blur. For this reason it has been found necessary to arrange the machinery for exhibiting moving pictures in such a way that each picture is halted for a twenty-fourth of a second, and screened while it is moving into place. Moving pictures, accordingly, are never seen in motion. The act of seeing is passive. Things are seen, just as they are felt, or heard, or tasted, without effort or volition on the part of the subject. When sight is perfect the letters on the test card are waiting, perfectly black and perfectly distinct, to be recognized. They do not have to be sought; they are there. In imperfect sight they are sought and chased. The eye goes after them. An effort is made to see them.

The muscles of the body are supposed never to be at rest. The blood-vessels, with their muscular coats, are never at rest. Even in sleep thought does not cease. But the normal condition of the nerves of sense—of hearing, sight, taste, smell and touch—is one of rest. They can be acted upon; they cannot act. The optic nerve, the retina and the visual centers of the brain are as passive as the finger-nail. They have nothing whatever in their structure that makes it possible for them to do anything, and when they are the subject of effort from outside sources their efficiency is always impaired.

The mind is the source of all such efforts from outside sources brought to bear upon the eye. Every thought of effort in the mind, of whatever sort, transmits a motor impulse to the eye; and every such impulse causes a deviation from the normal in the shape of the eyeball and lessens the sensitiveness of the center of sight. If one wants to have perfect sight, therefore, one must have no thought of effort in the mind. Mental strain of any kind always produces a conscious or unconscious eyestrain and if the strain takes the form of an effort to see, an error of refraction is always produced. A schoolboy was able to read the bottom line of the Snellen test card at ten feet, but when the teacher told him to mind what he was about he could not see the big C. Many children can see perfectly so long as their mothers are around; but if the mother goes out of the room, they may at once become myopic, because of the strain produced by fear. Unfamiliar objects produce eyestrain and a consequent error of refraction, because they first produce mental strain. A person may have good vision when he is telling the truth; but if he states what is not true, even with no intent to deceive, or if he imagines what is not true, an error of refraction will be produced, because it is impossible to state or imagine what is not true without an effort.

I may claim to have discovered that telling lies is bad for the eyes, and whatever bearing this circumstance may have upon the universality of defects of vision, the fact can easily be demonstrated. If a patient can read all the small letters on the bottom line of the test card, and either deliberately or carelessly miscalls any of them, the retinoscope will indicate an error of refraction. In numerous cases patients have been asked to state their ages incorrectly, or to try to imagine that they were a year older or a year younger than they actually were, and in every case when they did this the retinoscope indicated an error of refraction. A patient twenty-five years old had no error of refraction when he looked at a blank wall without trying to see; but if he said he was twenty-six, or if someone else said he was twenty-six, or if he tried to imagine that he was twenty-six, he became myopic. The same thing happened when he stated or tried to imagine that he was twenty-four. When he stated or remembered the truth his vision was normal, but when he stated or imagined an error he had an error of refraction.

Mental strain may produce many different kinds of eyestrain. According to the statement of most authorities there is only one kind of eyestrain, an indefinite thing resulting from so-called overuse of the eyes, or an effort to overcome a wrong shape of the eyeball. It can be demonstrated, however, that there is not only a different strain for each different error of refraction, but a different strain for most abnormal conditions of the eye. The strain that produces an error of refraction is not the same as the strain that produces a squint, or a cataract, or glaucoma, or amblyopia, or inflammation of the conjunctiva or of the margin of the lids, or disease of the optic nerve or retina. All these conditions may exist with only a slight error of refraction, and while the relief of one strain usually means the relief of any others that may coexist with it, it sometimes happens that the strain associated with such conditions as cataract and glaucoma is relieved without the complete relief of the strain that causes the error of refraction. Even the pain that so often accompanies errors of refraction is never caused by the same strain that causes these errors. Some myopes cannot read without pain or discomfort, but most of them suffer no inconvenience. When the hypermetrope regards an object at the distance the hypermetropia is lessened, but pain and discomfort may be increased. While there are many strains, however, there is only one cure for all of them. namely, relaxation.

A truth is strengthened by an accumulation of facts. A working hypothesis is proved not to be a truth if a single fact is not in harmony with it. The accepted theories of accommodation and of the cause of errors of refraction require that a multitude of facts shall be explained away. During more than thirty years of clinical experience, I have not observed a single fact that was not in harmony with the belief that the lens and the ciliary muscle have nothing to do with accommodation and that the changes in the shape of the eyeball upon which errors of refraction depend are not permanent. My clinical observations have of themselves been sufficient to demonstrate this fact. They have also been sufficient to show how errors of refraction can be produced at will, and how they may be cured, temporarily in a few minutes, and permanently by continued treatment.

End of quotes 

What to add to that. Many people are now promoting various exercises to improve eyesight. If you have carefully read the quotes from Dr. Bates' book, it is already clear to you that these are not exercises to strengthen the activity of the eye muscles. It is exactly the opposite. If you do any exercises, they must serve to relax the muscles, calm the nerve signals and, most importantly, to relax the brain activity. Today's time is too stimulating and not enough relaxing, which is why we see so many people around us with glasses.

I could also briefly mention that of course there are also objective causes of eyeball deformation, e.g. the above-mentioned inflammation, a swollen spot that does not disappear even after the inflammation is cured. Activation of autophagy, i.e. activation of AMPK, suppression of mTOR as described in previous posts, can help here. For me personally, a combination of various therapies has proven effective for removing excess tissue, glycine, green laser light, ozonated olive oil, Strepfen, etc.

I can also add here the eye muscle relaxation methods that help me the most:

• Eye wandering – to relax the eye muscles, you should not stare at one place for a long time. Try to  look in such a way that you do not spend more than half a second with the same gaze. For example, you can wander around  the entire picture instead of focusing on one point, you can alternate between two glances at a rhythm of about  half a second one look, half a second the other look or even faster. If there are people in the picture, look alternately at one and the other eye on  the face. You can apply this, for example, when watching TV. To improve relaxation, you can  also add any nodding movements of the head or the whole body. 
• Use your imagination – when looking at a letter that you can’t see clearly, don’t try to read it, but  imagine the letter clearly in your mind with maximum contrast. I even find  “looking through the eyelids” to be a very effective method, where you try to remember what you’re looking at, but with  your eyelids closed. When you lose the image, open your eyes for a moment and close them again and  continue like this. You can practice this practically anywhere and at any time. 

Previous

Next

References:

The cure of imperfect sight by treatment without glasses : Bates, W. H. (William ...