EXPERIMENT
When I look at this picture taken some years ago at my Inner Dance Training in Thailand, it still touches me. It touches me, because what you cannot see when you look at it is that at that very moment I wasn’t able to see clearly.
Let me explain:
I was lately encouraged to share an experiment that I did a while ago that might be inspiring for people with severe myopia or other reduced eyesight issues.
I’m sharing my personal experience here, and it’s obviously not meant as advice. And it will be a long text.
When I was a small child, my nervous system shut down all my senses as a coping mechanism. One of the results was that my eyes couldn’t see clearly anymore.
Western medicine’s solution is to give medicine; in that case, I got glasses/contact lenses that didn’t cure the root of the issue, but helped with the symptoms.
What happens when your eyes get used to the medicine and the root of the issue is not resolved? The eyesight decreases.
In my understanding, myopia is/becomes in that case a chronic disease, and the daily medication ´against´ the disease is wearing glasses/contact lenses. So over the years my eyes got used to the contact lenses, and the myopia increased more and more.
Whoever has between -5 and -10 dioptrics can probably relate to the fact that it seems impossible to go through life without any eyesight aid. You see everything blurred to such a degree that you cannot recognize signs on the street, you cannot recognize the people passing by, you basically only see colors without forms, it’s quite an intense experience.
When I was living in Thailand, I was very much in balance in general, living in nature directly at the beach, very supportive environment and at some point it felt so unnatural for me to wear contact lenses.
And it felt exciting to find out what happens if I just stop using them. So from one day to the next, I completely skipped wearing them.
In the beginning, it was quite intense, because I felt insecure walking around, especially when it became dark outside. Walking outside without any eyesight support was absolutely new for me: I’ve never done this since early childhood.
It triggered deepest fears.
Abandonment, loneliness, being cut off.
I needed (and had) the capacity to handle this. I felt through and allowed everything that came up.
Surprisingly quickly, I got comfortable with how my new life experience unfolded. It felt more like a playful experiment with no resistance to any possible outcome.
I recorded audios and created content for my online course, wrote articles, had appointments with coaching and bodywork clients.
After being some weeks into that experiment, I was part of an Inner Dance Training and I have to say, this was really next level for me.
You sit in a circle, everyone introduces her/himself and me sitting there not being able to see the people in this beautiful circle clearly. Not being able to read their facial expressions and to respond accordingly. Not being able to recognize group dynamics visually/not getting humorous situations and much more.
It is a very paradox experience because on one hand, it cuts you off from life (at least as you know it before) while simultaneously connecting you deeper to life.
The experience of interacting with people becomes a completely different one.
It was super interesting to experience firsthand how my ability to hear increased, my ability to smell and, this was the strongest for me, to feel and sense into people or things and the energetics around them.
When I returned to Europe and hosted a bigger retreat myself, I stopped with not wearing any eye support, but I found out that my vision improved significantly (several dioptrics) through this experiment.
What I have done since then up until now is that I just wear contact lenses that are a lot weaker than the suggested number of dioptrics. And this works great for me.
So yes, I’m super grateful to be able to see, and I don’t take it for granted.
And: If you ever experience me not responding when you make eye contact or wave at me, be aware that maybe I just can’t see you physically.
