More Imagination Insights

Have you ever mused upon what our vision really is? What does it mean to see? We naturally believe our vision is "real", that is, identical to the world around us. Like if there was a computer screen inside our head where each object would be reflected in a few pixels. All seen equally well, at the same time.

However, we don’t really see any "pixels" or any undigested lights and shadows. In fact, we are unable to see anything at all until our mind recognizes or makes the best guess about what we are actually looking at, basing on what the mind has learned through its entire lifetime. If it’s an unfamiliar object, the mind will analyze the smaller parts of it to see if they are familiar. In this way the mind will learn the new object and recognize it in the future.

In other words, to see means to perceive interpreted, already meaningful information about real objects based on your mind’s past experience. We see a tree with leaves and apples, but not a colorful patchwork of lights and shadows. We know what an apple tree is.

We see an object with the visual center of our mind and by imagining the object. Imagination, that is, building images from the raw data, be it eyes or memory, is a wonderfully accurate word for the process.

Imagination as a mental activity is the driving force of the visual system, not another way around. Without imagination you’d be totally blind even if the eyes still provided raw electric signals – they just wouldn’t be used by the mind. When imagination is at work, it also directs mind's attention to interesting details and drives the muscles of the eyes to shift and focus them accordingly, all happening automatically and unconsciously.

It’s clear now that lowered eyesight occurs when you underuse or suppress imagination, usually by replacing it with an abusive fixation of attention on the eyes as physical organs, in vain attempts to command them "to see better". You can feel it as strain and it causes all sorts of trouble. The attention is no longer properly directed by the imagination process, and tends to see all (and nothing) at once. The eyes become misfocused and their shifting stops because the eye muscles no longer receive meaningful commands.

It’s hard to tell what is the cause and effect of this condition, we have a bit of "chicken and egg" problem here. Perhaps somewhere on the edge, where imagination fails due to actual lack of information, like too far or too dim, the mind may happen to insist on seeing the impossible and instead of imagining finer detail, somehow turns its attention to the eyes. The vision lowers, so the imagination works further worse, and thus the vicious cycle is born, which becomes permanent if the abuse is practiced long enough.

Fortunately, it’s not likely that the visual mind completely stops imagining. We are still able to recognize most objects, even though the image is blurry. The blur is in fact only a failure to imagine finer details and textures of objects. The mind imagines objects in large strokes, ignoring details and thereby not producing the finer attention and shifting and focusing commands to the muscles of the eyes.

Therefore, to cure imperfect sight, you should use all means to divert attention from the eyes and wholeheartedly relinquish the control to imagination. It is important to realize that vision is an involuntary process happening in the mind, not in the eyes. The eyes should be ruthlessly left alone, and then imagination of finer details instantly becomes possible again.

One technique that recently helps me leave my eyes alone is to imagine that the image I see doesn't come through the eyes but is already in my mind. Like if there was no bone dome over the brain an the image projected directly on the visual mind. It takes me several seconds to believe, and when I get it, it's usually an instant relief. Also, that funny calm feeling that the image is "already there" and should not be made out, is exactly the one that previously accompanied all my clear flashes.