With all the online work happening these days, you might find that your eyes are sore and tired. Taking care of your eyes is an important part of your daily self-care routine that is often overlooked. It can also be a rich part of your yoga practice. The good news is that eyesight improvement is within the reach of everyone. You can heal your eyes with some conscious effort, mindful pauses, and by taking short breaks throughout your day to implement some of these fast and easy exercises. And, as your eyes start to heal and improve, you might notice some interesting changes within your mind too!

Eye Exercises can be done at any time of the day. They are especially useful when you’ve been working or reading for long periods:

1. EYE MASSAGING - Keep your eyes closed and gently massage the area around your eyes until you feel pressure and it becomes a little sore.

   a) Use your thumbs to massage inside your eyebrow ridge and the inside corners with the other fingers pressing gently into the forehead

   b) Use your thumb and index finger to massage the bridge of your nose - press the fingers up and down as well as together.

   c) With your thumbs under your lower jaw, use your index fingers and middle fingers together to press on the lower ridge of the eye socket and against both sides of the nose near the nostrils.

   d) With your thumbs under your lower jaw, use your index fingers and middle fingers together to press into the sides of your forehead or temples.

2. PALMING -A technique developed in the 1920s by Dr. William Bates, palming can refresh both your body and mind as well as improve your vision. Warm your hands by rubbing them together and then cover your cupped hands over your eyes. The center of each palm is to be directly over each eye and the heel of the hands rest on the cheekbones. Focus on your breathing and observe how the darkness and warmth soothes your eyes, as well as your body and mind.

3. LOOK OUT TO THE HORIZON - Take regular breaks to lift your eyes to look far out onto the horizon. If you can get outside and gaze out over a field, or ocean this can be a more powerful exercise. Let your vision adjust to looking out far for a while.

4. TRY TO TAKE YOUR GLASSES OFF & CONTACTS OUT - Give your eyes regular breaks to rest and relax. This is especially important during times when you don’t need to be focusing intently or reading. Take your glasses off and see what it feels like to use your regular vision. Focus on connecting more consciously with your peripheral vision. Get comfortable with fuzzy boundaries, both visually, emotionally, and mentally.

5. TRATAKA - This is one of the six yogic purification practices (shat-kriya-s). It was initially a Buddhist practice that was adopted by Tantra as a method of meditation. It involves staring at a single point such as the moon high in the night sky, or a small object against a solid background, a black dot on a white paper, or a candle flame in a dark room. Keep your eyes fixed on one point without blinking. Allow the eyes to naturally tear and a burning sensation will also occur. When you can no longer keep your eyes open without blinking and the eyes have started to tear, then gently close your eyes and stare at the after image of the flame, dot, or moon in your mind’s eye. After this after image dissolves, then lay down and take a rest.

6. REST FREQUENTLY - Take regular breaks to close your eyes and allow them to relax without any visual stimulation.

7. PENCIL PUSH-UPS - Pencil push up therapy is the eye exercise most commonly prescribed by ophthalmologists. It is an eye exercise in which a pencil is held directly in front, at arm’s length. Then move the pencil slowly towards the nose. (Do NOT put the pencil in your eye!) Follow the pencil with your eyes, try to keep it in clear focus. When the pencil starts to appear as a double image, then slowly move the pencil back to arm’s length again.

Two last exercises that I forgot to mention in this Wellness Wednesday video:

EYE CIRCLES - Throughout your day stop and move the eyes in all directions, as if you were following the time on a clock - look up, right, down, left and back up. Repeat this a couple times and then change directions. Make sure you go both ways!

BRAHMA MUDRA - This a yogic practice where you slowly and methodically move the head and eyes in all four directions. First from a neutral forward position, you move the head to align over the left shoulder and move the eyes as far to the left as you can, then slowly take the head to align over the right shoulder and the eyes move as far to the right as possible. After the right side come back to center and then take the head back, so the chin is moving away from the chest and the eyes look down to the nose tip. Then slowly move the head all the way back down so the chin touches the chest, and simultaneously, the eyes will look up between the eyebrows.

Remember that it takes time to create significant healing, but if you stick with these exercises and do them consistently, you will for sure witness your eyes feeling healthier and happier!

Now it’s your turn…

• Have you ever taken the time to reflect on the connection between your mind and your vision?

• Do you think that by constricting your visual experience through wearing glass or contact lenses that you might be narrowing the range of experience you are open to in other ways: emotionally, mentally or energetically?

• Have you ever thought about how we have become psychologically stuck in a particularly fixed view of the world, or how our obsession with detail might limit our creative spirit, inhibit self-expression and the ability to see from multiple perspectives?

Let me know in the comments below!

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this and if you found any of these exercises to be helpful!