Yoga of Perfect Sight

Prevention of Myopia in Schools

Defective eyesight is found in most school children, and all attempts have failed to prevent myopia.

You cannot see anything perfectly unless you have seen it before. When the eye looks at an unfamiliar object it always strains more or less to see that object and an error of refraction is always produced. When children look at unfamiliar writings or figures on the blackboard, distant maps, diagrams, or pictures they become myopic, though their vision may be under other circumstances absolutely normal. The same thing happens when adults look at unfamiliar distant objects. When the eye regards a familiar object, however, the effect is quite otherwise.

This fact furnishes us with a means of overcoming the mental strain to which children are subjected by the modern educational system. It is impossible to see anything perfectly when the mind is under a strain, and if children become able to relax by looking at familiar objects, they become able sometimes in an incredibly brief space of time, to maintain their relaxation looking at unfamiliar objects.

Practice on the Snellen test card:—Place the Snellen test card upon the wall of each classroom. Every day, children should read silently the smallest letters they can see from their seats, with both eyes together and then with each eye separately covering the other eye with the palm of the hand but avoiding any pressure upon the eyeball. Fix a period of five minutes for it at the beginning of school work. The practice of five minutes daily is sufficient to improve the sight of all children in one week and to cure defective eyesight after some time.