Read in this light Dr Bates' statements do
naturally convey the idea of a rigid, even
oppressive approach.
Philosophically, however, it can be seen that perfection
is not necessarily fixed at all, otherwise
the expression 'perfect freedom' would be meaning
less. Perfection, indeed, cannot exist apart from
the thing that is to be perfected, and perfection
only has meaning in terms of a thing's essential
nature.
We know that vision is above all else about
movement and change: Dr Bates constantly
emphasises this point throughout his work, and it
is amply supported by the entire literature of
research on the nervous system. Even the
technological ways of simulating the visual
process demonstrate this: if there is no movement
between the tape and heads of a video player
there is no picture:
the so called 'still' picture is nothing of the
kind, but is achieved by causing the machine to
run on the spot in a crude simulation of saccadic
eye movement.
Perfect vision, therefore needs to be
perfectly variable and mobile - in fact,
perfectly imperfect; that is to say,
imperfect to just the degree required by the
design parameters of the eye and associated
systems.
No aspect of this paradoxical business has caused
so much trouble as the idea of perfect
relaxation. I can remember one client
declaring at the outset of a first interview that
he could not possibly succeed with the Bates
Method since, "It says in the book that you
have to be perfectly relaxed and I'm not a
relaxed person". It was quite useless for me
to suggest that maybe being just a little more
relaxed than at present might be a start and
that the best way to begin would be to stop
worrying about whether one was relaxed or not and
take an interest in something outside. No, no:
that wasn't perfect enough.
Presented in this way this extreme attitude
appears quite humorous but it does raise a number
of serious points. Having said all of the above,
it remains true that vision usually becomes more
stable as it improves and that very good vision
is far more stable than poor vision which is in
the process of improvement.
