Yoga for the Eyes
There are about 14 million Americans who are visually impaired. Some start to see vision problems from a young age while others find that their vision has gotten worse as they get older. Yoga has been proven beneficial for the body in many ways, but one way you may not be aware of is helping improve eyesight naturally. Certain yoga eye exercises can help increase the function of the eyes and help decrease problems such as nearsightedness, farsightedness, and other eye disorders. Practicing these yoga techniques focuses on the defects in the eye muscles and can help prevent your eyes from getting worse. Follow the steps below to get started:
Palming:
- Sit with your eyes closed, completely relaxed.
- Rub your hands together until they are warm and place them over your eyelids.
- Your eye muscles will relax with the warmth and darkness.
- Repeat the process at least three times once the hands become cold again, keeping your eyes closed during the entirety of the exercise.
Blinking:
- Blink 10 times as quickly as you can.
- Close your eyes for 20 seconds and relax.
- Repeat again 5 times.
Sideways viewing:
- Sit with your legs out straight in front of you.
- Lift the arms with your fist closed and thumbs pointing up.
- Look at a point straight in front of you and level to your eyes.
- While keeping your head in this position, focus on these difference points: space between the eyebrows, left thumb, space between the eyebrows, right them, space between the eyebrows, left thumb.
- Repeat 15 times.
- Afterward, close your eyes to give them a rest.
Front and sideways viewing:
- Sit with your legs straight in front of you.
- Place the left closed fist on the left knee with your thumb pointing up.
- Look at a point straight in front of you and level with your eyes.
- Keep the head in this position while you breathe out, focus your eyes on the left thumb. Breathe in and focus your eyes at the point in front of you that you started with.
- Repeat the same for the right thumb.
- Close your eyes to rest.
Rotational viewing:
- Sit with legs straight in front of you.
- Place the left hand on the left knee.
- Hold the right fist above the right knee with the thumb pointing up, keep the elbow straight.
- While keeping the head still, focus eyes on the thumb.
- Make a circle with the thumb, keeping elbow straight.
- Repeat this five times in clockwise and anticlockwise.
- Repeat the exercise with the left thumb.
- Close eyes and rest.
Up and down viewing:
- Sit with legs straight in front of you.
- Point both thumbs up, placing both firsts on the knees.
- Raise the right thumb keeping the arms straight, follow your thumb up with your eyes.
- Lower down the thumb back to the original position, keeping head still and eyes on the thumb.
- Repeat 5 times with each the thumb while keeping the heat and back straight.
- Close the eyes to relax.
Preliminary nose tip gazing:
- Sit in a cross-legged position
- Raise the right arm directly in front of the nose.
- Make a fist with the right hand and keep your thumb pointing up.
- Focus eyes on the tip of the thumb.
- Bend the arms and bring thumb to the tip of the nose, while keeping eyes focused on thumb.
- Start to straighten the arm, keeping eyes at the tip of the thumb.
- Repeat five times.
Near and distant viewing:
- Place yourself in an area with a view of the horizon.
- Focus on the tip of the nose for 5-10 seconds.
- Repeat 15 times.
- Close and relax the eyes.
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