#224 Improve Vision Naturally: Expert Tips on Eye Health, Stress Reduction, and Holistic Vision Techniques with Claudia Muehlenweg

The information provided in this podcast is educational and not intended to diagnose or treat medical conditions.

Dr. Donnie Wilson struggled for decades to solve her numerous health issues and heal her body. But with focused determination, she healed herself. And in doing so, she discovered the Dr. Donnie stress recovery Protocol. On this show, you're going to hear from doctors, nutritionists, and Experts along with Dr. Donnie, who will give practical advice and wisdom to help heal your body. This is how humans heal.

Hi, and welcome to How Humans Heal Today. I'm excited to introduce you to this guest, who is Claudia Muhlenvik. She specializes in helping with vision. So she's actually the founder of the Naturally Clear Vision Institute. And I'm so excited you're here to help us with our eyesight today. Claudia, thank you.

Thank you for inviting me, Dani. I really appreciate it. And you did a great job. Great job pronouncing my last name. You really win a prize for that German pronunciation.

Oh, I'm so glad. I'm so glad. And, yeah, you're even getting to join me from Germany today. But I know you're not always in Germany. You're all around the world helping people everywhere with their vision. Tell us, how did you even come to figuring out how to help people with vision?

So, like many of us who do what we do, we had struggles or problems with that thing ourselves. So I got glasses when I was three years old, and I absolutely hated them. And when I got to school at age 6, I was bullied, I was teased. There was one boy in my class who wore glasses, and he was the professor who was like, the smart kid, right? I know the answer to everything. And I was not very smart. Like, not school, like, school smart. And so I got bullied and teased, and I was determined to get rid of these glasses. And in my teenage years, I was. So I looked at all the bookstores, and I found a book on vision improvement in a bookstore. And I was. I read that book and I practiced the things in there, and it actually helped me get out of glasses. And I was out of glasses my whole 20s, into my mid-30s. And then I was in a challenging marriage. I had two daughters. I had moved to America by then, and my vision tanked again. It got worse and worse. I was back in glasses. And a few years into that, I ended up in divorce. Long story short, single mom, sleep deprived. But at some point in my early 40s, I thought, like, I noticed how every time I put the glasses, like, took them off, that my vision was worse than it was before. So I thought like this, like something is wrong about this. So I actually, one night at this epiphany, I'm like, I need to do something about it. I know I'm over 40 and I know supposedly nothing you can do. And I still found, I found that book that night at 1am I was digging through, I found that book, started practicing the things and they helped me. But at that point I needed more help. So I hired a teacher and eventually I got rid of my glasses and event. I was so excited by doing this that I ended up studying this method and then teaching it since 2009.

Isn't that something? Because what I'm hearing in this, I want to break this down because what I'm hearing, first of all, is that stress is related to our vision. Like, you really put together that every time you had a lot of stress in your life that it affected your vision and you were very motivated to say, hey, just because someone says that we can't do anything about it, I'm not going to take that as factual. I'm going to like dig deeper and figure this out. And so you're going to be sharing a little bit more with us in this episode about how you do that and how you help people, which I think is amazing and so wonderful because I'm also someone who has struggled with vision through my life and I'm like, hey, if there's anything I can do to help my vision, right? We sometimes we take it for granted. Do you find that like, you know, like we just kind of like assume, oh, I need glasses or I need contacts, and we just kind of like deal with it and figure there's nothing we can do. Is that what most people say when they find you?

Yeah, I think that's definitely the case. And what I find interesting, most people that are attracted to working with me or find me are already into like holistic approaches, things that you teach. So that kind of not just following the regular doctor's advice that are already into like holistic, integrative approaches, but somehow vision is this one thing where everybody, like even holistic doctors, right, often wear the glasses and like somehow the eyeball and we actually see in the brain, we don't even see in the eyes, we see in the brain and somehow we think that there's nothing we can do. So I, I do find that. And when I do the education, I teach classes and five day programs and a lot of times people tell me, well, this makes so much sense. I like never thought about this, so 100% I think we have a blind spot, pun intended, around vision when it comes to, you know, things that we can make better when we believe that everything else has a root cause and we can address this and find a solution to the problem. And the same goes for vision and eyesight.

Now is it also even beyond like, you know, vision, does it go into other issues with the eyes? Like do you cover that as well, glaucoma and other health issues of the eyes?

Yeah, I mean this is a big topic, right? So we differentiate between the so called refractive errors, which is nearsighted, farsighted astigmatism, which is related to the refraction of light through the cornea and the lens onto the retina. Right. So that's what we call eyesight, visual acuity when people wear glasses. Right. That's kind of what we address with that. And then obviously there's the eye disease that you mentioned, glaucoma, age related macular degeneration, cataracts, those are the most common three, that's another bucket, so to speak. And then we have.

Stereo vision problems. Sometimes it's called binocular vision or fusion that is related to how the two eyes work together to create death perception. So that could be amopia double vision or AMIA is called lazy eye double vision. I had, I actually had strabismos, I had a squint, my right eye was turning in, so I was always bumping into things, had problems with like depth perception. So I work with all these scenarios and I, I have to say, I always say everybody can improve. You can always improve. It depends obviously on your age, the severity of the conditions. But we had people go from super high myopia to medium myopia, you know, or from sometimes we even had people like the doctor couldn't find the cataract anymore. But that is not always the case. Right, but glaucoma, let's look, you touched on glaucoma. So glaucoma is a pressure issue. And a lot of times with glaucoma there is this pressure on yourself, this kind of perfectionistic attitude. So we also work with the relaxation and they actually found in studies that meditative practices like yoga Nidra actually lowered the intraocular pressure, which in many cases of glaucoma, not in all of them, but in most cases is elevated and that that lowered as much as the eyedrops did. So it's really about the beliefs, your feelings, you know, how it's so many things. It's not just the physical body, right. I hope that makes sense. It's a lot of.

It absolutely does. And I think especially what when listeners hear from me all the time is that it's. It's like we have to look at the whole picture, and we can always look for. Of course, if you go to the eye doctor, they're likely to recommend their, you know, their usual treatment. They're not likely to talk about the benefits of meditation. But you're like, hey, we need to. We can take into consideration that. That actually calming the nervous system and stress recovery can make a difference in some of these eye issues that we, of course, when we think about it, of course, our. Our eyes are part of our body, but I think because the medical system has separated it into a separate profession and specialty, it's almost like we think somehow we think that our eyes are going to be treated differently than the rest of our body. It's kind of funny when you think about it.

Totally funny. And like you said, nervous system regulation, stress relation, relaxation, stress management. And I think what I usually do when I. When I meet somebody, I ask them, do you notice that your vision varies? And most people, most people, that's like, I would say nine out of ten would say yes. Sometimes in the morning it's better, or in the afternoon it's better, or when I'm outside, or like, so there's already a correlation to that. Vision changes, just like your blood pressure, your blood sugar, you know, those numbers, they're not static. And so in your visual acuity, sometimes you can see things pretty sharp, and other times you're like, why is everything, especially when we're stressed, Right? If you've ever had an accident, you're really stressed and you try, everything is blurry. You have this tunnel vision. You're in that freeze, you know, fight or flight mode. So people, most people recognize that, and if they don't, a lot of times they wear very high prescription glasses. And they also, I always say, you haven't paid attention to that. Like, you haven't noticed that. So, like, once we realize that our vision is kind of just like other things, it's. First of all, what do we pay attention to? Sometimes we don't even see. We're like our mind is somewhere else. We don't even pay attention. We literally don't see. Just like we can might. Sometimes we don't hear the annoying noises because our brain is not focusing on them. So that's one aspect. But another one is also like being in a relaxed way. Because when you're relaxed, you have that you have the peripheral vision, you have that kind of whole visual field versus when you are in that fight or flight or stress mode, you have that tunnel vision. And so many of us are now in this constant stress mode. And I mean, you and I, we can probably agree, like, we go through stressful times as well, right? Like, it's. We are humans, right? I had a client once tell me, you must be relaxed all the time. Like, come on, I'm human. I have stress, too. And I notice that my vision gets a little blurry when I'm really stressed. So, I mean, but I know now why, you know, that happens. And then I can focus on how can I relax again versus putting glasses on my face.

It's so interesting. You say, like, I was talking to a patient today who, who I've been helping her recover from stress, and she mentioned today that she was walking down her street, same street in her same neighborhood that she's lived in for, like, 15 years. And she's like, I just have stuff. Started noticing things in my neighborhood that I never. They've been there the whole time, but I wasn't even paying attention to it. So, like, you're saying, like, we get this literally tunnel vision where we are not even able to perceive what's around us. And so sometimes that is, you know, how much of that is vision and how much of that is perception? I was going to ask you, like, what are some things that people might be doing or might have been told to do related to their vision that are actually maybe working against them?

That's a great question. So I think one thing we hear all the time, and I used to hear that from the doctor, is you should always wear your glasses. Otherwise you got neuronia vision. And I think when I do those, you know, free classes, I always ask, put in the chat, like, have you noticed that your vision gets worse when you wear glasses all the time? And most people would say, yes. I'm like, okay, so that already doesn't make sense. So I always say, you know, and this. First of all, one thing, we have to backtrack a little bit. People that start wearing reading glasses in their 40s or 50s, they notice that when they put the reading glasses on to read the book and they look up, that is all blurry. That doesn't work. So you already realize that whatever diopters, which is the measurement of the strength of the lens that you use for near vision, doesn't work for distance vision because that's too strong. However, people that are nearsighted Often sometimes from college myopia or from school age. They usually get glasses or contacts for distance vision, but they wear them all the time. When in reality they could probably take the glasses off, depending on how strong it is and could read the book without glasses. Right. But they can kind of pull that effort in, but it's actually straining the eyes to use distance prescription for close ups. So I always, the first thing I always tell everybody, whatever, obviously safety for us. Right. Especially with driving and all those things, safety first, but whatever you can safely in a relaxed way or can see without glasses, then don't use glasses for that. Like let's say even if you're near sight and you can go on a hike, you know the neighborhood, you know, you feel good. Because if you don't feel safe, you cannot relax. And if you don't relax and your vision will be blurry. So then go for a walk without the glasses. Like that's a simple thing that everybody can do. Just kind of. And maybe if you wear reading glasses, maybe instead of a plus two and a half, maybe a plus one and a half is enough. Many times people told me, you know what, that's crazy. Yeah. I don't even know why I use those strong ones.

Interesting. So just being more aware of like, yeah, maybe we're overdoing it with our glasses and even sunglasses.

Yeah. So that's another good question. So I always, before I start talking, I always like to put a disclaimer on. Right. Sunglasses have. There is a reason and a good need for sunglasses for certain conditions and scenarios. Now we have built in sunglasses, they're called the pupils. Because if it's really. And that's actually sometimes they test that in the ER when people take reaction or the eye doctors test your pupillary reaction by shining a really bright light into your eyes. And your pupils will constrict really. If they help, they constrict really quick. So it's a tiny, tiny. Right. The pupil is tiny. Now when it's dark, your pupils can open like a camera aperture. It can open up all the way. So when it's really bright, the pupils are small. Now you. That means that nature already has a system for making sure that we don't get too much light into our eyes. Right now there is people that have. It could be medications, could be drugs, could be conditions where your pupils don't constrict. If you ever go to the eye doctor and they put the atrophy drops into your eyes to dilated pupil exam, you need to wear sunglasses. No questions asked or if you're in really extreme conditions, it's skiing on a white snow, whatever. But for most of us we are actually very sunlight deficient. And sunlight goes both for the skin and the eyes. And that has so many, I mean so many health related systems like from hormones to vitamin D production to circadian clock, I mean to melanin secretion, how much tanning, like the brain calibrates this through the eyes. Now when you wear sunglasses, the brain thinks it's night and you actually don't secrete as much melanin. I mean when you think about nature, what a beautiful system this all is, right? And so I think sometimes we try to mess too much with a good thing. But yeah, that is definitely a place for sunglasses. But usually I would tell most people the eyes are light receivers. Now if you're very light sensitive, it's like I can't hear because my ears are so sounds and I'm not talking about a Metallica concert, but let's say I can't hear those birds. Like it's just too, it's just hurts my ears. We would be like, what? Right? Eyes need to be able to receive light, right? And so we need to train the eyes to be to. I was super light sensitive so bad that I actually night driving was a problem for me because the headlights on cars would be so blinding. So and that's one of the things that many people tell me that I work with. I'm like, I, you know, sometimes wearing a cap or a hat, that's what I recommend. But yeah, I would say sunglasses, I haven't worn them in 20 years except for like those extreme conditions. And I, my eyes are super healthy.

So that's amazing. And it's such a good point that like our, we are, we, we have eyes for a reason. And so much of our body perceiving with our eyes like light and darkness as you mentioned, like, and if we're not getting light during the day and dark at night, it's going to mess up even hormone signaling and other signaling within our bodies. So it's like, yeah, like how do we come back to relating? You know, allowing our human body to experience the natural circadian rhythm and in natural environment that we live in versus always trying to modify it. Oh my gosh, that's such a great point. I love that. So I know in your, as you mentioned you do these online classes and you even offer free online classes quite often. So I want to make sure and have a link for everybody who can sign up to come and join you for one of your upcoming, you know, five day classes or webinars. Thank you so much for offering those because I'm sure everyone listening is like, oh my gosh, I want to learn more. But maybe you can even while you're here with us. Share. Is there anything that people can start with? Like what, what could they even start doing today beside of things you've already mentioned? Like, you've already given us a couple tips about like maybe you don't need glasses as much as you think or sunglasses as much as you think, but what else might people start to think about? Shifting.

That's great, great question. So there's lots of things you can do. One simple thing and you doing that really well is blinking. So a lot of times, especially as we get older, you know there's a dry eye syndrome and people have, studies have shown that when we look at screens, we don't blink that much. We blink two to three times per minute. So there is a computer vision syndrome is related to that, dry eye syndrome. So blinking when we look at. If you ever looked into human eyes and you did the eye gazing and they do like, and I'm staring into the camera like really hard without blinking, I can't even do it anymore. It hurts my eye.

Yeah, when you try, you're like, what am I doing?

Yeah, it's lubricated and also it prevents staring. So when we have, when we are straining, we, we are staring. We're making a huge effort. Like naturally clear vision is effortless. It's like hearing. It's like light signals come into your eyes. They get received by the retina, transformed into electric signals through the optic nerve. And the brain is where we, like you said so beautifully earlier, we perceive things, we perceive in the brain. That's why we don't perceive everything that our eyes see because we filter by our attention what we're interested in. Right. So, so blinking is just keeps your eyes lubricated. It keeps your, your vision shifting and moving from being stagnant and frozen and making an effort. So that's one of the simple things you can do. Another thing is like we talked about like you know, exposing your eyes to sunlight and if like especially the early morning sun, there's not even any UV light in there, maybe you go for a morning walk without sunglasses or if the sun is already higher up, you could do something like sunning where you just have your eyes closed and you face the sun and you can turn the head side to side so that just slowly reducing Your light sensitivity by letting your eyes get some natural light. Another thing we could do is we call this palming. So just like our body, right? We don't stand or run all day. Like, we rest our bodies and sometimes the eyes just giving the eyes a little rest. Blinking is one of those things. It's a micro rest. But sometimes you just want to close your eyes. You know, sometimes we sit. We don't always have to, of course, if you're driving, don't close your eyes. But let's say you listen to this. You know, you're like you're a passenger in a car or maybe you're sitting in a train or whatever. You're just somewhere else, or you're at the beach and you're just laying down and relaxing. Close your eyes. Close your eyes and just give your eyes a little break in your brain and just kind of like in a little meditative place. And you can add more by what we call palming. So with the. Some people call it cupping, but it's basically the cupped hands. And you cover your closed eyes by crossing your fingers over your forehead so that you can. And then you want to relax your shoulders, have your elbows be supported. And just this little, like black cocoon. It's a little black kind of cave for your eyes, right? So really relaxing. I recommend bringing up a happy thought, maybe a happy memory or place or person or whatever it is, but something where you're like.

I can let all the stress on the day drift away. And then you can stay in this palming meditation or in this palming rest for as long as you like. Sometimes I used to do it for 30 minutes. I just really felt so grateful. But you can just do it for like 10 seconds, 20 seconds, 30 seconds. And then when you want to come out of it, you take your hands away from your eyes. But don't rip the eyes open. Just wait. Let the light come through the eyelids. And then when you feel like, okay, I'm ready to come back here, you blink five times, you squeeze your eyes five times. And then your eyes already feel way more lubricated and relaxed. So that's like a little reset that you could do. So those are a couple more things. I mean, I have a lot more, but those are a couple things that you could do that are easy to do.

I've done a lot of detoxes over the years, and many of them made me feel a lot worse. Not only that, but I've had a lot of patients come in and tell me how after doing a Detox, they have a stomachache and headache and they can't sleep and they're feeling anxious and I'm like, I can't just recommend that my patients are do a program that's going to make them feel worse. So I finally decided to design my own detox program. It's a 14 day detox program that's not like other detox programs out there in several ways. One is that I'm focused on helping you to get the toxins out in a safe and effective way using nutrients, antioxidants and supporting our natural detoxification pathways in the body. Also, I'm helping you to decrease your exposure to toxins by learning the ways that you've been exposed to toxins and.

How to change your day to day.

Lifestyle to decrease your toxins over time. And I'm helping you to look not just at chemical and environmental toxins but also emotional and energetic toxicity. And yes, it's possible to accomplish all of this in 14 days. I have so many patients who have done the 14 day detox and report back to me how much better they feel. And I think it's also because I help you to know what to eat. You are getting adequate food that tastes good, plus protein shakes that I developed that are good for your body, that your body knows how to use these nutrients and take them in and use them to help you safely detoxify without feeling worse. Also I help you to balance your blood sugar levels, get better sleep and introduce things like meditation, biofeedback and other types of stress recovery into your day to day routine. So I just am so excited about it.

I want to make sure you know.

About this 14 day detox. I'm going to put the link, you can find it at drdani.com forward/detox-program but I'll also put the link below so you can find the 14 day detox program at Dr. Donnie.com I look forward to guiding you through this detox so that you can actually feel better on your way to better health.

I love it and I, it actually reminds me like sometimes when I've been working with patients for several hours I find myself like I just want to go lay down and close my eyes. And yes, that's when I, I'm like hey, if you've got your eyes closed you might as well do a meditation. So it's like use it like I love that. Where you're like hey, use it a chance as a chance to just let all the thoughts go and just let your system Reset and to acknowledge that we need that as humans. You know, I think we're so much right or taught to just keep going, going, going, going. And especially sometimes if someone's working, let's say, in an office or something, maybe they don't have a place where they can go lay down. But what you just described, you could do sitting somewhere, right? You could be at your desk, or you could be in the bathroom, or, you know, go outside.

I call that pee and palm. You know, sometimes if you don't want to be awkward or you just, you know, you have your elbows on your knees and just take a few. Wash your hands first and then, you know, take a few deep breaths. I mean. Exactly. And I want to give one more tip, since you mentioned office workers. So obviously, if you work in a cubicle, that is challenging. What if you have the ability to place your computer in front of a window? So I see that so many times that the window is behind people. But if you. Because you probably have heard the 20, 20, 20 rule sometimes. I've heard that from behavioral optometrists. And that's the idea. Every 20 minutes, look up for 20 seconds and look 20ft in the distance. I always say, like, who sets a timer every 20? Like, to me, it sounds super catchy, but it's not really who. I mean, seriously, I would end up doing it. No. So if. But if you have the computer in front of a window, again, assuming that you have, you know, it's just all you have to do. And right now, in my. Because I'm here at my sister's house, my computer is actually facing a wall. But usually at home, I just have to look just above the computer and I can look far in the distance. And that makes it so easy because then your attention can kind of move far, move near. Because we don't want the eyes locked in this near distance the whole time. And another tip with computers have. Because peripheral, we tend to kind of get this tunnel vision, especially if you wear glasses. Because with glasses, there's the sensation everything behind the glass is sharp and everything beyond is blurry. But human vision, we have a very small area of perfect clarity. That's the fovea. Everything. And you're farther away from the central fovea and the retina, right? We go the worse we see. So nobody has clear vision in the periphery. But if you have. If the room is dark. I've seen my teenage. When my daughters were teenagers, they used to be sitting in a dark room. The only thing is the screen. But that Even then your peripheral really shuts down. So what I'm trying to say is when you watch tv, don't sit in a dark room with the TV on or the computer on. Make sure you have the room kind of ambient lighting so that you know that you still have awareness of the room around you versus like, you know, getting this tunnel vision that really helps you because that's relaxing to the eyes and doesn't strain the eyes so much than just sitting and, you know, looking at the screen in a dark room.

I just love that you're sharing this information and whole different way to think about what are little things we can do in our day that can make a huge difference in our vision. Because, I mean, I'm thinking that this could impact people's vision throughout their life. Do you see that? Like with the people who follow your method, do you see that they're reporting back that this is changing their vision into their. Into the decades coming. Tell us more what you notice with the cases you work with.

Definitely, I've definitely seen that. I mean, like with everyone, right? There's ups and downs. We were doing well and then things were not so well or there was major stressors. But yes, people tell me all the time, sometimes just from a talk I gave for free, right? Oh my God, I'm still doing this. I'm just, I'm not wearing the sunglasses anymore. My night driving is great. I still don't need glasses or I hear amazing stories. Like even decades after I initially worked with somebody, I think at the end of the day, the message to me, what I think is important, understand that you have way more control over your overall health and your eyesight and vision. That is including everything else, right? So some people are like, yes, I love it. I can actually do something. Other people, like, now I'm in charge. I thought I can just blame it on age and genetics and just like, you know, I got the bad part, you know, the short end of the stick. So. So yeah, so that's the thing, you know, some people want the quick fix. Just know with health there is no quick fix. Whatever. Quick fix. It doesn't matter if you think Lasik, everybody's back in glasses. Lasik can have serious side effects. I know some people are super happy, but there is. It's a risky surgery and it doesn't last. Everybody is back in glasses and I work with all those people. Glasses eventually will lead you down to a path, especially if you have high levels of nearsightedness. There's a higher risk for eye Diseases when you're nearsighted. For those of you just listening and not watching the video, I have an eyeball and I'm squishing it so it looks more like an oval. A nearsighted eyeball is elongated, which puts the more pressure on the retina, puts you at higher risk for retinal detachment, for macular degeneration. So reducing your levels of, like, even if you don't get out of glass, but you reduce your level of near sightness of all these, you know, that will already help you keep your eyes in healthier shape. And then obviously things that you teach too, like, I mean, eating a healthy diet, staying hydrated, all movement, and it's not necessarily exercise, like, we obviously think that's important for your heart, for your overall health, is going to benefit your eyes more than any other organ. We have more mitochondria in our retina than in any other part of the body. So that's why not eye diseases. Diseases are often found by ophthalmologists when they look in your eye. They often find diabetes or any of those things way before lab results show anything off. So the eyes are super sensitive. And like you said in the beginning, are you taking your vision for granted? Are you just thinking it's okay to abuse them? Then think again, what would it mean if I lose my vision? I think we don't think about it often enough. Like you said, we do take it for granted.

Yeah. And that's so amazing to think. Like, I love that you're explaining that, like, why we don't want to stress the eye more. We might as well help it out. And that that can really make a difference into the future for sure. Because it isn't something we just think, oh, this comes with aging. But wait a minute, maybe it doesn't have to come with aging. If we take even these little steps daily, that can make a difference. And so I'm so glad for people to be able to come to your next training online so they can learn more. So I'll tell us a little bit about it and I'll make sure to input a link so everybody can go join you.

So I call this see better in just five days. And because I always say to people, don't believe me, don't believe your eye doctor. See for yourself. Right. Because what the natural vision improvement is not as known as other holistic modalities. And so I don't want to feel people that, you know, I'm trying to sell you something like, do it, see for yourself. And you will be amazed in just five days what you can do to see better and also get more awareness about this thing and understand more about it. So that is coming up and it's August 19th for this fall in 24. I do this several times a year, so it's called seabed. And just five days. And then I also have masterclass that I teach and all those are for free. So, yeah, I hope to see you there and help you, you know, get more clear, understand your vision better, and know how easy it is to keep your eyes. And even if you're not interested in losing your glasses, right. You're just. Just learning how you can keep your vision in optimal shape as you get older. Because I've met many people I centenarians that didn't glasses. So yes, we get older, we get wrinkles. We can't pretend that doesn't happen. And yet at the same time, we can be healthy in our 70s and 80s than in our 30s or 40s if we do the right things. Right. It's all up to us what we do.

Absolutely. And what I'm thinking is, I love how you use this terminology of like, see for yourself and get more clear. These are words we use related to our vision. But I'm thinking that as people. People get this clarity about what they can do to improve their eyesight, they might actually get insights into their self. Do you see that?

Yeah, I see that so much. I mean, that's usually more in my longer programs where people are like, oh, my God, I thought this was just about eyesight. I mean, yeah, your whole belief system. I mean, just alone how we talk about our eyes. Right. I hear that all the time. I'm blind like a bat. And then I look at somebody's glass and there might be a minus one and a half near side. I'm like, you could see. I mean, you know what I mean? The language we use so oftentimes we just describe it. So we start with how we talk about our eyes, how we talk about ourselves. We often. I mean, this is like woven into our, you know, human tapestry. We talk negative. I should be doing that. I'm too fat. I'm too this, you know, like, so I'm like, stop, stop. And then people are like, this is so interesting. I had no idea that I had these belief systems or these emotions. Emotions. If I were to start with emotions, I think nobody would be like. But everybody's like, wow, it's so interesting. I didn't even realize because sometimes we have to find the root cause and the root cause is always some kind of stress level. And it could be in childhood, it could be an advanced childhood event that made you see the world is a scary place. And your nervous system was like, let's make sure this is blurry. You weren't really near sighted but your nervous system was trying to protect you. And so finding like at some point doing this kind of work to realize, wow, like I always ask people, when you get your glasses, what happened a year or two before and so many times my parents divorced, we moved a lot, I got bullied, my grandmother died, whatever. Or I had a pharmacist who got less than a four. She said we got computers and I didn't understand computers and this was really stressing me out. And I was so she was just really stressed at work or college. Myopia, right? It's not just that the near work inside and studying, but it's also, it's the mental, like the test, the pressure, it's, you know, it's not just the. We always think it's just the distance of how you know. Yes, it's not good to just look up close all the time for sure. But it's also the mental and emotional strain and maybe you have student loans and all this worry, I mean all that combined is like this toxic cocktail that leads to vision problems. So understanding those things and connecting the dots and the last thing I want to say, we also look at the life vision. Like what do you. A lot of times when I work with people, they're in their 50s or 60s, it's like that point, you know, they usually say cataract. They usually say Vitas at 40, Bifocals at 50, Cataract at 60, Glaucoma at 70 and AMD at 80. I literally heard that eye doctor say that. So I'm like, when you're in your 60s and maybe your kids are grown up and now, like now what? You know, you're too young to retire or maybe. But so we look at like what is your, what is your vision for your life? What is your purpose? Because when I looked at, I was so interested. Have you seen the blue zones? The Dan Buttner?

Yes.

Right. So remember in Japan they call about ikigai, they call ikigai or Costa Vita, Costa Rica, they call it plan de vida. Like this idea. Every day there's a purpose. Every day there's a reason to get up. And did you notice how few of those centenarians wear glasses? Right. So there is this excitement, this joy, this curiosity that the social communication, the network. There's all these factors that cannot just be blamed, like diet and movement. Yes, all those things too. But this emotional and mental component was so big there. And that's, that's what we also. So we look at all these pieces really when I work and not in the five day training, we don't have time for that. In the five days when I work with my clients in the longer programs, we look at all those pieces and it's amazing the insights that people have. For sure.

That's beautiful. That's beautiful. And I love. Yeah. That you can, that, that everyone can start with like the five days and just be like, okay, let me just see if this is something for me that like, and start to implement some steps. And then you can always see, hey, is this something that I want to go further and go deeper and use this as a entry into understanding more and, and helping you to live your, you know, connect more with your vision for your life, Right? We, we also get disconnected from that just as much as we get disconnected from our peripheral vision. Like, what is it that I envision for my life and how can I feel open and ready to perceive that and go for it, Right?

I mean, Louise Hay, right. The famous Louise Hayes, she said about cataracts, dark future, no joy in life, right? And it's like, that's why, 60s, mid-60s, you retire, you're like, well, what am I? You know who's like? When we have a job, we often, you know, we identify with our work. We go there. It's like we have a purpose, we make money. And now all of a sudden it's like a lot of people fall to this dark hole. And I think it's so important to have this purpose or this sense of like, it doesn't matter what it is, right? It's just something that gets me excited to get out of bed every morning and finding that again or maybe connecting with that again or, you know, maybe just honing in. Because as we go through life, we change, right? My daughters are now grown up, right? I mean, I don't, you know, I was a single mom for all these years. As a single. I identify as a single mom raising two daughters on my own. I mean, I'm still a single mom, but now they're like, they're grown, right? They have their own careers and their own work. But I'm like, when I found this, this was not my original career. My original career was as a designer, a graphic designer. I worked in advertising for many years and I love in my 20s, I love doing those things. We did very creative advertising. I mean, I was proud of my work. But then I got older and I saw so many of my colleagues got fired and, you know, like, you got to the point where, like, and it's an exhausting job where you work hundred, like, you work crazy hours. I'm like, I don't want to do that anymore. And then I discovered this through my own journey of, you know, getting rid of my glasses. And I was like, I can do this till I'm 100. And I even better. The older I am, the better it is because now even, you know, more interesting If I'm like 95 and I don't need glasses. So, not that I want to work that much when I get older, but I don't think I ever want to stop telling people about vision improvement because it's so. It changed my life. And every time I see. When we have a final call in my 12, we have a 12 week program called Naturally Vision. We had a call like a month ago, the final call, and people are crying. I mean, it's like, it's like the transformation is so. I'm just sitting there, I'm like, I'm so happy. I'm so lucky I get to do this, you know. And I'm sure you feel similar when you work with your clients.

Yes. And it is, it's, I hear, though, your passion for this and, and how I always listen to like, how you went from, like, say, you know, even graphic design and advertising, you're looking, you're looking at design and now you're, you're understanding how, you know, our vision helps us. What do we want to see in the world? What do we want to create? And, and how beautiful. Thank you for sharing what you've created in your life for people to feel inspired, like, yeah, like what really, do you know, what is really possible that we can, we can be living our passion and helping others at the same time. So.

Oh, my gosh.

Thank you so much for joining us today, Claudia. I'm so glad we got to talk this through.

Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate you inviting me because you have an amazing following, you do amazing work, and I think many of your patients and clients would be happy to know because again, vision is somehow this blind spot that we somehow forget right about. And knowing that you have so much. The eyes are made out of flesh and blood. We see in the brain. We know from neuroscience, we can train the brain. So, yes, there's a lot of things you can do. And I'm so grateful that you invited me so that I can share this knowledge with your tribe.

Absolutely. Well, thanks everyone for listening in. Be sure to look for the link down below so you can join Claudia for her next classes. And thanks for joining us here at How Humans Heal. Make sure you subscribe to join me for the next episode. See you all soon.

Thanks for listening to How Humans Heal. If you liked this episode, leave a rating and a review. And for more resources, visit drdani.com.