| Glasses, contacts, or surgery. These are the usual | | | | exercise. Designed to reverse the stresses placed |
| choices offered to those of us with bad vision. Orlin | | | | upon the optical system, the vision-rebuilding process |
| Sorensen, though, needed an alternative. A commercial | | | | fortifies your eyes in ways that would never be |
| airline pilot who found himself in jeopardy of being | | | | achieved through normal daily activities. |
| downsized after the 9/11 tragedies, Sorensen decided | | | | Sorensen's Rebuild Your Vision program provides |
| to go for broke and pursue his lifelong dream of | | | | multilevel goals and strengthening tools that challenge |
| becoming a Navy fighter pilot. The only catch was that | | | | and stimulate different parts of the visual system. |
| Navy fighter candidates were required to have | | | | Customized training programs are available for those |
| near-perfect, uncorrected vision -- no surgery allowed. | | | | suffering from nearsightedness, astigmatism, and aging |
| As for so many who seek different medical options, it | | | | vision (presbyopia). The program's simple drills and |
| was word of mouth that led Sorensen down a | | | | exercises can be done at home, in the office, or on the |
| different path: a fellow pilot suggested eye exercises | | | | road, thus enabling the practitioner to integrate them as |
| to naturally correct vision. Turns out, the exercises | | | | part of an overall healthy lifestyle. It's no accident that |
| weren't so much the "road not taken" as the "road not | | | | Sorensen is from Seattle, a city surrounded by natural |
| taken in a while." Sorensen's research revealed that | | | | beauty whose residents are perennially voted as |
| natural vision training, in fact, had been around for | | | | some of America's fittest. |
| almost a century. | | | | An idea takes flight |
| Natural vision correction involves performing eye | | | | Not only has Rebuild Your Vision become a success -- |
| exercises and relaxation techniques daily to increase | | | | according to surveys from customers worldwide, the |
| optical muscle strength and coordination. With a | | | | program boasts over a 90% success rate in improving |
| 30-minute daily routine, after just a month Sorensen | | | | vision problems -- but the medical establishment has |
| improved his vision from 20/85 to 20/20; he went on | | | | also done research supporting the theories that the |
| to pass the Navy's visual acuity test. In 2001, he | | | | program is based upon, as in this excerpt from the |
| founded a company, Rebuild Your Vision, to share his | | | | Journal of the American Optometric Association |
| knowledge with the general public and to challenge the | | | | describing the results of subjects who underwent |
| widespread belief that surgery is the only method of | | | | natural vision training: "Subjects often stated that they |
| correcting vision. As more and more people turn to | | | | had experienced the ability to make eye contact |
| alternative medicine -- one in three people in the U.S., | | | | (without correction) with people across a room or |
| according to the New England Journal of Medicine -- | | | | street; they could see buildings and windows clearly |
| Sorensen's company has proven to be visionary in | | | | without glasses many miles across San Francisco Bay, |
| more ways than one. | | | | or in the case of high-diopter myopes (> -4.0 diopters) |
| A wholistic orientation to health | | | | they were able to read books easily at arm's length." |
| Watching TV, computer use, reliance on optical | | | | Unlike eye surgery, natural vision correction is |
| correction from glasses and contacts, as well as the | | | | noninvasive and risk-free. And unlike glasses or |
| normal aging process, all contribute to weak and | | | | contacts, it an active process rather than a palliative |
| distorted vision. Integral components of the eye are not | | | | measure. So it's no wonder vision rebuilding seems to |
| stimulated but instead suffer from a narrow range of | | | | strike a chord with health-conscious people today, who |
| use, in the same way that repetitive mousing and | | | | are increasingly choosing organic foods over fast |
| typing tasks on the computer can lead to tendonitis in | | | | foods, meditation over confrontation, and lifestyle |
| the arm and, eventually, carpal tunnel. Just as you | | | | changes over potentially harmful quick fixes. Ironic, but |
| exercise your body at the gym or practice yoga in | | | | sometimes we need to take the long view to really |
| order to improve muscle tone, agility, range of motion, | | | | appreciate what we're seeing. |
| and flexibility, so too do the eyes benefit from daily | | | | |