For the last few months, I have been working with a behavioral vision therapist to cure my (minor) double vision. I thought this would entail eye muscle exercises, but I was wrong. Week after week we are working on changing the way my brain focuses on my peripheral vision. It is as if my brain has learned to look forward, interpreting items in the peripheral as negligible or perhaps dangerous.
Our brains evolved to keep us safe in a dangerous world, especially the things at the edge of our vision. And yet business coaches tell us to “Keep your eyes on the prize” and “don’t be distracted from your goal” as if anything in our peripheral vision is useless and to be ignored.
And yet, synchronicity and serendipity do not lie on the straight road before us, they dance around the edges of our vision, waiting to embrace us with delight when we notice them. Much like shooting stars we cannot see them unless we open our minds, and our eyes, to the edges of our lives.
Without our peripheral view we neglect to see how our work helps and supports others; how our life mission is part of a larger universal web. We find ourselves committed to the one way we believe our dream must look, and the only way it can come to pass. We ignore all the unseen hands ready to lift and open doors in mystical ways, because we are overly devoted to the one-true-and-right path.
As I exercise my brain to see broader and wider, I feel the world of opportunities opening around me. Road-side attractions have become more inviting. I feel alive with potential, and joyfully awaken to greet each day, as if the corners of the world are reaching out to invite me on a new adventure, in a lovely circuitous, meandering way.