While looking at this twin photo of the Statue of Liberty, let your eyes relax (pretend you’re focusing on a distant object) until the two images merge into a third in the center. The center image will be in 3D.
This type of eye exercise, called parallel-viewing, is done by moving your irises slightly away from each other. Cross-viewing (crossing your eyes) is another 3D-viewing method.
There are YouTube video versions of these exercises, too: here, and here. Doing these exercises, you can enjoy entire 3D movies without glasses.
Not only is free-viewing 3D tremendous fun (once you get the hang of it), it’s also good for you. When you lock on parallel- or cross-view images, you relax the ciliary muscle of your eye.
A sad fact of modern life is that our ciliary muscles are in a near constant state of tight contraction. Almost every object we focus on throughout our day is very close, primarily our computer screens and phones.
To stay healthy, our eyes need to focus on distant objects like mountains and clouds. One of the best parts of going on vacation is being able to stare idly at distant objects like these. It makes our eyes happy. Resting on a good parallel-view image is like a mini-vacation for the eyes.
For that reason, it’s a good idea to look away from your computer screen once in a while to focus on a distant object.
I bring up the eye exercises to make an analogy. There’s another kind of focus that’s related to our near-object eye focus that we’re also neglecting. We could be overly constricting a completely different kind of muscle.
I’m talking about the creative muscle. In trying to focus on creative projects, we’re urged to hyper-focus, to strive for flow state, and to stay focused for long periods.
As one of the people pushing this kind of focus, I realize I’m part of the problem.
Just like we need to defocus our eyes periodically for optimum eye health, we also need to defocus our creativity. Letting your mind wander and daydream without direction or goals is important once in a while. It can help you get clarity, perspective, and come up with new ideas and new directions.
Take a couple of vacations today—one for your eyes, the other for your mind.
I’ve always been competitive when it comes to Magic Eye. Might have to carry that pride into my day dreaming.
I have always had a hard time with this but today I think I figured it out a bit better.
I look at the the image on the left with my right eye closed and them the image on the right with the left eye closed...and voila!
I would recommend a terrific audiobook called Hyperfocus by Chris Baile...it talks about the importance of focusing and defocusing. It was very impactful for me and even convinced me to meditate which is not something I ever enjoyed before...