Lasik Eye Surgery Made My Mental Health Better
Who knew it would take a surgeon creating a flap in my corneas?
I know people talk about the benefits of taking some time away your phone and disconnecting from the world but I didn’t actually think anyone was serious about doing it. After all, how could good advice be so ridiculously impractical?
I mean, that is, unless you’re in recovery after having a surgeon create a flap in your corneas to correct your vision, rendering you unable to focus on much more than administering eyedrops every four hours. Only then, I found, somebody suddenly got time for dat. You have no choice but to disconnect.
After recently having a surgeon reshape part of my eyeball with a (FUCKING) laser (BEAM) and being forced into internet rehabilitation for like, a week, I was, by default, blessed with a little gift of a mental cleanse 🧹🪣
I feel like a small sham-wow strutted its way around the innards of my cranium, shaking its little tail feather while it polished off every greasy surface of my soul, which had been tormented by technology and to-do lists for far too long.
Because the reality is that the world runs on technology. Innit.
Much of our livelihoods and relationships depend on digital connection. We were blissfully unenlightened before Reddit or Rogan or rage on the internet. I’d even say that all that energy we produced firing up over the Will Smith slap was probably seen from space and has brought us that much closer to communications with our extraterrestrial brothers and sisters. It’s exciting times. I can’t even remember a time before I had instant access to pizza or sex or the stock market via my handheld devices.
Thus we can all agree that the digital world and our ability to prosper in it is a glorious thing…
However, I only recently became aware of just how absurdly negative too much of it has been for my mind.
Because of the old eye ball makeover (thanks, technology) I had in Colombia in March, I spent a whole entire week with no screen time. I paused my social life, had a big juicy break from work, and, without anyone around me wanting to lay flat on their back with their life on hold to keep my company, I was forced to focus my attention on podcasts, audiobooks and sometimes when I could no longer listen, pure stillness.
(I often fell asleep in the stillness.)
I was so shut off from the world that I began to feel like I’d been shoved back into my mother’s womb with a pair of Samsung Galaxy Buds.
It wasn’t all that comfortable at times. Not only did my back hurt from all the verticals, but a spring clean of the mind leaves a lot of space for boredom you have to push through.
However, coming out the other side with a few less cobwebs of the consciousness, I’m sleeping better, eating less and I’m not as irritable when my novio wants to kiss my face as soon as I wake up.
In fact, things have only gotten funnier first thing in the morning because the tape that holds the night protectors onto my eyes leaves a sticky residue on my face. And it was a real chuckle when novio’s big delicious lips got stuck to my cheek the other morning. I erupted into a 6am set of giggles, so as you can see, things are really spicing back up in the bedroom.
I found that because I didn’t have this whole bunch of to-dos, to-thinks, to-worries or to-commit-tos, my mind wasn’t constantly stuck in traffic, and I actually had headspace to focus on the things in front of me… instead of the things in the future like I normally do.
When I allowed myself to not plan any further than just getting through the next few hours of eyeball healing, I dropped the anxiety of always wanting the next thing to happen. And as a result, I was like a little Buddhist monk.
(Requiring moments of closed eyes/stillness wherever I did go.)
If novio entered the room, I didn’t have to make a conscious effort to rip myself out of the world of social media and content creation, he became the most exciting part of my day (probably the way it should be but I’m still learning the art of relationships). All I wanted to do was just watch and observe his little quirks.
This is kind of sad to say, but for the first time in a long time, I felt the intense love I have for him.
Instead of just knowing that I have it, I felt that I have it. And that’s progress.
We don’t all have to go out and get our eyes light sabered to become better people, but I highly recommend some sort of strict digital detox, allowing (read: forcing) yourself to be still, bored and uncomfortable. It’ll only do jazzy things for ya noggin.
Check out my video on the eye surgery below.
That’s all from me, chicos. xx
A book recommendation given to me on the topic which I am yet to read but intend to:
The Comfort Crisis by Michael Easter
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