Beauty Buzz/Blog Biz
Editor’s Note:
May is Healthy Vision Month and prior to losing my sight I fully appreciated the ability to live with correctable vision. From personal experience, going through a major life-altering event like sight loss is extremely difficult. This is why it’s so important for you to keep your eyes healthy. This month take the opportunity to get a comprehensive eye examination.
In recognition of Healthy Vision Month, I thought I’d reshare an updated piece that I published a few years ago. I hope you like it. ~Steph
The Transformative Power of Sight Loss
- Prior to losing my sight, I used to think blindness was an all-consuming and suffocating darkness.
- Prior to losing my sight, I used to think blindness was the worst thing that could happen to a person.
- Prior to losing my sight, I used to think blindness meant living a solitary life.
- Prior to losing my sight, I used to think blindness meant using a white cane.
- Prior to losing my sight, I used to think blindness meant I couldn’t enjoy entertainment like books, tv, or movies.
- Prior to losing my sight, I used to think blindness would change my relationships with friends and family.
- Prior to losing my sight, I used to think blindness meant I wouldn’t be able to cook, clean, or care for myself.
- Prior to losing my sight, I used to think blindness would mean the end of laughter, beauty, and the things that bring me joy.
- Prior to losing my sight, I used to think blindness would prevent me from living a meaningful life.
- Prior to losing my sight, I thought blindness meant limitations that could not be met or exceeded.
All the things I thought I knew about blindness/sight loss were wrong. My eyesight has significantly decreased to the point where my residual sight can no longer be measured by standard methods. Today my right eye is measured by hand waving a couple of feet from my eye. My left eye is measured by finger counting.
The Meaningful Gains
Since the beginning of my blindness journey, I’ve learned so much about myself, others, and life in general. For several years I’ve said that I am the same person today as I was when I began my journey into blindness but this really isn’t true. I have changed because to remain the same means I’ve not grown.
Life is bigger than me and you, life is bigger than blindness. If I could extend my arms from one end of the galaxy to the other I still would not be able to contain life.
Life is beautiful. With each new day we have an opportunity to live our life to the best of our ability. Beauty is all around us and we can experience it in a myriad of ways.
Blindness is not the barrier because there is always a way. The barriers each of us have to overcome are our biases as we ALL have them. Sometimes we have to go through some stuff in order to come face to face with our own biases. When I faced mine, then immersed myself within the blind community it was only then I became transformed.
If I had to choose one thing blindness has taught me, it would be I have a greater appreciation for life. Life doesn’t change but it can change us if we let it.
Image Descriptions:
- Isolated transformation (in 5 stages on a branch) from cocoon to adult of the Lime Butterfly on a white background.
- Awaken, Learn, Evolve, Transform, Become and an Arrow on sticky notes against a black background.