In regarding the eyes as the ?windows to the soul?, Roberto Kaplan considers the deeper significance of the emergence of physical eye problems. In Conscious Seeing he explains that how you see is the largest influence in what you see, and invites you to venture into the realm of your inner vision. When you look at your eyes beyond the diagnosis of a problem, you realise that visual symptoms are valuable messages through which we can become more aware of our true nature. An insightful, practical and holistic approach to eye care and personal transformation, Conscious Seeing gives you the tools to re-program your consciousness and modify your perception to restore your inner balance.
274pp, 152mm x 228mm, illus. in b&w, softback, 2002

Extract
The Mind's Eye
Conscious seeing can lead to perceiving the world around us in a much deeper way. To go deeper, it is necessary to break down the functions of the human eye into two parts. When light leaves the camera eye it is first processed in the brain. Then the mind is used to construct meaning of the light sensations. I call this part of the human eye the mind's eye. This is where thoughts, feelings, and emotions are woven together to construct the meaning we give to what we see.

In the mind's eye we form impressions and construct a perceptual reality of how we see. Many of us believe that the reality we see from the mind's eye is the one and only truth. I propose that the mind's eye may be partly or fully composed of perceptions related to our survival personality. This means that what we perceive from the mind's eye usually is seen through filters of fears, anger, and other emotions we've accumulated from our varied states of woundedness. Once these perceptions have been firmly established into the matrix of our mind's eye, then their software messages, so to speak, can be programmed back to the camera eye. This is our physical eyes relaying our pasts to us through the symptoms and eye conditions that each of us possesses.

Also, in the mind's eye we are still under the influence of our usual way of dealing with the concepts of space and time. When our view, our sense of space inside and outside ourselves, is 'mentally' distorted, this can result in refractive conditions like astigmatism. Over time this mind's eye state will be mirrored in the camera, or physical, eye. In other words, what starts on the level of thought and feeling can be transformed into a physical manifestation in the physical structure of the camera eye. We are in a time frame where we see life in terms of yesterday, today, and tomorrow. In conscious seeing you can use the information from the camera eye to become more fully aware of the software programming of the mind's eye.

The Eye of Vivencia
You can enter into a level of your mind where you know that you are 'being' versus 'doing' something. This sense of being is at a deep level of the mind called the ground. Consider the ground of being to be a nonmeasurable quantum space, a place where there is no reference point for measuring time. If you go even deeper - that is, underground - you can reach the place of total consciousness itself.

There are different levels of the mind above the ground, where the thoughts and feelings derived from foveal and retinal inputs through the eye are processed. In order for thoughts and feeling to fully integrate, you have to be present to your own consciousness. To see this deeply is to transcend understanding and enter vivencia. Vivencia is the place where you are not your personality, your thoughts, your feelings, or even your emotions. Vivencia is where you are aligned with your true nature. No mask is worn. You are your authentic self.

Dismantle the control of the thinking mind and time melts away.
Be with a love and days feel like hours.
-The Author

This means that to see from the eye of vivencia is to perceive from pure consciousness. This is the point of observation where you are present with what is. You are unaffected by fleeting perceptions, which are like moving clouds. In this way your vision can no longer be contaminated by survival perceptions. You let them move through you. You stay in observation of what is. Because the influences of the mind's eye are sufficiently known to you, you can enter into the eye of vivencia.

We all have had exceptional moments like this, of being so into a hobby, work, or being in love that we lose ourselves. Time flies by and our sense of space vanishes. This is conscious seeing. In this state, you have the ability to know how to differentiate between perceptions that are survival oriented and levels of awareness that arise from pure consciousness, because you are becoming visually aware of reality rather than being highly influenced by states of illusion.

From Conscious Seeing, ?2008 by Roberto Kaplan, published by Beyond Words.