Clearer than I realized
This past week I had cataract surgery.
At 53, that wasn’t exactly on my bucket list.
After years of martial arts, and just life in general, it turns out my eyes have taken more damage than I thought.
The cataract didn’t show up overnight.
It crept in.
At first it was just a little haze. Then more glare when I drove at night.
Screens felt harder to focus on. Bright rooms looked washed out.
It was like someone had quietly turned the sharpness down on the world.
I adjusted. I kept training. Kept teaching. Kept working on the computer. I was squinting slightly without even realizing it.
That’s the strange thing about gradual decline.
It feels normal.
The morning after surgery, I blinked a few times and just stared at the wall.
I could see.
I went out for my daily walk with my dog Henry and I could see everything. The trees were clear and I could even see the squirrels moving through the branches. The sky wasn’t muted anymore.
I had forgotten what clear vision felt like.
And it was incredible.
The Insight
We take clarity for granted because loss rarely happens all at once.
It happens slowly.
Posture folds forward a little at a time.
Breathing gets shallow without us noticing.
Patience wears thin under pressure.
We adapt. We compensate. We make it work.
But making it work and feeling fully alive are two very different things.
This experience reminded me how easy it is to accept “good enough” as a baseline.
Gratitude, for me, isn’t forced positivity.
It’s noticing when something improves. And staying with that feeling instead of rushing on to the next task.
Clear vision brought me back to the details.
To faces.
To light.
To depth.
That’s not small.
The Practice
Today, pause for one minute.
Stand tall.
Take five slow breaths through your nose.
Then actually look around the room you’re in.
Notice color.
Notice edges.
Notice light.
Pick one ordinary thing and really see it.
The Bottom Line
I’m grateful in a very literal way this week.
And I don’t plan on slipping back into blur.