Fuzzy and Brilliant
By Cecilia Sepp, CAE, CNAP, VEIP
Earlier this week, I went to the ophthalmologist for the first time in 3 years. Last time I went, I was having trouble with dry eyes, but it turns out that is an easy remedy: baby shampoo to wash the eyes and eye drops twice per day.
This time, though, I went because I noticed that my vision seemed to be deteriorating. It seemed even harder to read small fonts (I’ve been using reading glasses for years) and my eyes just seemed like they didn’t work as well late in the day. At times it seemed I needed more light to read; these symptoms were not anything I could assess on my own, so I made an appointment with the eye doctor.
The day of the appointment, I was checked in by a helpful person at the front desk, and then was seen by a medical assistant who ran a series of eye exams. He also tested lens strengths to see if that improved my vision. He put several types of drops in my eyes to test pressure and then dilated them.
If you’ve never had your eyes dilated, the world starts to look fuzzy and brilliant at the same time (like some strategic plans I’ve read).
Next up was the resident, an earnest young man who did several different exams and then added more drops to my eyes. The ophthalmologist came into the room shortly after this and the Resident presented his findings.
The diagnosis: dry eyes and eye fatigue. I felt a great sense of relief; I wasn’t going blind.
The treatment: continue what I have been doing, use eye drops FOUR times per day, and I was given a prescription for stronger reading glasses. The doctor also advised that I not sit at my computer so much and take more breaks from screen time (good advice for all of us).
All reasonable and manageable. But I came out with the same question I always do: WHY do they dilate your eyes and fill them with drops near the end of the exam when you must navigate your way home?? It was difficult to see anything clearly; everything up close was fuzzy beyond recognition. Objects at a distance had brilliant auras of light around them.
I tried to text my husband to let him know I was heading home but couldn’t read the screen. So, I had to call which took some effort since I couldn’t see well. I then navigated my way around the Foggy Bottom area to the Metro more from memory than sight. I made it back to Silver Spring and had to call an Uber; by this time, I barely could read the screen (an improvement from COULDN’T) so I had to hope I selected “home” on the screen rather than some distant destination. Luckily the driver found me because I could not read the license plate.
The entire time I couldn’t really see, I acted like I could so it wouldn’t be apparent that I was navigating by luck and muscle memory. This lack of vision was startling and, yes, made me see the world differently.
After I arrived home with my temporarily limited vision, I pondered my fuzzy and brilliant situation and I realized that many times, we are all moving from habit, and we don’t really see what we are doing. We go through the motions without thought and without really seeing. In the nonprofit world, this is equivalent to the saying “that’s the way we’ve always done it.” This is the epitaph of many a defunct organization.
Luck and muscle memory are not strong starting points for decision making. What do you see when you look at your organization? Are you really “seeing”? Or are you just going through the motions?