Keywords

holistic eye care, vision improvement, eye health tips, behavioral optometry, Sam Berne, eye exercises, nutrition for eyes, blue light protection, workshops, private sessions

summary

In this engaging conversation, Dr. Sam Berne shares his insights on holistic eye care, emphasizing the importance of daily habits for maintaining eye health. He discusses the impact of nutrition, sunlight, and eye exercises, while also highlighting his workshops and private sessions aimed at personalized care. The discussion also touches on the effects of screen time on vision and the significance of blue light protection.

takeaways

• Dr. Sam Berne is a behavioral optometrist with a holistic approach.


• Morning sunlight is crucial for resetting circadian rhythms.


• A diet rich in colorful vegetables supports eye health.


• Eye exercises can enhance circulation and oxygenation in the eyes.


• Light is essential for overall health and energy fields.


• Social media has expanded Dr. Berne’s reach to a global audience.


• Workshops are tailored to individual goals and health needs.


• Private sessions focus on treating the root causes of vision problems.


• Blue light from screens can negatively affect eye health.


• The Palm Hum exercise is beneficial for relaxation and eye care

Sound Bites

• “Get some morning sunlight.”


• “Light is a food, don’t be afraid of it.”


• “Blue light can dry your eyes out.”


• “It’s the Palm Hum by Dr. Sam.”

Chapters

00:00 Introduction and Welcome Back to Kauai

01:59 Understanding Holistic Eye Care

04:59 Daily Habits for Eye Health

08:57 Exploring Sam’s Books and Workshops

11:55 Private Sessions and Personalized Care

16:00 The Impact of Screens on Eye Health

Sam Berne (00:00 .29)

Here for my interview on KKCR, Public Radio Kauai. I was here about a year and a half ago and back again with my friend Tracy Chavarone, who’s gonna have me on and interview me. So stay tuned.

to Dr. Sam Byrne. Aloha Sam. Aloha. So nice to see you in person. I know we’re face to face. We’re face to face. Eye to eye. Welcome back to Kauai. Yeah, feels great to be here. We just had 15 inches of snow in Santa Fe so nice to be in the tropics. Isn’t that kind of unusual to have that much snow this early? Well it used to be with climate change you know we’re

getting that much snow but back in the 90s yeah we used to get that kind of snow end of October beginning in November what a blessing you know it lowers the fire risk and

Anyway, it’s great to be here in the humidity. was mentioning I was in New Mexico in October and it was very, very dry. I definitely had to put lotion on my skin. It is a high desert environment. I have to warn people about that. It was so beautiful. Mexico is just spectacular.

It really is the land of enchantment. really is and so much space there, open land, great hiking, nature, Chaco Canyon and all those magical places.

Sam Berne (01:34 .765)

Well, and of course, kawaii has its own magic, which brings you back. I know it’s like a magnet that keeps bringing me back. So for those of you who have never met Dr. Sam Byrne, I’m going to have him like introduce himself. But he’s the author of many books and he is a holistic, I would say a holistic eye doctor. I don’t know if that’s what you would consider yourself, but.

Yes, well I’m a behavioral optometrist, doctor of optometry, but I have studied many different healing modalities and my mission is to help people regain their eyesight if it’s deteriorating, improve their vision as they get older, work with kids with learning problems and the spectrum disorders, autism, the ADD, there’s a very big vision component.

to it, traumatic brain injury, people that want to reduce their prescriptions. So I’ve devoted my career, you know, it’s four decades, and still going strong, helping people with their health and their vision.

But you do use it well, except your holistic approaches. Yeah, well, know, when listeners, you go to the eye doctor and they give you a stronger prescription and they tell you how you have a disease and you’re going to lose your sight or drug surgery and needles. That’s the,

the standard care. So just learning things like functional medicine, what do you eat to preserve your eyes? How does the sun affect your eyes? What about being on computers? You know, so there’s a lot of things that you can do to take better care of this major modality that we relate to the world with. And usually I get people where they’ve gone to the doctor and it’s, my goodness, I’m going to lose my sight or I have to get surgery. And that’s where I come in and I can…

Sam Berne (03:34 .797)

do some interventions to help them. for people listening right now, what are some of the daily habits people can incorporate to keep their eyes as healthy as possible or even improve their eye health? Well, to keep it simple, there three main things. Number one, get some morning sunlight. The research backs that up, that when you get morning sunlight, it actually resets your

circadian rhythm and it puts you into a better mood and it’s great for your eyesight and vision. Number two, eat a diet that involves the rainbow of vegetables and if we think about the red, orange, yellow, green vegetables, those feed the retina, the macula and the cornea.

And so if you eat a healthy diet, low processed or no processed foods, and reduce or eliminate sugar, you have a great chance to preserve your eyesight. And number three, eye exercises work really well to improve the circulation and oxygenation in the eyes. One of my famous ones is called the palm hum exercise. That’s where you rub your hands together for a few seconds

you cup your hands over your eyes and you breathe in through your nose and on the exhale you make a humming sound and you do about six or eight of those after a day on the computer and that will improve your circulation, oxygenation, lubricate your eyes and balance your nervous system. So those are three simple things that you can do to preserve your vision.

And those are all totally doable. And I love the rainbow vegetables because for me I like to have a lot of colors in my food because I feel like I’m also nourishing my chakras when I eat all those colors on that more esoteric level. Yeah, well, there’s a camera that I use called a GDV camera. This measures energy fields, chakras, and acupuncture meridians. And we did research on how the chakras were impacted when we fed people

Sam Berne (05:54 .761)

color therapy through their eyes. And we found that when they looked at different colors, overall their chakras got more balanced and more lined up and larger. So the eyes are the organ of light that transports that light throughout the entire body. Light is a food, don’t be afraid of it. And yeah, it affects our energy fields and our…

our meridians and so yeah very much so. If you just tuned in I’ll speak with Dr. Sam Byrne and so Sam I’d love for you to give out your website and like any other information if you want to give out your phone number how long will you be here on Kauai? I’ll be here through next Wednesday and we have a workshop scheduled this Saturday. The registration closes tomorrow morning.

So you can call me 505-9200-317. I’m also doing some private sessions. So if you want some one-on-one time, give me a call. My website is drsamberne.com. I’m also very active on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube. So you can type my name in and I have thousands of free videos.

a membership so if you want to go deeper with me you can do that. Lots of ways to learn about what I’m doing. you mentioned like I think every social media out there so I’m just curious what how has social media changed your ability to assist people in their lives?

Well, it helps me connect to people that probably would have never heard from me or about me. And I have a international following. So people say in Germany or Australia, you know, they get to see my content and it gives them another opportunity to, you know, to help themselves. My mission is to educate and I give away my content for free. I also have a podcast.

Sam Berne (08:06 .933)

the burn podcast and so with all of those different channels I’m able to reach people video, audio, written and it’s really been a great service to be able to connect with people on so many levels from many different locations.

So once again, if you just tuned in, I’m speaking with Dr. Sam Byrne. And now I know you have authored quite a few books, and do you want to just mention some of those? Because I know you were here, was it last year, or was it this year when you were here for your latest book? It was last April, and it was a book called Vital Vision, and that’s my newest book that’s been out about a year. You can get that on Amazon, both ebook and also written. I’ve written, my first book was called Creating Your

personal vision. I wrote that in 1994. I did a new edition about two, three years ago that has eye exercises in it. I also wrote a book about nutrition called Taking It In and how foods affect our vision and our brain. And then I wrote a book called I Sense, How to Play in the Field of Healing, where I talk about energy, medicine, and my research swimming with the wi