The expression ‘hunter vision and cathedral vision’ (or mode) describes two ways of being.

‘Hunter mode’ brings on frowning.  It is target- and deadline-oriented.  I believe stimuli build up tension in the forehead governed by the stressful, busy and close-up screen computer/ cell-phone world we inhabit.  For example, focussing (eye convergence) on a nearby computer monitor builds eye-muscle strength and tension and might be as damaging to your skin around your eyes as the more obvious but short-term forehead frowning that we do when angry, worried or perplexed.  Compounded with a sedentary lifestyle and work-life stress, we start to live in our heads rather than in our bodies. When this happens without relent, we end up looking tired, stressed and run-down. In ‘hunter mode’ we become predisposed to long-term frowning.

Finding solutions to this way of living is not straightforward.  I distinguish hunter mode from ‘cathedral mode’**. In cathedral mode, we are more heart-full and less ‘head-full’.  We are more in our bodies.  We are more likely to ‘dance’.  Finding a balance between cathedral and hunter mode has helped me relax my face, eyes, sinuses and eyes.

Almost anything can be a dance – including stillness.  Then what is the ‘opposite’ of dance (and movement and breath)?   The opposite of dance is eight hours of word processing sitting at a computer.  But even within this focused hunting front-of-head activity, we can find dance, body, space and mindfulness.  Here is the question; in our busy world, how can we be ‘cathedral’ while in hunting mode…how to chill/thrill and rest-digest alongside fight-flight…

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**I called it cathedral vision/mode because I saw how people’s faces would ‘open up’ and their shoulders would drop when looking at the vaulted roof-space and stained glass windows of the Norman cathedral in my city.