The human body is an amazing piece of kit, and when you think about how many of its processes are automated, it can sometimes be a bit unnerving.
From our ability to fall asleep to how our body digests food, even breathing is done without us realizing it. It all happens in the blink of an eye, and speaking of which, we blink an average of 14 to 17 times a minute.
Blinking is designed to protect our eyes from foreign objects, also spreading tears across them to stop them from drying out.
If you sleep for an average of eight hours a day, that means you blink up to 16,320 times a day.
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You might be wondering what happens if you stop blinking, and according to a YouTube video from Zack D. Films, it's not pleasant at all.
The video warns that not blinking for just 30 seconds would lead to the moisture on your eyeball evaporating.
Within a couple of minutes, the first layer of your eye would start to be damaged, and after 10 minutes, your vision would become blurry due to the tear film breaking down.
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After a few hours, all moisture would be gone and damage to the cornea would be severe. You might not have noticed, but as your cornea doesn't have any blood vessels, it relies on blinking to keep it hydrated.
Blinking is also important to prevent eye infections, while not blinking enough can lead to
Replying to the video, someone said: "Zack explained the worst torture technique in history💀."
Another added, "What kinda horror movie do you like ?
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Me : zack’s animation 😂," while a third concluded, "New fear unlocked: Staring Contests! 💀."
Although The Guinness Book of World Records doesn't keep records for anything that could be considered dangerous to the body, the India Book of Records recognized Anand Haridas as holding the record in 2021 when he went 91 minutes without blinking. He claims he achieved this feat due to the yogic method of meditation known as Trataka.
Haridas is a supposed expert in Trataka, which involves staring at a single point for an extended period.
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When Times of India asked Haridas how he pulled it off, he simply said: "Practice makes a man perfect."
Expanding on how he claimed the record, Haridas added: "Initially I could not even keep my eyes open for five minutes due to pain and heavy flow of tears. But later on, I practised it almost everyday and slowly improved the timing to 5, 10 and 20 minutes. Over the last one year, I could do it for more than 45 minutes, and two months ago I was able to hold it for 1.15 hours."
Other videos suggest that if you could hypothetically not blink for three days, this would be a turning point where you'd stop feeling pain. The downside of that is that it's because your eyes have effectively died. More than this, the bacteria that hasn't been wiped away by your inability to blink will lead to it eating your eye tissue.
Suddenly, we feel the need to blink.