The Clarity Of Blindness: Why You Must Be Blind To Truly See

In a video I recently watched, Nigerian musician, producer, and songwriter Cobhams Asuquo shared a unique insight about his blindness—an experience he views not as a limitation, but as an advantage. Recalling a visit to the mall with his wife, Cobhams noticed something telling: while he remained focused, his wife, guided by her sight, spent time looking at a myriad of other things and ended up picking far more than intended.

Reflecting on this experience, Cobhams concluded that true focus requires us to be blind—blind to distractions, temptations, and diversions that lure us from our purpose.

What does it mean to be blind? Is it merely the loss of optical abilities? In Acts 9, we read about the Apostle Paul, whose encounter with true spiritual sight rendered him physically blind. Three days of darkness led him to inner vision and clarity that he might never have found through mere physical sight. It must have been a memorable period of meditation and reflection.

In a similar way, life requires us to narrow our focus, to intentionally blur out what doesn’t serve our purpose. Take a camera lens, for example: the closer it zooms in on its subject, the more everything else fades into the background. Everything else should merely be the canvas on which we paint our focal picture!

This narrowing of focus allows us to see the object of our desire with crystal clarity. Until we become blind to every other thing, a goal, focus, or aim will never take precedence. It would be like every other passing image—a temporary spectacle, an ephemeral flicker, a passing blur that never grants fulfillment.

So, let true light guide you—but let it blind you, too, cutting out the noise that dilutes your vision. Change your lenses if you need to. Perhaps you haven’t been blinded because you’ve been looking from the wrong perspective.