Is this from experience? Because I find it to be more conjecture than anything every time I've seen it come up. Not one light on any of my guns has less than a 500 lumen rating except for my original TLR-1. I've gone through my place many times in the dark to see what I could see and what I can't with them (Streamlight TLR-1 HL - 630 lumens, Streamlight Protac HL - 600 lumens, Elzetta Charlie AVS - 900 lumens, Inforce WMLx - 500 lumens, Surefire P1R Peacekeeper - 600 lumens). I've never come close to blinding myself. You can use your light-colored walls to bounce light in order to make your WML act as a lamp instead of a spotting light if you're worried about blinding yourself.