The Rolfing Domain of Inquiry

Any attempt to understand what it is we do as Rolfers brings us face to face with the fact that Rolfing is not a finished system. What Dr. Rolf left in the hands of her students and teachers was not a closed system of dogmatic claims and attitudes, but a critical and profound third paradigm’ inquiry into the nature and meaning of normal structure and normal function. To define it in one sentence: Rolfing is a third paradigm philosophy, science, and art (or craft) which attempts to structurally and functionally integrate the human body person in space time and gravity through myo fascial manipulation and movement education. Although this definition is a mouthful, it accurately characterizes our domain of inquiry.

Because Rolfing is a third paradigm, wholistic, integrative system, engaging in any one level of this inquiry ultimately requires engaging in all. Of course, some of us have more expertise and interest in the scientific, others in the philosophical, and still others in the practical hands-on aspect of the work. Some of us, of course, are interested in all three. Nevertheless, no matter what our talents and predilections are, Rolfing will be best served if, in the spirit of critical dialogue, we attempt to advance and understand the Rolfing domain of inquiry at every level.

While contemplating the question of what our domain of inquiry looks like, I was reading a number of books in the philosophy of science. I ran across a metaphor for science that seemed especially well suited to Rolfing and stimulated my theoretical imagination. The metaphor was coined by Otto Neurath, a German philosopher of science. He said: “Science is like a boat, which we rebuild plank by plank while staying afloat in it. The philosopher and the scientist are in the same boat 2. ” I We obviously are engaged in the science of Rolfing, and to that extent we are clearly in the same boat. Nevertheless, since Rolfing is its own unique kind of inquiry, our boat should look somewhat different from the science boat.

As a preliminary attempt to display and understand the Rolf boat, I offer two diagrams.

The first diagram displays the hierarchical relation of the three paradigms of practice with some examples. Rolfing is shown as a third paradigm practice. Since I have already laid out the three paradigms in a previous article, I will not say any more about it here.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-1.jpg’>

The second diagram lays out the system of Rolfing. To follow through on our metaphor, the second displays the major outlines of the Rolf boat with some of its most important planks.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-2.jpg’>

The first two boxes at the top of the diagram concern the definition of Rolfing and its goals. The second box indicates that structural integration and functional economy are the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

As practitioners of the art of Rolfing we are always faced with three related and fundamentally important questions: 1) What do I do first?, 2) What do I do next?, and 3) How do I go on from here?. Every therapeutic system must find some way to answer these questions. Rolfing, like every other system of manipulation and movement education, has created recipes, or protocols, as formulistic guides for answering these questions. Ultimately, however, these questions are best answered when we understand the principles of intervention and can recognize normal and not so normal patterns of structure and function.

Thus, the taxonomy boxes are critically important. A taxonomy is a system of classification. As Rolfers we are interested only in those taxonomies that assist us in developing and sharpening our ability to recognize relevant local and global patterns of normalcy and loss of normalcy. Obviously, the taxonomies we choose as relevant are the ones that are observable in the body person and assist us in achieving the goals of our work.

At this point in time, I believe that there are only four fundamental taxonomy types that are relevant to our work: the segmental/structural, the geometrical, the functional, and the energetic. Under these four types I have included a number of examples of some of the more well known taxonomies, such as Jan Sultan’s Internal/External taxonomy and the old stand-by of lines/blocks/cylinders. These examples are not meant to be exhaustive. I could have included Hubert Godard’s functional/movement taxonomy or Gael Ohlgren and David Clarke’s taxonomy of unencumbered walking or Peter Levine’s neurological shock trauma taxonomy or palintonic lines as a geometrical or energetic taxonomy or some of Hans Flury’s geometrical and structural taxonomies.

Notice that the very attempt to state the goals of Rolfing necessarily implies taxonomies of normal structure and normal function. Some of our taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include specific tests by which to determine local and/or global order and lack of order.

Mastering the information represented in these boxes is essential to our being able to design a session or series of Rolfing sessions. Understanding how, when, and in what order to use these taxonomies and their associated tests most effectively in the designing of Rolfing sessions requires understanding the principles. Designing sessions takes us into the realm of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

A strategy is more general than a tactic. Strategies, for example, concern the number of sessions it takes to achieve certain structural and functional goals. Strategies also concern the general area or areas of the body that are the focus of the session or sessions. Tactics lay out the actual sequence of how the work should best proceed. For example, when you say “This person needs work on the pelvis, legs, and spine”, you have stated a strategy. Now that you have determined the components that need work, you need to determine next what specific areas in the lower body and spine you must address and in what order. You might say, for example, “I will start with the lower legs and feet first and then work the fourth hour line, and finish with back work that specifically addresses these side bending rotations. My reasons for choosing this line of entry are…, etc.” In saying this you have stated a tactic.

Of course, when you put your hands on your client’s body and begin to work, you may discover a number of issues not readily apparent to your eyes. These discoveries may confirm your choices or they may lead you to revise your tactical approach or even change your strategic approach.

Implicit in your strategies, tactics, and what your hands tell you is a sense of what techniques will work best for your unique and individual client. Some places in her body may respond best to light indirect techniques and others to heavier indirect techniques. Some areas may require good old fashioned heavy pressured direct techniques to prepare and open up an area for gentle indirect repositioning of vertebrae. Some clients respond well to mixing in a lot of movement with your manipulations and others do not. All of these considerations concern the art of Rolfing and require an understanding of how to use the principles and taxonomies in the context of attempting to achieve the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

How To Rolf Non-formulistically 3

With the help of the above brief explanation of the diagram of our system, let us look in some detail at how to Rolf non-formulistically. There are two sets of related questions that need to be asked; taxonomy questions and principle questions. Let us look at the taxonomy questions first. Begin by asking yourself the following two questions: 1) which component(s) of the body, if organized, will bring the highest possible level of order to the whole?, and 2) which component(s) exhibit the major motion restrictions? Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, the answers to these questions should tar-get the same component(s). Accurately answering these two questions requires a highly developed pattern recognition capacity. It requires being able to understand and use all the relevant taxonomies in conjunction with the ability to recognize normal structure and function. To say it differently, we must be able to recognize, at both the local and global levels, what order and its loss look like. Therefore, we can call these two questions the taxonomy questions.

These two taxonomy questions should not be confused with and limited to the question traditionally posed at the eighth and ninth hours, “Is this session an upper or a lower?” The upper/lower question is much too limited. By focusing only on the upper and lower girdles, this question actually interferes with our ability to perceive other components of the body that very often demand our attention and work. For example, if support and back/front balance have been properly handled and if the body has been properly prepared, then the eighth hour might very well be about the axial complex. Clearly, the axial complex is neither a lower or upper component. Strategizing sessions by looking through the lens of the upper/ lower question, therefore, can very often lead us away from what is required to achieve structural integration and functional economy.

After you have determined the component(s), which, if organized, will best benefit the whole, ask the following three questions: 1) Is this body person prepared to accept and sustain the proposed organization of component(s)?; 2) How is the support? Is there sufficient support for the proposed organization of component(s)?; and 3) Is there appropriate back/front balance and core/ sleeve organization? These questions are formulated from principles and can be called the principle questions. The first question is based on the Preparatory Principle, the second on the Support Principle, and the third on the Palintonic Principle. The Wholistic Principle governs all three principles and says that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are. It reminds us that we must intend and perceive globally while we work locally. It also reminds us that every strategy, tactic, and technique must be considered in terms of its impact on the whole person in gravity.

The principles should be under consideration at all times. How the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions are answered determines the temporal sequence of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

For example, suppose a client is about to receive the first session in a post-ten series. I have already discussed at length the spinal bio-mechanical taxonomy and the strategies and tactics for organizing the spine in RE-THINKING THE C-POSITION.4 In order to keep our discussion short, I will assume knowledge of the information contained in that article as background for our present example. Let us suppose, therefore, you determine that this particular series should concentrate on organizing your client’s spine. On the basis of how you answer the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions, you may strategize the proposed work as a three session series. First, however, you must ask the preparatory question: is your client’s body ready and able to accept the proposed level of work? If the answer is no, then you must prepare his body to accept the proposed level of spinal organization. Depending on the level of openness and order already present, the preparatory work may take an entire session or only fifteen minutes. And the preparatory work must be uniquely structured to the needs of this particular client.

If you decide that your client is ready and able to absorb the proposed organization, then the preparatory principle has already been fulfilled and you can move on to the support and palintonic questions. If, for example, support, back/front balance, and sleeve restrictions have not been handled adequately, then you must address these issues before you move into the spinal work. If some of these issues are not a problem, then the principles involved have been fulfilled and you can move on to the next consideration, which may or may not be organizing the spine.

Realize that after you complete the first post-ten session, any combination of preparatory, support, and palintonic issues may surface and need to be handled in the next session. To take a simple example, you may find that you want to “mobilize and warm up the tissue a bit” in an area before you attempt to release articular fixations and derotate associated vertebrae. Your inclination in this case falls under the preparatory principle. On a larger scale, you may discover that the preparatory strategy of the first session upset the support in your client’s body. Thus, you may need to spend some time securing the foundations before advancing to the spinal work.

The amount of time it takes to handle all these issues obviously depends on your client’s unique structural and functional needs. You may discover as you work that your client responds easily and quickly to your work and that a three session series is more than enough time to get the job done. Or you may discover that your strategy of three sessions underestimated your client’s difficulties and that actually five sessions are needed to get the job done.

The very same principle/taxonomy questions considered above in relation to our imagined post-ten series apply equally to the ten series strategy. Before we look at strategizing basic Rolfing according to principles, let us first consider the ten series as a formulistic recipe. Notice that a great deal of the focus of the early sessions of the formulistic recipe is on preparation. This point is especially clear in the first session. Even though the second session of the recipe takes us to the lower legs and feet and hence to support issues, preparation is still the primary issue. The second hour mostly concerns decompensating the feet, lower legs, and spine in preparation for the organization that is to come later. Preparation is still at work in the third hour, but the palintonic issue of back/front order begins to take precedence. The palintonic issue of sleeve/ core organization is present all the way through in these first three sessions in the injunction to begin the series with work on the sleeve.

Although the above look at the first three sessions of the ten series is a bit brief and simplistic, it is perhaps enough to provide a sense of how the principle/taxonomy questions might underlie the recipe(s). However, when we cease looking at and Rolfing our clients through these traditional formulistic lenses, we must realize that the order and progression of the work will probably look somewhat different, and in some cases quite a bit different, than any given recipe(s) can predict.

When we cease structuring our work around recipes and instead formulate our strategies and tactics by means of the principle /,taxonomy questions, we realize immediately that the amount of time it takes to achieve adequate preparation, support, and palintonicity will necessarily vary from client to client and session to session. Furthermore, the level and depth at which any given client is able to own preparation, support, and palintonicity also varies considerably. The issues of preparation, support, palintonicity also always show up in varying degrees of importance and at different levels according to the unique structural and functional needs of each individual client throughout any Rolfing series. For example, in post ten Rolfing, preparation strategies, tactics, and techniques are quite different in application, scope, and depth from the preparation requirements of the early stages of the ten-series. When we drop our formulistic lenses, it is clear that the first three sessions of the recipe(s) are often not enough to achieve adequate back/front order, which is supposed to be the goal of the third hour. In point of fact, for some clients back/front order does not appear until after core/ sleeve issues have been resolved or, in some cases, until after an advanced series.

As I have pointed out in previous articles, recipes are based on principles. Recipes are not principles. They are formulistic patterns of Rolfing. My experience is that a series of ten sessions provides an excellent framework within which to strategize the initial Rolfing series for most clients. However, when the sessions unfold according to the unique needs of the client in accordance with the principles, the work often progresses in ways that look quite different from the way many of our recipes suggest it should. Nevertheless, I am still amazed by the clarity and power of our recipes, both in how effective they are for many clients and in how much structural/functional wisdom is contained there in.

Concluding Remarks

Rolfing is not, and probably never will be, a finished system. To return to Neurath’s metaphor, every box in my diagram of our system is an important plank in the wholistic Rolf boat. No doubt, there are more planks to be discovered. But, no plank should be immune to criticism and every plank should be undergoing careful and intense investigation. We choose which planks are important and relevant to our system on the basis of our understanding of the nature of Rolfing. Because our system is a wholistic integrative inquiry, adding, replacing, or refurbishing planks often reverberates throughout the whole system.

This diagram of our system is useful because it clearly displays our domain of inquiry and the relations between its many levels. It is also useful in our dialogue with other systems of somatic education and therapy, especially with other third paradigm systems. If each third paradigm system could fill in the important boxes with the information relevant to that system, the similarities and differences between each would become immediately obvious. Such comparisons could open the door to many rich and provocative discussions. In turn, such discussions might stimulate more cooperation and cross pollination. One obvious similarity between all third paradigm systems is the Wholistic Principle. At the very least, all wholistic systems would have to embrace the principle that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are.

An interesting and important difference that I have discovered between second and third paradigm practices of manual therapy is that second paradigm practitioners always proceed according to treatment protocols (or recipes) rather than principles. In-deed, I would argue that by the very nature of the second paradigm symptomatic and piece-meal approach to the body, it is not even possible to formulate principles of manipulation. Principles appropriately show up only in third paradigm systems.

On the basis of this diagram let me make one final suggestion. We still stand in need of a clear comprehensive science and phenomenolgy of structural integration. As I understand it, a good part of Hans Flury’s important work is motivated by the recognition of this need. What precisely does structural integration look like? How do we recognize it when it appears?

I would be prepared to argue that no single indicator can be found for determining structural integration. We have assumed for years that the line of gravity was our only and best objective indicator or standard for structural integration. Peter Schwind5 has already pointed out some of the obvious shortcomings of this view. Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, we should be looking for a number of structural and functional indicators. None of these possible indicators and tests taken by itself will allow us to conclude with any certainty that structural integration has occurred. But all of them taken together might add up to a series of descriptive standards and tests for structural/functional order.

Fortunately, a number of people have been hard at work articulating taxonomies of normal and not so normal structure and function. Some of these taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include clear tests for determining lack of local/global order and, by implication, tests for determining order. I mentioned some of these taxonomies and their creators in the first section of this article. Notice that each of our four meta-taxonomy boxes contains and implies implicit and explicit descriptions of and tests for normalcy. My suggestion is that these taxonomies are where we need to look for our indicators of structural integration. And as we continue to articulate and clarify these taxonomies, we will discover the comprehensive phenomenology and science of normal structure and function we are looking for. Being able to use these taxonomies in conjunction with our principles will allow our work to become more effective.

I am attracted to this diagram and the boat metaphor because together they display the many levels of our systematic discipline of inquiry and reassure us in the understanding of how our system can continue as it constantly and necessarily undergoes criticism, revision, and improvement at every level. Rolfing will sink to the bottom of the sea of obscurity, if it remains mired in the dogmatic ritualism of its past. Just to the extent that we cannot answer the questions, “What do I do first?”, “What do I do next?”, and “How do I go on from here?”, without invoking the authority of a teacher or of formulistic recipe(s) is the extent to which we limit our understanding of the work. The philosophy, science, and art of Rolfing demand critical ongoing investigations into every level and every plank of our wholistic boat.

Footnotes

1 Rolf Lines (Spring 1992), Vol. XX No.2.

2 Quoted in NEUROPHILOSOPY: Toward a Unified Science of theMind/ Brain by PatriciaSmith Churchland (Cambridge, Mass., 1986), P.265.

3 A great deal of this section comes from and rests upon Jan Sultan’s pioneering attempts to teach non-formulisitic Rolfing.

4 Rolf Lines (March, 1993), pp. 60-72.

5 See, for example, Preliminary Considerations For A Theory Of Core, Rolf Lines (Fall,1992) pp. 16-24.[:de]The Rolfing Domain of Inquiry

Any attempt to understand what it is we do as Rolfers brings us face to face with the fact that Rolfing is not a finished system. What Dr. Rolf left in the hands of her students and teachers was not a closed system of dogmatic claims and attitudes, but a critical and profound third paradigm’ inquiry into the nature and meaning of normal structure and normal function. To define it in one sentence: Rolfing is a third paradigm philosophy, science, and art (or craft) which attempts to structurally and functionally integrate the human body person in space time and gravity through myo fascial manipulation and movement education. Although this definition is a mouthful, it accurately characterizes our domain of inquiry.

Because Rolfing is a third paradigm, wholistic, integrative system, engaging in any one level of this inquiry ultimately requires engaging in all. Of course, some of us have more expertise and interest in the scientific, others in the philosophical, and still others in the practical hands-on aspect of the work. Some of us, of course, are interested in all three. Nevertheless, no matter what our talents and predilections are, Rolfing will be best served if, in the spirit of critical dialogue, we attempt to advance and understand the Rolfing domain of inquiry at every level.

While contemplating the question of what our domain of inquiry looks like, I was reading a number of books in the philosophy of science. I ran across a metaphor for science that seemed especially well suited to Rolfing and stimulated my theoretical imagination. The metaphor was coined by Otto Neurath, a German philosopher of science. He said: “Science is like a boat, which we rebuild plank by plank while staying afloat in it. The philosopher and the scientist are in the same boat 2. ” I We obviously are engaged in the science of Rolfing, and to that extent we are clearly in the same boat. Nevertheless, since Rolfing is its own unique kind of inquiry, our boat should look somewhat different from the science boat.

As a preliminary attempt to display and understand the Rolf boat, I offer two diagrams.

The first diagram displays the hierarchical relation of the three paradigms of practice with some examples. Rolfing is shown as a third paradigm practice. Since I have already laid out the three paradigms in a previous article, I will not say any more about it here.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-1.jpg’>

The second diagram lays out the system of Rolfing. To follow through on our metaphor, the second displays the major outlines of the Rolf boat with some of its most important planks.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-2.jpg’>

The first two boxes at the top of the diagram concern the definition of Rolfing and its goals. The second box indicates that structural integration and functional economy are the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

As practitioners of the art of Rolfing we are always faced with three related and fundamentally important questions: 1) What do I do first?, 2) What do I do next?, and 3) How do I go on from here?. Every therapeutic system must find some way to answer these questions. Rolfing, like every other system of manipulation and movement education, has created recipes, or protocols, as formulistic guides for answering these questions. Ultimately, however, these questions are best answered when we understand the principles of intervention and can recognize normal and not so normal patterns of structure and function.

Thus, the taxonomy boxes are critically important. A taxonomy is a system of classification. As Rolfers we are interested only in those taxonomies that assist us in developing and sharpening our ability to recognize relevant local and global patterns of normalcy and loss of normalcy. Obviously, the taxonomies we choose as relevant are the ones that are observable in the body person and assist us in achieving the goals of our work.

At this point in time, I believe that there are only four fundamental taxonomy types that are relevant to our work: the segmental/structural, the geometrical, the functional, and the energetic. Under these four types I have included a number of examples of some of the more well known taxonomies, such as Jan Sultan’s Internal/External taxonomy and the old stand-by of lines/blocks/cylinders. These examples are not meant to be exhaustive. I could have included Hubert Godard’s functional/movement taxonomy or Gael Ohlgren and David Clarke’s taxonomy of unencumbered walking or Peter Levine’s neurological shock trauma taxonomy or palintonic lines as a geometrical or energetic taxonomy or some of Hans Flury’s geometrical and structural taxonomies.

Notice that the very attempt to state the goals of Rolfing necessarily implies taxonomies of normal structure and normal function. Some of our taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include specific tests by which to determine local and/or global order and lack of order.

Mastering the information represented in these boxes is essential to our being able to design a session or series of Rolfing sessions. Understanding how, when, and in what order to use these taxonomies and their associated tests most effectively in the designing of Rolfing sessions requires understanding the principles. Designing sessions takes us into the realm of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

A strategy is more general than a tactic. Strategies, for example, concern the number of sessions it takes to achieve certain structural and functional goals. Strategies also concern the general area or areas of the body that are the focus of the session or sessions. Tactics lay out the actual sequence of how the work should best proceed. For example, when you say “This person needs work on the pelvis, legs, and spine”, you have stated a strategy. Now that you have determined the components that need work, you need to determine next what specific areas in the lower body and spine you must address and in what order. You might say, for example, “I will start with the lower legs and feet first and then work the fourth hour line, and finish with back work that specifically addresses these side bending rotations. My reasons for choosing this line of entry are…, etc.” In saying this you have stated a tactic.

Of course, when you put your hands on your client’s body and begin to work, you may discover a number of issues not readily apparent to your eyes. These discoveries may confirm your choices or they may lead you to revise your tactical approach or even change your strategic approach.

Implicit in your strategies, tactics, and what your hands tell you is a sense of what techniques will work best for your unique and individual client. Some places in her body may respond best to light indirect techniques and others to heavier indirect techniques. Some areas may require good old fashioned heavy pressured direct techniques to prepare and open up an area for gentle indirect repositioning of vertebrae. Some clients respond well to mixing in a lot of movement with your manipulations and others do not. All of these considerations concern the art of Rolfing and require an understanding of how to use the principles and taxonomies in the context of attempting to achieve the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

How To Rolf Non-formulistically 3

With the help of the above brief explanation of the diagram of our system, let us look in some detail at how to Rolf non-formulistically. There are two sets of related questions that need to be asked; taxonomy questions and principle questions. Let us look at the taxonomy questions first. Begin by asking yourself the following two questions: 1) which component(s) of the body, if organized, will bring the highest possible level of order to the whole?, and 2) which component(s) exhibit the major motion restrictions? Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, the answers to these questions should tar-get the same component(s). Accurately answering these two questions requires a highly developed pattern recognition capacity. It requires being able to understand and use all the relevant taxonomies in conjunction with the ability to recognize normal structure and function. To say it differently, we must be able to recognize, at both the local and global levels, what order and its loss look like. Therefore, we can call these two questions the taxonomy questions.

These two taxonomy questions should not be confused with and limited to the question traditionally posed at the eighth and ninth hours, “Is this session an upper or a lower?” The upper/lower question is much too limited. By focusing only on the upper and lower girdles, this question actually interferes with our ability to perceive other components of the body that very often demand our attention and work. For example, if support and back/front balance have been properly handled and if the body has been properly prepared, then the eighth hour might very well be about the axial complex. Clearly, the axial complex is neither a lower or upper component. Strategizing sessions by looking through the lens of the upper/ lower question, therefore, can very often lead us away from what is required to achieve structural integration and functional economy.

After you have determined the component(s), which, if organized, will best benefit the whole, ask the following three questions: 1) Is this body person prepared to accept and sustain the proposed organization of component(s)?; 2) How is the support? Is there sufficient support for the proposed organization of component(s)?; and 3) Is there appropriate back/front balance and core/ sleeve organization? These questions are formulated from principles and can be called the principle questions. The first question is based on the Preparatory Principle, the second on the Support Principle, and the third on the Palintonic Principle. The Wholistic Principle governs all three principles and says that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are. It reminds us that we must intend and perceive globally while we work locally. It also reminds us that every strategy, tactic, and technique must be considered in terms of its impact on the whole person in gravity.

The principles should be under consideration at all times. How the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions are answered determines the temporal sequence of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

For example, suppose a client is about to receive the first session in a post-ten series. I have already discussed at length the spinal bio-mechanical taxonomy and the strategies and tactics for organizing the spine in RE-THINKING THE C-POSITION.4 In order to keep our discussion short, I will assume knowledge of the information contained in that article as background for our present example. Let us suppose, therefore, you determine that this particular series should concentrate on organizing your client’s spine. On the basis of how you answer the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions, you may strategize the proposed work as a three session series. First, however, you must ask the preparatory question: is your client’s body ready and able to accept the proposed level of work? If the answer is no, then you must prepare his body to accept the proposed level of spinal organization. Depending on the level of openness and order already present, the preparatory work may take an entire session or only fifteen minutes. And the preparatory work must be uniquely structured to the needs of this particular client.

If you decide that your client is ready and able to absorb the proposed organization, then the preparatory principle has already been fulfilled and you can move on to the support and palintonic questions. If, for example, support, back/front balance, and sleeve restrictions have not been handled adequately, then you must address these issues before you move into the spinal work. If some of these issues are not a problem, then the principles involved have been fulfilled and you can move on to the next consideration, which may or may not be organizing the spine.

Realize that after you complete the first post-ten session, any combination of preparatory, support, and palintonic issues may surface and need to be handled in the next session. To take a simple example, you may find that you want to “mobilize and warm up the tissue a bit” in an area before you attempt to release articular fixations and derotate associated vertebrae. Your inclination in this case falls under the preparatory principle. On a larger scale, you may discover that the preparatory strategy of the first session upset the support in your client’s body. Thus, you may need to spend some time securing the foundations before advancing to the spinal work.

The amount of time it takes to handle all these issues obviously depends on your client’s unique structural and functional needs. You may discover as you work that your client responds easily and quickly to your work and that a three session series is more than enough time to get the job done. Or you may discover that your strategy of three sessions underestimated your client’s difficulties and that actually five sessions are needed to get the job done.

The very same principle/taxonomy questions considered above in relation to our imagined post-ten series apply equally to the ten series strategy. Before we look at strategizing basic Rolfing according to principles, let us first consider the ten series as a formulistic recipe. Notice that a great deal of the focus of the early sessions of the formulistic recipe is on preparation. This point is especially clear in the first session. Even though the second session of the recipe takes us to the lower legs and feet and hence to support issues, preparation is still the primary issue. The second hour mostly concerns decompensating the feet, lower legs, and spine in preparation for the organization that is to come later. Preparation is still at work in the third hour, but the palintonic issue of back/front order begins to take precedence. The palintonic issue of sleeve/ core organization is present all the way through in these first three sessions in the injunction to begin the series with work on the sleeve.

Although the above look at the first three sessions of the ten series is a bit brief and simplistic, it is perhaps enough to provide a sense of how the principle/taxonomy questions might underlie the recipe(s). However, when we cease looking at and Rolfing our clients through these traditional formulistic lenses, we must realize that the order and progression of the work will probably look somewhat different, and in some cases quite a bit different, than any given recipe(s) can predict.

When we cease structuring our work around recipes and instead formulate our strategies and tactics by means of the principle /,taxonomy questions, we realize immediately that the amount of time it takes to achieve adequate preparation, support, and palintonicity will necessarily vary from client to client and session to session. Furthermore, the level and depth at which any given client is able to own preparation, support, and palintonicity also varies considerably. The issues of preparation, support, palintonicity also always show up in varying degrees of importance and at different levels according to the unique structural and functional needs of each individual client throughout any Rolfing series. For example, in post ten Rolfing, preparation strategies, tactics, and techniques are quite different in application, scope, and depth from the preparation requirements of the early stages of the ten-series. When we drop our formulistic lenses, it is clear that the first three sessions of the recipe(s) are often not enough to achieve adequate back/front order, which is supposed to be the goal of the third hour. In point of fact, for some clients back/front order does not appear until after core/ sleeve issues have been resolved or, in some cases, until after an advanced series.

As I have pointed out in previous articles, recipes are based on principles. Recipes are not principles. They are formulistic patterns of Rolfing. My experience is that a series of ten sessions provides an excellent framework within which to strategize the initial Rolfing series for most clients. However, when the sessions unfold according to the unique needs of the client in accordance with the principles, the work often progresses in ways that look quite different from the way many of our recipes suggest it should. Nevertheless, I am still amazed by the clarity and power of our recipes, both in how effective they are for many clients and in how much structural/functional wisdom is contained there in.

Concluding Remarks

Rolfing is not, and probably never will be, a finished system. To return to Neurath’s metaphor, every box in my diagram of our system is an important plank in the wholistic Rolf boat. No doubt, there are more planks to be discovered. But, no plank should be immune to criticism and every plank should be undergoing careful and intense investigation. We choose which planks are important and relevant to our system on the basis of our understanding of the nature of Rolfing. Because our system is a wholistic integrative inquiry, adding, replacing, or refurbishing planks often reverberates throughout the whole system.

This diagram of our system is useful because it clearly displays our domain of inquiry and the relations between its many levels. It is also useful in our dialogue with other systems of somatic education and therapy, especially with other third paradigm systems. If each third paradigm system could fill in the important boxes with the information relevant to that system, the similarities and differences between each would become immediately obvious. Such comparisons could open the door to many rich and provocative discussions. In turn, such discussions might stimulate more cooperation and cross pollination. One obvious similarity between all third paradigm systems is the Wholistic Principle. At the very least, all wholistic systems would have to embrace the principle that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are.

An interesting and important difference that I have discovered between second and third paradigm practices of manual therapy is that second paradigm practitioners always proceed according to treatment protocols (or recipes) rather than principles. In-deed, I would argue that by the very nature of the second paradigm symptomatic and piece-meal approach to the body, it is not even possible to formulate principles of manipulation. Principles appropriately show up only in third paradigm systems.

On the basis of this diagram let me make one final suggestion. We still stand in need of a clear comprehensive science and phenomenolgy of structural integration. As I understand it, a good part of Hans Flury’s important work is motivated by the recognition of this need. What precisely does structural integration look like? How do we recognize it when it appears?

I would be prepared to argue that no single indicator can be found for determining structural integration. We have assumed for years that the line of gravity was our only and best objective indicator or standard for structural integration. Peter Schwind5 has already pointed out some of the obvious shortcomings of this view. Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, we should be looking for a number of structural and functional indicators. None of these possible indicators and tests taken by itself will allow us to conclude with any certainty that structural integration has occurred. But all of them taken together might add up to a series of descriptive standards and tests for structural/functional order.

Fortunately, a number of people have been hard at work articulating taxonomies of normal and not so normal structure and function. Some of these taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include clear tests for determining lack of local/global order and, by implication, tests for determining order. I mentioned some of these taxonomies and their creators in the first section of this article. Notice that each of our four meta-taxonomy boxes contains and implies implicit and explicit descriptions of and tests for normalcy. My suggestion is that these taxonomies are where we need to look for our indicators of structural integration. And as we continue to articulate and clarify these taxonomies, we will discover the comprehensive phenomenology and science of normal structure and function we are looking for. Being able to use these taxonomies in conjunction with our principles will allow our work to become more effective.

I am attracted to this diagram and the boat metaphor because together they display the many levels of our systematic discipline of inquiry and reassure us in the understanding of how our system can continue as it constantly and necessarily undergoes criticism, revision, and improvement at every level. Rolfing will sink to the bottom of the sea of obscurity, if it remains mired in the dogmatic ritualism of its past. Just to the extent that we cannot answer the questions, “What do I do first?”, “What do I do next?”, and “How do I go on from here?”, without invoking the authority of a teacher or of formulistic recipe(s) is the extent to which we limit our understanding of the work. The philosophy, science, and art of Rolfing demand critical ongoing investigations into every level and every plank of our wholistic boat.

Footnotes

1 Rolf Lines (Spring 1992), Vol. XX No.2.

2 Quoted in NEUROPHILOSOPY: Toward a Unified Science of theMind/ Brain by PatriciaSmith Churchland (Cambridge, Mass., 1986), P.265.

3 A great deal of this section comes from and rests upon Jan Sultan’s pioneering attempts to teach non-formulisitic Rolfing.

4 Rolf Lines (March, 1993), pp. 60-72.

5 See, for example, Preliminary Considerations For A Theory Of Core, Rolf Lines (Fall,1992) pp. 16-24.[:fr]The Rolfing Domain of Inquiry

Any attempt to understand what it is we do as Rolfers brings us face to face with the fact that Rolfing is not a finished system. What Dr. Rolf left in the hands of her students and teachers was not a closed system of dogmatic claims and attitudes, but a critical and profound third paradigm’ inquiry into the nature and meaning of normal structure and normal function. To define it in one sentence: Rolfing is a third paradigm philosophy, science, and art (or craft) which attempts to structurally and functionally integrate the human body person in space time and gravity through myo fascial manipulation and movement education. Although this definition is a mouthful, it accurately characterizes our domain of inquiry.

Because Rolfing is a third paradigm, wholistic, integrative system, engaging in any one level of this inquiry ultimately requires engaging in all. Of course, some of us have more expertise and interest in the scientific, others in the philosophical, and still others in the practical hands-on aspect of the work. Some of us, of course, are interested in all three. Nevertheless, no matter what our talents and predilections are, Rolfing will be best served if, in the spirit of critical dialogue, we attempt to advance and understand the Rolfing domain of inquiry at every level.

While contemplating the question of what our domain of inquiry looks like, I was reading a number of books in the philosophy of science. I ran across a metaphor for science that seemed especially well suited to Rolfing and stimulated my theoretical imagination. The metaphor was coined by Otto Neurath, a German philosopher of science. He said: “Science is like a boat, which we rebuild plank by plank while staying afloat in it. The philosopher and the scientist are in the same boat 2. ” I We obviously are engaged in the science of Rolfing, and to that extent we are clearly in the same boat. Nevertheless, since Rolfing is its own unique kind of inquiry, our boat should look somewhat different from the science boat.

As a preliminary attempt to display and understand the Rolf boat, I offer two diagrams.

The first diagram displays the hierarchical relation of the three paradigms of practice with some examples. Rolfing is shown as a third paradigm practice. Since I have already laid out the three paradigms in a previous article, I will not say any more about it here.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-1.jpg’>

The second diagram lays out the system of Rolfing. To follow through on our metaphor, the second displays the major outlines of the Rolf boat with some of its most important planks.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-2.jpg’>

The first two boxes at the top of the diagram concern the definition of Rolfing and its goals. The second box indicates that structural integration and functional economy are the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

As practitioners of the art of Rolfing we are always faced with three related and fundamentally important questions: 1) What do I do first?, 2) What do I do next?, and 3) How do I go on from here?. Every therapeutic system must find some way to answer these questions. Rolfing, like every other system of manipulation and movement education, has created recipes, or protocols, as formulistic guides for answering these questions. Ultimately, however, these questions are best answered when we understand the principles of intervention and can recognize normal and not so normal patterns of structure and function.

Thus, the taxonomy boxes are critically important. A taxonomy is a system of classification. As Rolfers we are interested only in those taxonomies that assist us in developing and sharpening our ability to recognize relevant local and global patterns of normalcy and loss of normalcy. Obviously, the taxonomies we choose as relevant are the ones that are observable in the body person and assist us in achieving the goals of our work.

At this point in time, I believe that there are only four fundamental taxonomy types that are relevant to our work: the segmental/structural, the geometrical, the functional, and the energetic. Under these four types I have included a number of examples of some of the more well known taxonomies, such as Jan Sultan’s Internal/External taxonomy and the old stand-by of lines/blocks/cylinders. These examples are not meant to be exhaustive. I could have included Hubert Godard’s functional/movement taxonomy or Gael Ohlgren and David Clarke’s taxonomy of unencumbered walking or Peter Levine’s neurological shock trauma taxonomy or palintonic lines as a geometrical or energetic taxonomy or some of Hans Flury’s geometrical and structural taxonomies.

Notice that the very attempt to state the goals of Rolfing necessarily implies taxonomies of normal structure and normal function. Some of our taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include specific tests by which to determine local and/or global order and lack of order.

Mastering the information represented in these boxes is essential to our being able to design a session or series of Rolfing sessions. Understanding how, when, and in what order to use these taxonomies and their associated tests most effectively in the designing of Rolfing sessions requires understanding the principles. Designing sessions takes us into the realm of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

A strategy is more general than a tactic. Strategies, for example, concern the number of sessions it takes to achieve certain structural and functional goals. Strategies also concern the general area or areas of the body that are the focus of the session or sessions. Tactics lay out the actual sequence of how the work should best proceed. For example, when you say “This person needs work on the pelvis, legs, and spine”, you have stated a strategy. Now that you have determined the components that need work, you need to determine next what specific areas in the lower body and spine you must address and in what order. You might say, for example, “I will start with the lower legs and feet first and then work the fourth hour line, and finish with back work that specifically addresses these side bending rotations. My reasons for choosing this line of entry are…, etc.” In saying this you have stated a tactic.

Of course, when you put your hands on your client’s body and begin to work, you may discover a number of issues not readily apparent to your eyes. These discoveries may confirm your choices or they may lead you to revise your tactical approach or even change your strategic approach.

Implicit in your strategies, tactics, and what your hands tell you is a sense of what techniques will work best for your unique and individual client. Some places in her body may respond best to light indirect techniques and others to heavier indirect techniques. Some areas may require good old fashioned heavy pressured direct techniques to prepare and open up an area for gentle indirect repositioning of vertebrae. Some clients respond well to mixing in a lot of movement with your manipulations and others do not. All of these considerations concern the art of Rolfing and require an understanding of how to use the principles and taxonomies in the context of attempting to achieve the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

How To Rolf Non-formulistically 3

With the help of the above brief explanation of the diagram of our system, let us look in some detail at how to Rolf non-formulistically. There are two sets of related questions that need to be asked; taxonomy questions and principle questions. Let us look at the taxonomy questions first. Begin by asking yourself the following two questions: 1) which component(s) of the body, if organized, will bring the highest possible level of order to the whole?, and 2) which component(s) exhibit the major motion restrictions? Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, the answers to these questions should tar-get the same component(s). Accurately answering these two questions requires a highly developed pattern recognition capacity. It requires being able to understand and use all the relevant taxonomies in conjunction with the ability to recognize normal structure and function. To say it differently, we must be able to recognize, at both the local and global levels, what order and its loss look like. Therefore, we can call these two questions the taxonomy questions.

These two taxonomy questions should not be confused with and limited to the question traditionally posed at the eighth and ninth hours, “Is this session an upper or a lower?” The upper/lower question is much too limited. By focusing only on the upper and lower girdles, this question actually interferes with our ability to perceive other components of the body that very often demand our attention and work. For example, if support and back/front balance have been properly handled and if the body has been properly prepared, then the eighth hour might very well be about the axial complex. Clearly, the axial complex is neither a lower or upper component. Strategizing sessions by looking through the lens of the upper/ lower question, therefore, can very often lead us away from what is required to achieve structural integration and functional economy.

After you have determined the component(s), which, if organized, will best benefit the whole, ask the following three questions: 1) Is this body person prepared to accept and sustain the proposed organization of component(s)?; 2) How is the support? Is there sufficient support for the proposed organization of component(s)?; and 3) Is there appropriate back/front balance and core/ sleeve organization? These questions are formulated from principles and can be called the principle questions. The first question is based on the Preparatory Principle, the second on the Support Principle, and the third on the Palintonic Principle. The Wholistic Principle governs all three principles and says that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are. It reminds us that we must intend and perceive globally while we work locally. It also reminds us that every strategy, tactic, and technique must be considered in terms of its impact on the whole person in gravity.

The principles should be under consideration at all times. How the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions are answered determines the temporal sequence of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

For example, suppose a client is about to receive the first session in a post-ten series. I have already discussed at length the spinal bio-mechanical taxonomy and the strategies and tactics for organizing the spine in RE-THINKING THE C-POSITION.4 In order to keep our discussion short, I will assume knowledge of the information contained in that article as background for our present example. Let us suppose, therefore, you determine that this particular series should concentrate on organizing your client’s spine. On the basis of how you answer the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions, you may strategize the proposed work as a three session series. First, however, you must ask the preparatory question: is your client’s body ready and able to accept the proposed level of work? If the answer is no, then you must prepare his body to accept the proposed level of spinal organization. Depending on the level of openness and order already present, the preparatory work may take an entire session or only fifteen minutes. And the preparatory work must be uniquely structured to the needs of this particular client.

If you decide that your client is ready and able to absorb the proposed organization, then the preparatory principle has already been fulfilled and you can move on to the support and palintonic questions. If, for example, support, back/front balance, and sleeve restrictions have not been handled adequately, then you must address these issues before you move into the spinal work. If some of these issues are not a problem, then the principles involved have been fulfilled and you can move on to the next consideration, which may or may not be organizing the spine.

Realize that after you complete the first post-ten session, any combination of preparatory, support, and palintonic issues may surface and need to be handled in the next session. To take a simple example, you may find that you want to “mobilize and warm up the tissue a bit” in an area before you attempt to release articular fixations and derotate associated vertebrae. Your inclination in this case falls under the preparatory principle. On a larger scale, you may discover that the preparatory strategy of the first session upset the support in your client’s body. Thus, you may need to spend some time securing the foundations before advancing to the spinal work.

The amount of time it takes to handle all these issues obviously depends on your client’s unique structural and functional needs. You may discover as you work that your client responds easily and quickly to your work and that a three session series is more than enough time to get the job done. Or you may discover that your strategy of three sessions underestimated your client’s difficulties and that actually five sessions are needed to get the job done.

The very same principle/taxonomy questions considered above in relation to our imagined post-ten series apply equally to the ten series strategy. Before we look at strategizing basic Rolfing according to principles, let us first consider the ten series as a formulistic recipe. Notice that a great deal of the focus of the early sessions of the formulistic recipe is on preparation. This point is especially clear in the first session. Even though the second session of the recipe takes us to the lower legs and feet and hence to support issues, preparation is still the primary issue. The second hour mostly concerns decompensating the feet, lower legs, and spine in preparation for the organization that is to come later. Preparation is still at work in the third hour, but the palintonic issue of back/front order begins to take precedence. The palintonic issue of sleeve/ core organization is present all the way through in these first three sessions in the injunction to begin the series with work on the sleeve.

Although the above look at the first three sessions of the ten series is a bit brief and simplistic, it is perhaps enough to provide a sense of how the principle/taxonomy questions might underlie the recipe(s). However, when we cease looking at and Rolfing our clients through these traditional formulistic lenses, we must realize that the order and progression of the work will probably look somewhat different, and in some cases quite a bit different, than any given recipe(s) can predict.

When we cease structuring our work around recipes and instead formulate our strategies and tactics by means of the principle /,taxonomy questions, we realize immediately that the amount of time it takes to achieve adequate preparation, support, and palintonicity will necessarily vary from client to client and session to session. Furthermore, the level and depth at which any given client is able to own preparation, support, and palintonicity also varies considerably. The issues of preparation, support, palintonicity also always show up in varying degrees of importance and at different levels according to the unique structural and functional needs of each individual client throughout any Rolfing series. For example, in post ten Rolfing, preparation strategies, tactics, and techniques are quite different in application, scope, and depth from the preparation requirements of the early stages of the ten-series. When we drop our formulistic lenses, it is clear that the first three sessions of the recipe(s) are often not enough to achieve adequate back/front order, which is supposed to be the goal of the third hour. In point of fact, for some clients back/front order does not appear until after core/ sleeve issues have been resolved or, in some cases, until after an advanced series.

As I have pointed out in previous articles, recipes are based on principles. Recipes are not principles. They are formulistic patterns of Rolfing. My experience is that a series of ten sessions provides an excellent framework within which to strategize the initial Rolfing series for most clients. However, when the sessions unfold according to the unique needs of the client in accordance with the principles, the work often progresses in ways that look quite different from the way many of our recipes suggest it should. Nevertheless, I am still amazed by the clarity and power of our recipes, both in how effective they are for many clients and in how much structural/functional wisdom is contained there in.

Concluding Remarks

Rolfing is not, and probably never will be, a finished system. To return to Neurath’s metaphor, every box in my diagram of our system is an important plank in the wholistic Rolf boat. No doubt, there are more planks to be discovered. But, no plank should be immune to criticism and every plank should be undergoing careful and intense investigation. We choose which planks are important and relevant to our system on the basis of our understanding of the nature of Rolfing. Because our system is a wholistic integrative inquiry, adding, replacing, or refurbishing planks often reverberates throughout the whole system.

This diagram of our system is useful because it clearly displays our domain of inquiry and the relations between its many levels. It is also useful in our dialogue with other systems of somatic education and therapy, especially with other third paradigm systems. If each third paradigm system could fill in the important boxes with the information relevant to that system, the similarities and differences between each would become immediately obvious. Such comparisons could open the door to many rich and provocative discussions. In turn, such discussions might stimulate more cooperation and cross pollination. One obvious similarity between all third paradigm systems is the Wholistic Principle. At the very least, all wholistic systems would have to embrace the principle that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are.

An interesting and important difference that I have discovered between second and third paradigm practices of manual therapy is that second paradigm practitioners always proceed according to treatment protocols (or recipes) rather than principles. In-deed, I would argue that by the very nature of the second paradigm symptomatic and piece-meal approach to the body, it is not even possible to formulate principles of manipulation. Principles appropriately show up only in third paradigm systems.

On the basis of this diagram let me make one final suggestion. We still stand in need of a clear comprehensive science and phenomenolgy of structural integration. As I understand it, a good part of Hans Flury’s important work is motivated by the recognition of this need. What precisely does structural integration look like? How do we recognize it when it appears?

I would be prepared to argue that no single indicator can be found for determining structural integration. We have assumed for years that the line of gravity was our only and best objective indicator or standard for structural integration. Peter Schwind5 has already pointed out some of the obvious shortcomings of this view. Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, we should be looking for a number of structural and functional indicators. None of these possible indicators and tests taken by itself will allow us to conclude with any certainty that structural integration has occurred. But all of them taken together might add up to a series of descriptive standards and tests for structural/functional order.

Fortunately, a number of people have been hard at work articulating taxonomies of normal and not so normal structure and function. Some of these taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include clear tests for determining lack of local/global order and, by implication, tests for determining order. I mentioned some of these taxonomies and their creators in the first section of this article. Notice that each of our four meta-taxonomy boxes contains and implies implicit and explicit descriptions of and tests for normalcy. My suggestion is that these taxonomies are where we need to look for our indicators of structural integration. And as we continue to articulate and clarify these taxonomies, we will discover the comprehensive phenomenology and science of normal structure and function we are looking for. Being able to use these taxonomies in conjunction with our principles will allow our work to become more effective.

I am attracted to this diagram and the boat metaphor because together they display the many levels of our systematic discipline of inquiry and reassure us in the understanding of how our system can continue as it constantly and necessarily undergoes criticism, revision, and improvement at every level. Rolfing will sink to the bottom of the sea of obscurity, if it remains mired in the dogmatic ritualism of its past. Just to the extent that we cannot answer the questions, “What do I do first?”, “What do I do next?”, and “How do I go on from here?”, without invoking the authority of a teacher or of formulistic recipe(s) is the extent to which we limit our understanding of the work. The philosophy, science, and art of Rolfing demand critical ongoing investigations into every level and every plank of our wholistic boat.

Footnotes

1 Rolf Lines (Spring 1992), Vol. XX No.2.

2 Quoted in NEUROPHILOSOPY: Toward a Unified Science of theMind/ Brain by PatriciaSmith Churchland (Cambridge, Mass., 1986), P.265.

3 A great deal of this section comes from and rests upon Jan Sultan’s pioneering attempts to teach non-formulisitic Rolfing.

4 Rolf Lines (March, 1993), pp. 60-72.

5 See, for example, Preliminary Considerations For A Theory Of Core, Rolf Lines (Fall,1992) pp. 16-24.[:es]The Rolfing Domain of Inquiry

Any attempt to understand what it is we do as Rolfers brings us face to face with the fact that Rolfing is not a finished system. What Dr. Rolf left in the hands of her students and teachers was not a closed system of dogmatic claims and attitudes, but a critical and profound third paradigm’ inquiry into the nature and meaning of normal structure and normal function. To define it in one sentence: Rolfing is a third paradigm philosophy, science, and art (or craft) which attempts to structurally and functionally integrate the human body person in space time and gravity through myo fascial manipulation and movement education. Although this definition is a mouthful, it accurately characterizes our domain of inquiry.

Because Rolfing is a third paradigm, wholistic, integrative system, engaging in any one level of this inquiry ultimately requires engaging in all. Of course, some of us have more expertise and interest in the scientific, others in the philosophical, and still others in the practical hands-on aspect of the work. Some of us, of course, are interested in all three. Nevertheless, no matter what our talents and predilections are, Rolfing will be best served if, in the spirit of critical dialogue, we attempt to advance and understand the Rolfing domain of inquiry at every level.

While contemplating the question of what our domain of inquiry looks like, I was reading a number of books in the philosophy of science. I ran across a metaphor for science that seemed especially well suited to Rolfing and stimulated my theoretical imagination. The metaphor was coined by Otto Neurath, a German philosopher of science. He said: “Science is like a boat, which we rebuild plank by plank while staying afloat in it. The philosopher and the scientist are in the same boat 2. ” I We obviously are engaged in the science of Rolfing, and to that extent we are clearly in the same boat. Nevertheless, since Rolfing is its own unique kind of inquiry, our boat should look somewhat different from the science boat.

As a preliminary attempt to display and understand the Rolf boat, I offer two diagrams.

The first diagram displays the hierarchical relation of the three paradigms of practice with some examples. Rolfing is shown as a third paradigm practice. Since I have already laid out the three paradigms in a previous article, I will not say any more about it here.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-1.jpg’>

The second diagram lays out the system of Rolfing. To follow through on our metaphor, the second displays the major outlines of the Rolf boat with some of its most important planks.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-2.jpg’>

The first two boxes at the top of the diagram concern the definition of Rolfing and its goals. The second box indicates that structural integration and functional economy are the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

As practitioners of the art of Rolfing we are always faced with three related and fundamentally important questions: 1) What do I do first?, 2) What do I do next?, and 3) How do I go on from here?. Every therapeutic system must find some way to answer these questions. Rolfing, like every other system of manipulation and movement education, has created recipes, or protocols, as formulistic guides for answering these questions. Ultimately, however, these questions are best answered when we understand the principles of intervention and can recognize normal and not so normal patterns of structure and function.

Thus, the taxonomy boxes are critically important. A taxonomy is a system of classification. As Rolfers we are interested only in those taxonomies that assist us in developing and sharpening our ability to recognize relevant local and global patterns of normalcy and loss of normalcy. Obviously, the taxonomies we choose as relevant are the ones that are observable in the body person and assist us in achieving the goals of our work.

At this point in time, I believe that there are only four fundamental taxonomy types that are relevant to our work: the segmental/structural, the geometrical, the functional, and the energetic. Under these four types I have included a number of examples of some of the more well known taxonomies, such as Jan Sultan’s Internal/External taxonomy and the old stand-by of lines/blocks/cylinders. These examples are not meant to be exhaustive. I could have included Hubert Godard’s functional/movement taxonomy or Gael Ohlgren and David Clarke’s taxonomy of unencumbered walking or Peter Levine’s neurological shock trauma taxonomy or palintonic lines as a geometrical or energetic taxonomy or some of Hans Flury’s geometrical and structural taxonomies.

Notice that the very attempt to state the goals of Rolfing necessarily implies taxonomies of normal structure and normal function. Some of our taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include specific tests by which to determine local and/or global order and lack of order.

Mastering the information represented in these boxes is essential to our being able to design a session or series of Rolfing sessions. Understanding how, when, and in what order to use these taxonomies and their associated tests most effectively in the designing of Rolfing sessions requires understanding the principles. Designing sessions takes us into the realm of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

A strategy is more general than a tactic. Strategies, for example, concern the number of sessions it takes to achieve certain structural and functional goals. Strategies also concern the general area or areas of the body that are the focus of the session or sessions. Tactics lay out the actual sequence of how the work should best proceed. For example, when you say “This person needs work on the pelvis, legs, and spine”, you have stated a strategy. Now that you have determined the components that need work, you need to determine next what specific areas in the lower body and spine you must address and in what order. You might say, for example, “I will start with the lower legs and feet first and then work the fourth hour line, and finish with back work that specifically addresses these side bending rotations. My reasons for choosing this line of entry are…, etc.” In saying this you have stated a tactic.

Of course, when you put your hands on your client’s body and begin to work, you may discover a number of issues not readily apparent to your eyes. These discoveries may confirm your choices or they may lead you to revise your tactical approach or even change your strategic approach.

Implicit in your strategies, tactics, and what your hands tell you is a sense of what techniques will work best for your unique and individual client. Some places in her body may respond best to light indirect techniques and others to heavier indirect techniques. Some areas may require good old fashioned heavy pressured direct techniques to prepare and open up an area for gentle indirect repositioning of vertebrae. Some clients respond well to mixing in a lot of movement with your manipulations and others do not. All of these considerations concern the art of Rolfing and require an understanding of how to use the principles and taxonomies in the context of attempting to achieve the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

How To Rolf Non-formulistically 3

With the help of the above brief explanation of the diagram of our system, let us look in some detail at how to Rolf non-formulistically. There are two sets of related questions that need to be asked; taxonomy questions and principle questions. Let us look at the taxonomy questions first. Begin by asking yourself the following two questions: 1) which component(s) of the body, if organized, will bring the highest possible level of order to the whole?, and 2) which component(s) exhibit the major motion restrictions? Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, the answers to these questions should tar-get the same component(s). Accurately answering these two questions requires a highly developed pattern recognition capacity. It requires being able to understand and use all the relevant taxonomies in conjunction with the ability to recognize normal structure and function. To say it differently, we must be able to recognize, at both the local and global levels, what order and its loss look like. Therefore, we can call these two questions the taxonomy questions.

These two taxonomy questions should not be confused with and limited to the question traditionally posed at the eighth and ninth hours, “Is this session an upper or a lower?” The upper/lower question is much too limited. By focusing only on the upper and lower girdles, this question actually interferes with our ability to perceive other components of the body that very often demand our attention and work. For example, if support and back/front balance have been properly handled and if the body has been properly prepared, then the eighth hour might very well be about the axial complex. Clearly, the axial complex is neither a lower or upper component. Strategizing sessions by looking through the lens of the upper/ lower question, therefore, can very often lead us away from what is required to achieve structural integration and functional economy.

After you have determined the component(s), which, if organized, will best benefit the whole, ask the following three questions: 1) Is this body person prepared to accept and sustain the proposed organization of component(s)?; 2) How is the support? Is there sufficient support for the proposed organization of component(s)?; and 3) Is there appropriate back/front balance and core/ sleeve organization? These questions are formulated from principles and can be called the principle questions. The first question is based on the Preparatory Principle, the second on the Support Principle, and the third on the Palintonic Principle. The Wholistic Principle governs all three principles and says that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are. It reminds us that we must intend and perceive globally while we work locally. It also reminds us that every strategy, tactic, and technique must be considered in terms of its impact on the whole person in gravity.

The principles should be under consideration at all times. How the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions are answered determines the temporal sequence of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

For example, suppose a client is about to receive the first session in a post-ten series. I have already discussed at length the spinal bio-mechanical taxonomy and the strategies and tactics for organizing the spine in RE-THINKING THE C-POSITION.4 In order to keep our discussion short, I will assume knowledge of the information contained in that article as background for our present example. Let us suppose, therefore, you determine that this particular series should concentrate on organizing your client’s spine. On the basis of how you answer the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions, you may strategize the proposed work as a three session series. First, however, you must ask the preparatory question: is your client’s body ready and able to accept the proposed level of work? If the answer is no, then you must prepare his body to accept the proposed level of spinal organization. Depending on the level of openness and order already present, the preparatory work may take an entire session or only fifteen minutes. And the preparatory work must be uniquely structured to the needs of this particular client.

If you decide that your client is ready and able to absorb the proposed organization, then the preparatory principle has already been fulfilled and you can move on to the support and palintonic questions. If, for example, support, back/front balance, and sleeve restrictions have not been handled adequately, then you must address these issues before you move into the spinal work. If some of these issues are not a problem, then the principles involved have been fulfilled and you can move on to the next consideration, which may or may not be organizing the spine.

Realize that after you complete the first post-ten session, any combination of preparatory, support, and palintonic issues may surface and need to be handled in the next session. To take a simple example, you may find that you want to “mobilize and warm up the tissue a bit” in an area before you attempt to release articular fixations and derotate associated vertebrae. Your inclination in this case falls under the preparatory principle. On a larger scale, you may discover that the preparatory strategy of the first session upset the support in your client’s body. Thus, you may need to spend some time securing the foundations before advancing to the spinal work.

The amount of time it takes to handle all these issues obviously depends on your client’s unique structural and functional needs. You may discover as you work that your client responds easily and quickly to your work and that a three session series is more than enough time to get the job done. Or you may discover that your strategy of three sessions underestimated your client’s difficulties and that actually five sessions are needed to get the job done.

The very same principle/taxonomy questions considered above in relation to our imagined post-ten series apply equally to the ten series strategy. Before we look at strategizing basic Rolfing according to principles, let us first consider the ten series as a formulistic recipe. Notice that a great deal of the focus of the early sessions of the formulistic recipe is on preparation. This point is especially clear in the first session. Even though the second session of the recipe takes us to the lower legs and feet and hence to support issues, preparation is still the primary issue. The second hour mostly concerns decompensating the feet, lower legs, and spine in preparation for the organization that is to come later. Preparation is still at work in the third hour, but the palintonic issue of back/front order begins to take precedence. The palintonic issue of sleeve/ core organization is present all the way through in these first three sessions in the injunction to begin the series with work on the sleeve.

Although the above look at the first three sessions of the ten series is a bit brief and simplistic, it is perhaps enough to provide a sense of how the principle/taxonomy questions might underlie the recipe(s). However, when we cease looking at and Rolfing our clients through these traditional formulistic lenses, we must realize that the order and progression of the work will probably look somewhat different, and in some cases quite a bit different, than any given recipe(s) can predict.

When we cease structuring our work around recipes and instead formulate our strategies and tactics by means of the principle /,taxonomy questions, we realize immediately that the amount of time it takes to achieve adequate preparation, support, and palintonicity will necessarily vary from client to client and session to session. Furthermore, the level and depth at which any given client is able to own preparation, support, and palintonicity also varies considerably. The issues of preparation, support, palintonicity also always show up in varying degrees of importance and at different levels according to the unique structural and functional needs of each individual client throughout any Rolfing series. For example, in post ten Rolfing, preparation strategies, tactics, and techniques are quite different in application, scope, and depth from the preparation requirements of the early stages of the ten-series. When we drop our formulistic lenses, it is clear that the first three sessions of the recipe(s) are often not enough to achieve adequate back/front order, which is supposed to be the goal of the third hour. In point of fact, for some clients back/front order does not appear until after core/ sleeve issues have been resolved or, in some cases, until after an advanced series.

As I have pointed out in previous articles, recipes are based on principles. Recipes are not principles. They are formulistic patterns of Rolfing. My experience is that a series of ten sessions provides an excellent framework within which to strategize the initial Rolfing series for most clients. However, when the sessions unfold according to the unique needs of the client in accordance with the principles, the work often progresses in ways that look quite different from the way many of our recipes suggest it should. Nevertheless, I am still amazed by the clarity and power of our recipes, both in how effective they are for many clients and in how much structural/functional wisdom is contained there in.

Concluding Remarks

Rolfing is not, and probably never will be, a finished system. To return to Neurath’s metaphor, every box in my diagram of our system is an important plank in the wholistic Rolf boat. No doubt, there are more planks to be discovered. But, no plank should be immune to criticism and every plank should be undergoing careful and intense investigation. We choose which planks are important and relevant to our system on the basis of our understanding of the nature of Rolfing. Because our system is a wholistic integrative inquiry, adding, replacing, or refurbishing planks often reverberates throughout the whole system.

This diagram of our system is useful because it clearly displays our domain of inquiry and the relations between its many levels. It is also useful in our dialogue with other systems of somatic education and therapy, especially with other third paradigm systems. If each third paradigm system could fill in the important boxes with the information relevant to that system, the similarities and differences between each would become immediately obvious. Such comparisons could open the door to many rich and provocative discussions. In turn, such discussions might stimulate more cooperation and cross pollination. One obvious similarity between all third paradigm systems is the Wholistic Principle. At the very least, all wholistic systems would have to embrace the principle that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are.

An interesting and important difference that I have discovered between second and third paradigm practices of manual therapy is that second paradigm practitioners always proceed according to treatment protocols (or recipes) rather than principles. In-deed, I would argue that by the very nature of the second paradigm symptomatic and piece-meal approach to the body, it is not even possible to formulate principles of manipulation. Principles appropriately show up only in third paradigm systems.

On the basis of this diagram let me make one final suggestion. We still stand in need of a clear comprehensive science and phenomenolgy of structural integration. As I understand it, a good part of Hans Flury’s important work is motivated by the recognition of this need. What precisely does structural integration look like? How do we recognize it when it appears?

I would be prepared to argue that no single indicator can be found for determining structural integration. We have assumed for years that the line of gravity was our only and best objective indicator or standard for structural integration. Peter Schwind5 has already pointed out some of the obvious shortcomings of this view. Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, we should be looking for a number of structural and functional indicators. None of these possible indicators and tests taken by itself will allow us to conclude with any certainty that structural integration has occurred. But all of them taken together might add up to a series of descriptive standards and tests for structural/functional order.

Fortunately, a number of people have been hard at work articulating taxonomies of normal and not so normal structure and function. Some of these taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include clear tests for determining lack of local/global order and, by implication, tests for determining order. I mentioned some of these taxonomies and their creators in the first section of this article. Notice that each of our four meta-taxonomy boxes contains and implies implicit and explicit descriptions of and tests for normalcy. My suggestion is that these taxonomies are where we need to look for our indicators of structural integration. And as we continue to articulate and clarify these taxonomies, we will discover the comprehensive phenomenology and science of normal structure and function we are looking for. Being able to use these taxonomies in conjunction with our principles will allow our work to become more effective.

I am attracted to this diagram and the boat metaphor because together they display the many levels of our systematic discipline of inquiry and reassure us in the understanding of how our system can continue as it constantly and necessarily undergoes criticism, revision, and improvement at every level. Rolfing will sink to the bottom of the sea of obscurity, if it remains mired in the dogmatic ritualism of its past. Just to the extent that we cannot answer the questions, “What do I do first?”, “What do I do next?”, and “How do I go on from here?”, without invoking the authority of a teacher or of formulistic recipe(s) is the extent to which we limit our understanding of the work. The philosophy, science, and art of Rolfing demand critical ongoing investigations into every level and every plank of our wholistic boat.

Footnotes

1 Rolf Lines (Spring 1992), Vol. XX No.2.

2 Quoted in NEUROPHILOSOPY: Toward a Unified Science of theMind/ Brain by PatriciaSmith Churchland (Cambridge, Mass., 1986), P.265.

3 A great deal of this section comes from and rests upon Jan Sultan’s pioneering attempts to teach non-formulisitic Rolfing.

4 Rolf Lines (March, 1993), pp. 60-72.

5 See, for example, Preliminary Considerations For A Theory Of Core, Rolf Lines (Fall,1992) pp. 16-24.[:ja]The Rolfing Domain of Inquiry

Any attempt to understand what it is we do as Rolfers brings us face to face with the fact that Rolfing is not a finished system. What Dr. Rolf left in the hands of her students and teachers was not a closed system of dogmatic claims and attitudes, but a critical and profound third paradigm’ inquiry into the nature and meaning of normal structure and normal function. To define it in one sentence: Rolfing is a third paradigm philosophy, science, and art (or craft) which attempts to structurally and functionally integrate the human body person in space time and gravity through myo fascial manipulation and movement education. Although this definition is a mouthful, it accurately characterizes our domain of inquiry.

Because Rolfing is a third paradigm, wholistic, integrative system, engaging in any one level of this inquiry ultimately requires engaging in all. Of course, some of us have more expertise and interest in the scientific, others in the philosophical, and still others in the practical hands-on aspect of the work. Some of us, of course, are interested in all three. Nevertheless, no matter what our talents and predilections are, Rolfing will be best served if, in the spirit of critical dialogue, we attempt to advance and understand the Rolfing domain of inquiry at every level.

While contemplating the question of what our domain of inquiry looks like, I was reading a number of books in the philosophy of science. I ran across a metaphor for science that seemed especially well suited to Rolfing and stimulated my theoretical imagination. The metaphor was coined by Otto Neurath, a German philosopher of science. He said: “Science is like a boat, which we rebuild plank by plank while staying afloat in it. The philosopher and the scientist are in the same boat 2. ” I We obviously are engaged in the science of Rolfing, and to that extent we are clearly in the same boat. Nevertheless, since Rolfing is its own unique kind of inquiry, our boat should look somewhat different from the science boat.

As a preliminary attempt to display and understand the Rolf boat, I offer two diagrams.

The first diagram displays the hierarchical relation of the three paradigms of practice with some examples. Rolfing is shown as a third paradigm practice. Since I have already laid out the three paradigms in a previous article, I will not say any more about it here.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-1.jpg’>

The second diagram lays out the system of Rolfing. To follow through on our metaphor, the second displays the major outlines of the Rolf boat with some of its most important planks.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-2.jpg’>

The first two boxes at the top of the diagram concern the definition of Rolfing and its goals. The second box indicates that structural integration and functional economy are the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

As practitioners of the art of Rolfing we are always faced with three related and fundamentally important questions: 1) What do I do first?, 2) What do I do next?, and 3) How do I go on from here?. Every therapeutic system must find some way to answer these questions. Rolfing, like every other system of manipulation and movement education, has created recipes, or protocols, as formulistic guides for answering these questions. Ultimately, however, these questions are best answered when we understand the principles of intervention and can recognize normal and not so normal patterns of structure and function.

Thus, the taxonomy boxes are critically important. A taxonomy is a system of classification. As Rolfers we are interested only in those taxonomies that assist us in developing and sharpening our ability to recognize relevant local and global patterns of normalcy and loss of normalcy. Obviously, the taxonomies we choose as relevant are the ones that are observable in the body person and assist us in achieving the goals of our work.

At this point in time, I believe that there are only four fundamental taxonomy types that are relevant to our work: the segmental/structural, the geometrical, the functional, and the energetic. Under these four types I have included a number of examples of some of the more well known taxonomies, such as Jan Sultan’s Internal/External taxonomy and the old stand-by of lines/blocks/cylinders. These examples are not meant to be exhaustive. I could have included Hubert Godard’s functional/movement taxonomy or Gael Ohlgren and David Clarke’s taxonomy of unencumbered walking or Peter Levine’s neurological shock trauma taxonomy or palintonic lines as a geometrical or energetic taxonomy or some of Hans Flury’s geometrical and structural taxonomies.

Notice that the very attempt to state the goals of Rolfing necessarily implies taxonomies of normal structure and normal function. Some of our taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include specific tests by which to determine local and/or global order and lack of order.

Mastering the information represented in these boxes is essential to our being able to design a session or series of Rolfing sessions. Understanding how, when, and in what order to use these taxonomies and their associated tests most effectively in the designing of Rolfing sessions requires understanding the principles. Designing sessions takes us into the realm of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

A strategy is more general than a tactic. Strategies, for example, concern the number of sessions it takes to achieve certain structural and functional goals. Strategies also concern the general area or areas of the body that are the focus of the session or sessions. Tactics lay out the actual sequence of how the work should best proceed. For example, when you say “This person needs work on the pelvis, legs, and spine”, you have stated a strategy. Now that you have determined the components that need work, you need to determine next what specific areas in the lower body and spine you must address and in what order. You might say, for example, “I will start with the lower legs and feet first and then work the fourth hour line, and finish with back work that specifically addresses these side bending rotations. My reasons for choosing this line of entry are…, etc.” In saying this you have stated a tactic.

Of course, when you put your hands on your client’s body and begin to work, you may discover a number of issues not readily apparent to your eyes. These discoveries may confirm your choices or they may lead you to revise your tactical approach or even change your strategic approach.

Implicit in your strategies, tactics, and what your hands tell you is a sense of what techniques will work best for your unique and individual client. Some places in her body may respond best to light indirect techniques and others to heavier indirect techniques. Some areas may require good old fashioned heavy pressured direct techniques to prepare and open up an area for gentle indirect repositioning of vertebrae. Some clients respond well to mixing in a lot of movement with your manipulations and others do not. All of these considerations concern the art of Rolfing and require an understanding of how to use the principles and taxonomies in the context of attempting to achieve the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

How To Rolf Non-formulistically 3

With the help of the above brief explanation of the diagram of our system, let us look in some detail at how to Rolf non-formulistically. There are two sets of related questions that need to be asked; taxonomy questions and principle questions. Let us look at the taxonomy questions first. Begin by asking yourself the following two questions: 1) which component(s) of the body, if organized, will bring the highest possible level of order to the whole?, and 2) which component(s) exhibit the major motion restrictions? Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, the answers to these questions should tar-get the same component(s). Accurately answering these two questions requires a highly developed pattern recognition capacity. It requires being able to understand and use all the relevant taxonomies in conjunction with the ability to recognize normal structure and function. To say it differently, we must be able to recognize, at both the local and global levels, what order and its loss look like. Therefore, we can call these two questions the taxonomy questions.

These two taxonomy questions should not be confused with and limited to the question traditionally posed at the eighth and ninth hours, “Is this session an upper or a lower?” The upper/lower question is much too limited. By focusing only on the upper and lower girdles, this question actually interferes with our ability to perceive other components of the body that very often demand our attention and work. For example, if support and back/front balance have been properly handled and if the body has been properly prepared, then the eighth hour might very well be about the axial complex. Clearly, the axial complex is neither a lower or upper component. Strategizing sessions by looking through the lens of the upper/ lower question, therefore, can very often lead us away from what is required to achieve structural integration and functional economy.

After you have determined the component(s), which, if organized, will best benefit the whole, ask the following three questions: 1) Is this body person prepared to accept and sustain the proposed organization of component(s)?; 2) How is the support? Is there sufficient support for the proposed organization of component(s)?; and 3) Is there appropriate back/front balance and core/ sleeve organization? These questions are formulated from principles and can be called the principle questions. The first question is based on the Preparatory Principle, the second on the Support Principle, and the third on the Palintonic Principle. The Wholistic Principle governs all three principles and says that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are. It reminds us that we must intend and perceive globally while we work locally. It also reminds us that every strategy, tactic, and technique must be considered in terms of its impact on the whole person in gravity.

The principles should be under consideration at all times. How the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions are answered determines the temporal sequence of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

For example, suppose a client is about to receive the first session in a post-ten series. I have already discussed at length the spinal bio-mechanical taxonomy and the strategies and tactics for organizing the spine in RE-THINKING THE C-POSITION.4 In order to keep our discussion short, I will assume knowledge of the information contained in that article as background for our present example. Let us suppose, therefore, you determine that this particular series should concentrate on organizing your client’s spine. On the basis of how you answer the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions, you may strategize the proposed work as a three session series. First, however, you must ask the preparatory question: is your client’s body ready and able to accept the proposed level of work? If the answer is no, then you must prepare his body to accept the proposed level of spinal organization. Depending on the level of openness and order already present, the preparatory work may take an entire session or only fifteen minutes. And the preparatory work must be uniquely structured to the needs of this particular client.

If you decide that your client is ready and able to absorb the proposed organization, then the preparatory principle has already been fulfilled and you can move on to the support and palintonic questions. If, for example, support, back/front balance, and sleeve restrictions have not been handled adequately, then you must address these issues before you move into the spinal work. If some of these issues are not a problem, then the principles involved have been fulfilled and you can move on to the next consideration, which may or may not be organizing the spine.

Realize that after you complete the first post-ten session, any combination of preparatory, support, and palintonic issues may surface and need to be handled in the next session. To take a simple example, you may find that you want to “mobilize and warm up the tissue a bit” in an area before you attempt to release articular fixations and derotate associated vertebrae. Your inclination in this case falls under the preparatory principle. On a larger scale, you may discover that the preparatory strategy of the first session upset the support in your client’s body. Thus, you may need to spend some time securing the foundations before advancing to the spinal work.

The amount of time it takes to handle all these issues obviously depends on your client’s unique structural and functional needs. You may discover as you work that your client responds easily and quickly to your work and that a three session series is more than enough time to get the job done. Or you may discover that your strategy of three sessions underestimated your client’s difficulties and that actually five sessions are needed to get the job done.

The very same principle/taxonomy questions considered above in relation to our imagined post-ten series apply equally to the ten series strategy. Before we look at strategizing basic Rolfing according to principles, let us first consider the ten series as a formulistic recipe. Notice that a great deal of the focus of the early sessions of the formulistic recipe is on preparation. This point is especially clear in the first session. Even though the second session of the recipe takes us to the lower legs and feet and hence to support issues, preparation is still the primary issue. The second hour mostly concerns decompensating the feet, lower legs, and spine in preparation for the organization that is to come later. Preparation is still at work in the third hour, but the palintonic issue of back/front order begins to take precedence. The palintonic issue of sleeve/ core organization is present all the way through in these first three sessions in the injunction to begin the series with work on the sleeve.

Although the above look at the first three sessions of the ten series is a bit brief and simplistic, it is perhaps enough to provide a sense of how the principle/taxonomy questions might underlie the recipe(s). However, when we cease looking at and Rolfing our clients through these traditional formulistic lenses, we must realize that the order and progression of the work will probably look somewhat different, and in some cases quite a bit different, than any given recipe(s) can predict.

When we cease structuring our work around recipes and instead formulate our strategies and tactics by means of the principle /,taxonomy questions, we realize immediately that the amount of time it takes to achieve adequate preparation, support, and palintonicity will necessarily vary from client to client and session to session. Furthermore, the level and depth at which any given client is able to own preparation, support, and palintonicity also varies considerably. The issues of preparation, support, palintonicity also always show up in varying degrees of importance and at different levels according to the unique structural and functional needs of each individual client throughout any Rolfing series. For example, in post ten Rolfing, preparation strategies, tactics, and techniques are quite different in application, scope, and depth from the preparation requirements of the early stages of the ten-series. When we drop our formulistic lenses, it is clear that the first three sessions of the recipe(s) are often not enough to achieve adequate back/front order, which is supposed to be the goal of the third hour. In point of fact, for some clients back/front order does not appear until after core/ sleeve issues have been resolved or, in some cases, until after an advanced series.

As I have pointed out in previous articles, recipes are based on principles. Recipes are not principles. They are formulistic patterns of Rolfing. My experience is that a series of ten sessions provides an excellent framework within which to strategize the initial Rolfing series for most clients. However, when the sessions unfold according to the unique needs of the client in accordance with the principles, the work often progresses in ways that look quite different from the way many of our recipes suggest it should. Nevertheless, I am still amazed by the clarity and power of our recipes, both in how effective they are for many clients and in how much structural/functional wisdom is contained there in.

Concluding Remarks

Rolfing is not, and probably never will be, a finished system. To return to Neurath’s metaphor, every box in my diagram of our system is an important plank in the wholistic Rolf boat. No doubt, there are more planks to be discovered. But, no plank should be immune to criticism and every plank should be undergoing careful and intense investigation. We choose which planks are important and relevant to our system on the basis of our understanding of the nature of Rolfing. Because our system is a wholistic integrative inquiry, adding, replacing, or refurbishing planks often reverberates throughout the whole system.

This diagram of our system is useful because it clearly displays our domain of inquiry and the relations between its many levels. It is also useful in our dialogue with other systems of somatic education and therapy, especially with other third paradigm systems. If each third paradigm system could fill in the important boxes with the information relevant to that system, the similarities and differences between each would become immediately obvious. Such comparisons could open the door to many rich and provocative discussions. In turn, such discussions might stimulate more cooperation and cross pollination. One obvious similarity between all third paradigm systems is the Wholistic Principle. At the very least, all wholistic systems would have to embrace the principle that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are.

An interesting and important difference that I have discovered between second and third paradigm practices of manual therapy is that second paradigm practitioners always proceed according to treatment protocols (or recipes) rather than principles. In-deed, I would argue that by the very nature of the second paradigm symptomatic and piece-meal approach to the body, it is not even possible to formulate principles of manipulation. Principles appropriately show up only in third paradigm systems.

On the basis of this diagram let me make one final suggestion. We still stand in need of a clear comprehensive science and phenomenolgy of structural integration. As I understand it, a good part of Hans Flury’s important work is motivated by the recognition of this need. What precisely does structural integration look like? How do we recognize it when it appears?

I would be prepared to argue that no single indicator can be found for determining structural integration. We have assumed for years that the line of gravity was our only and best objective indicator or standard for structural integration. Peter Schwind5 has already pointed out some of the obvious shortcomings of this view. Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, we should be looking for a number of structural and functional indicators. None of these possible indicators and tests taken by itself will allow us to conclude with any certainty that structural integration has occurred. But all of them taken together might add up to a series of descriptive standards and tests for structural/functional order.

Fortunately, a number of people have been hard at work articulating taxonomies of normal and not so normal structure and function. Some of these taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include clear tests for determining lack of local/global order and, by implication, tests for determining order. I mentioned some of these taxonomies and their creators in the first section of this article. Notice that each of our four meta-taxonomy boxes contains and implies implicit and explicit descriptions of and tests for normalcy. My suggestion is that these taxonomies are where we need to look for our indicators of structural integration. And as we continue to articulate and clarify these taxonomies, we will discover the comprehensive phenomenology and science of normal structure and function we are looking for. Being able to use these taxonomies in conjunction with our principles will allow our work to become more effective.

I am attracted to this diagram and the boat metaphor because together they display the many levels of our systematic discipline of inquiry and reassure us in the understanding of how our system can continue as it constantly and necessarily undergoes criticism, revision, and improvement at every level. Rolfing will sink to the bottom of the sea of obscurity, if it remains mired in the dogmatic ritualism of its past. Just to the extent that we cannot answer the questions, “What do I do first?”, “What do I do next?”, and “How do I go on from here?”, without invoking the authority of a teacher or of formulistic recipe(s) is the extent to which we limit our understanding of the work. The philosophy, science, and art of Rolfing demand critical ongoing investigations into every level and every plank of our wholistic boat.

Footnotes

1 Rolf Lines (Spring 1992), Vol. XX No.2.

2 Quoted in NEUROPHILOSOPY: Toward a Unified Science of theMind/ Brain by PatriciaSmith Churchland (Cambridge, Mass., 1986), P.265.

3 A great deal of this section comes from and rests upon Jan Sultan’s pioneering attempts to teach non-formulisitic Rolfing.

4 Rolf Lines (March, 1993), pp. 60-72.

5 See, for example, Preliminary Considerations For A Theory Of Core, Rolf Lines (Fall,1992) pp. 16-24.[:it]The Rolfing Domain of Inquiry

Any attempt to understand what it is we do as Rolfers brings us face to face with the fact that Rolfing is not a finished system. What Dr. Rolf left in the hands of her students and teachers was not a closed system of dogmatic claims and attitudes, but a critical and profound third paradigm’ inquiry into the nature and meaning of normal structure and normal function. To define it in one sentence: Rolfing is a third paradigm philosophy, science, and art (or craft) which attempts to structurally and functionally integrate the human body person in space time and gravity through myo fascial manipulation and movement education. Although this definition is a mouthful, it accurately characterizes our domain of inquiry.

Because Rolfing is a third paradigm, wholistic, integrative system, engaging in any one level of this inquiry ultimately requires engaging in all. Of course, some of us have more expertise and interest in the scientific, others in the philosophical, and still others in the practical hands-on aspect of the work. Some of us, of course, are interested in all three. Nevertheless, no matter what our talents and predilections are, Rolfing will be best served if, in the spirit of critical dialogue, we attempt to advance and understand the Rolfing domain of inquiry at every level.

While contemplating the question of what our domain of inquiry looks like, I was reading a number of books in the philosophy of science. I ran across a metaphor for science that seemed especially well suited to Rolfing and stimulated my theoretical imagination. The metaphor was coined by Otto Neurath, a German philosopher of science. He said: “Science is like a boat, which we rebuild plank by plank while staying afloat in it. The philosopher and the scientist are in the same boat 2. ” I We obviously are engaged in the science of Rolfing, and to that extent we are clearly in the same boat. Nevertheless, since Rolfing is its own unique kind of inquiry, our boat should look somewhat different from the science boat.

As a preliminary attempt to display and understand the Rolf boat, I offer two diagrams.

The first diagram displays the hierarchical relation of the three paradigms of practice with some examples. Rolfing is shown as a third paradigm practice. Since I have already laid out the three paradigms in a previous article, I will not say any more about it here.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-1.jpg’>

The second diagram lays out the system of Rolfing. To follow through on our metaphor, the second displays the major outlines of the Rolf boat with some of its most important planks.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-2.jpg’>

The first two boxes at the top of the diagram concern the definition of Rolfing and its goals. The second box indicates that structural integration and functional economy are the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

As practitioners of the art of Rolfing we are always faced with three related and fundamentally important questions: 1) What do I do first?, 2) What do I do next?, and 3) How do I go on from here?. Every therapeutic system must find some way to answer these questions. Rolfing, like every other system of manipulation and movement education, has created recipes, or protocols, as formulistic guides for answering these questions. Ultimately, however, these questions are best answered when we understand the principles of intervention and can recognize normal and not so normal patterns of structure and function.

Thus, the taxonomy boxes are critically important. A taxonomy is a system of classification. As Rolfers we are interested only in those taxonomies that assist us in developing and sharpening our ability to recognize relevant local and global patterns of normalcy and loss of normalcy. Obviously, the taxonomies we choose as relevant are the ones that are observable in the body person and assist us in achieving the goals of our work.

At this point in time, I believe that there are only four fundamental taxonomy types that are relevant to our work: the segmental/structural, the geometrical, the functional, and the energetic. Under these four types I have included a number of examples of some of the more well known taxonomies, such as Jan Sultan’s Internal/External taxonomy and the old stand-by of lines/blocks/cylinders. These examples are not meant to be exhaustive. I could have included Hubert Godard’s functional/movement taxonomy or Gael Ohlgren and David Clarke’s taxonomy of unencumbered walking or Peter Levine’s neurological shock trauma taxonomy or palintonic lines as a geometrical or energetic taxonomy or some of Hans Flury’s geometrical and structural taxonomies.

Notice that the very attempt to state the goals of Rolfing necessarily implies taxonomies of normal structure and normal function. Some of our taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include specific tests by which to determine local and/or global order and lack of order.

Mastering the information represented in these boxes is essential to our being able to design a session or series of Rolfing sessions. Understanding how, when, and in what order to use these taxonomies and their associated tests most effectively in the designing of Rolfing sessions requires understanding the principles. Designing sessions takes us into the realm of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

A strategy is more general than a tactic. Strategies, for example, concern the number of sessions it takes to achieve certain structural and functional goals. Strategies also concern the general area or areas of the body that are the focus of the session or sessions. Tactics lay out the actual sequence of how the work should best proceed. For example, when you say “This person needs work on the pelvis, legs, and spine”, you have stated a strategy. Now that you have determined the components that need work, you need to determine next what specific areas in the lower body and spine you must address and in what order. You might say, for example, “I will start with the lower legs and feet first and then work the fourth hour line, and finish with back work that specifically addresses these side bending rotations. My reasons for choosing this line of entry are…, etc.” In saying this you have stated a tactic.

Of course, when you put your hands on your client’s body and begin to work, you may discover a number of issues not readily apparent to your eyes. These discoveries may confirm your choices or they may lead you to revise your tactical approach or even change your strategic approach.

Implicit in your strategies, tactics, and what your hands tell you is a sense of what techniques will work best for your unique and individual client. Some places in her body may respond best to light indirect techniques and others to heavier indirect techniques. Some areas may require good old fashioned heavy pressured direct techniques to prepare and open up an area for gentle indirect repositioning of vertebrae. Some clients respond well to mixing in a lot of movement with your manipulations and others do not. All of these considerations concern the art of Rolfing and require an understanding of how to use the principles and taxonomies in the context of attempting to achieve the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

How To Rolf Non-formulistically 3

With the help of the above brief explanation of the diagram of our system, let us look in some detail at how to Rolf non-formulistically. There are two sets of related questions that need to be asked; taxonomy questions and principle questions. Let us look at the taxonomy questions first. Begin by asking yourself the following two questions: 1) which component(s) of the body, if organized, will bring the highest possible level of order to the whole?, and 2) which component(s) exhibit the major motion restrictions? Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, the answers to these questions should tar-get the same component(s). Accurately answering these two questions requires a highly developed pattern recognition capacity. It requires being able to understand and use all the relevant taxonomies in conjunction with the ability to recognize normal structure and function. To say it differently, we must be able to recognize, at both the local and global levels, what order and its loss look like. Therefore, we can call these two questions the taxonomy questions.

These two taxonomy questions should not be confused with and limited to the question traditionally posed at the eighth and ninth hours, “Is this session an upper or a lower?” The upper/lower question is much too limited. By focusing only on the upper and lower girdles, this question actually interferes with our ability to perceive other components of the body that very often demand our attention and work. For example, if support and back/front balance have been properly handled and if the body has been properly prepared, then the eighth hour might very well be about the axial complex. Clearly, the axial complex is neither a lower or upper component. Strategizing sessions by looking through the lens of the upper/ lower question, therefore, can very often lead us away from what is required to achieve structural integration and functional economy.

After you have determined the component(s), which, if organized, will best benefit the whole, ask the following three questions: 1) Is this body person prepared to accept and sustain the proposed organization of component(s)?; 2) How is the support? Is there sufficient support for the proposed organization of component(s)?; and 3) Is there appropriate back/front balance and core/ sleeve organization? These questions are formulated from principles and can be called the principle questions. The first question is based on the Preparatory Principle, the second on the Support Principle, and the third on the Palintonic Principle. The Wholistic Principle governs all three principles and says that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are. It reminds us that we must intend and perceive globally while we work locally. It also reminds us that every strategy, tactic, and technique must be considered in terms of its impact on the whole person in gravity.

The principles should be under consideration at all times. How the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions are answered determines the temporal sequence of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

For example, suppose a client is about to receive the first session in a post-ten series. I have already discussed at length the spinal bio-mechanical taxonomy and the strategies and tactics for organizing the spine in RE-THINKING THE C-POSITION.4 In order to keep our discussion short, I will assume knowledge of the information contained in that article as background for our present example. Let us suppose, therefore, you determine that this particular series should concentrate on organizing your client’s spine. On the basis of how you answer the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions, you may strategize the proposed work as a three session series. First, however, you must ask the preparatory question: is your client’s body ready and able to accept the proposed level of work? If the answer is no, then you must prepare his body to accept the proposed level of spinal organization. Depending on the level of openness and order already present, the preparatory work may take an entire session or only fifteen minutes. And the preparatory work must be uniquely structured to the needs of this particular client.

If you decide that your client is ready and able to absorb the proposed organization, then the preparatory principle has already been fulfilled and you can move on to the support and palintonic questions. If, for example, support, back/front balance, and sleeve restrictions have not been handled adequately, then you must address these issues before you move into the spinal work. If some of these issues are not a problem, then the principles involved have been fulfilled and you can move on to the next consideration, which may or may not be organizing the spine.

Realize that after you complete the first post-ten session, any combination of preparatory, support, and palintonic issues may surface and need to be handled in the next session. To take a simple example, you may find that you want to “mobilize and warm up the tissue a bit” in an area before you attempt to release articular fixations and derotate associated vertebrae. Your inclination in this case falls under the preparatory principle. On a larger scale, you may discover that the preparatory strategy of the first session upset the support in your client’s body. Thus, you may need to spend some time securing the foundations before advancing to the spinal work.

The amount of time it takes to handle all these issues obviously depends on your client’s unique structural and functional needs. You may discover as you work that your client responds easily and quickly to your work and that a three session series is more than enough time to get the job done. Or you may discover that your strategy of three sessions underestimated your client’s difficulties and that actually five sessions are needed to get the job done.

The very same principle/taxonomy questions considered above in relation to our imagined post-ten series apply equally to the ten series strategy. Before we look at strategizing basic Rolfing according to principles, let us first consider the ten series as a formulistic recipe. Notice that a great deal of the focus of the early sessions of the formulistic recipe is on preparation. This point is especially clear in the first session. Even though the second session of the recipe takes us to the lower legs and feet and hence to support issues, preparation is still the primary issue. The second hour mostly concerns decompensating the feet, lower legs, and spine in preparation for the organization that is to come later. Preparation is still at work in the third hour, but the palintonic issue of back/front order begins to take precedence. The palintonic issue of sleeve/ core organization is present all the way through in these first three sessions in the injunction to begin the series with work on the sleeve.

Although the above look at the first three sessions of the ten series is a bit brief and simplistic, it is perhaps enough to provide a sense of how the principle/taxonomy questions might underlie the recipe(s). However, when we cease looking at and Rolfing our clients through these traditional formulistic lenses, we must realize that the order and progression of the work will probably look somewhat different, and in some cases quite a bit different, than any given recipe(s) can predict.

When we cease structuring our work around recipes and instead formulate our strategies and tactics by means of the principle /,taxonomy questions, we realize immediately that the amount of time it takes to achieve adequate preparation, support, and palintonicity will necessarily vary from client to client and session to session. Furthermore, the level and depth at which any given client is able to own preparation, support, and palintonicity also varies considerably. The issues of preparation, support, palintonicity also always show up in varying degrees of importance and at different levels according to the unique structural and functional needs of each individual client throughout any Rolfing series. For example, in post ten Rolfing, preparation strategies, tactics, and techniques are quite different in application, scope, and depth from the preparation requirements of the early stages of the ten-series. When we drop our formulistic lenses, it is clear that the first three sessions of the recipe(s) are often not enough to achieve adequate back/front order, which is supposed to be the goal of the third hour. In point of fact, for some clients back/front order does not appear until after core/ sleeve issues have been resolved or, in some cases, until after an advanced series.

As I have pointed out in previous articles, recipes are based on principles. Recipes are not principles. They are formulistic patterns of Rolfing. My experience is that a series of ten sessions provides an excellent framework within which to strategize the initial Rolfing series for most clients. However, when the sessions unfold according to the unique needs of the client in accordance with the principles, the work often progresses in ways that look quite different from the way many of our recipes suggest it should. Nevertheless, I am still amazed by the clarity and power of our recipes, both in how effective they are for many clients and in how much structural/functional wisdom is contained there in.

Concluding Remarks

Rolfing is not, and probably never will be, a finished system. To return to Neurath’s metaphor, every box in my diagram of our system is an important plank in the wholistic Rolf boat. No doubt, there are more planks to be discovered. But, no plank should be immune to criticism and every plank should be undergoing careful and intense investigation. We choose which planks are important and relevant to our system on the basis of our understanding of the nature of Rolfing. Because our system is a wholistic integrative inquiry, adding, replacing, or refurbishing planks often reverberates throughout the whole system.

This diagram of our system is useful because it clearly displays our domain of inquiry and the relations between its many levels. It is also useful in our dialogue with other systems of somatic education and therapy, especially with other third paradigm systems. If each third paradigm system could fill in the important boxes with the information relevant to that system, the similarities and differences between each would become immediately obvious. Such comparisons could open the door to many rich and provocative discussions. In turn, such discussions might stimulate more cooperation and cross pollination. One obvious similarity between all third paradigm systems is the Wholistic Principle. At the very least, all wholistic systems would have to embrace the principle that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are.

An interesting and important difference that I have discovered between second and third paradigm practices of manual therapy is that second paradigm practitioners always proceed according to treatment protocols (or recipes) rather than principles. In-deed, I would argue that by the very nature of the second paradigm symptomatic and piece-meal approach to the body, it is not even possible to formulate principles of manipulation. Principles appropriately show up only in third paradigm systems.

On the basis of this diagram let me make one final suggestion. We still stand in need of a clear comprehensive science and phenomenolgy of structural integration. As I understand it, a good part of Hans Flury’s important work is motivated by the recognition of this need. What precisely does structural integration look like? How do we recognize it when it appears?

I would be prepared to argue that no single indicator can be found for determining structural integration. We have assumed for years that the line of gravity was our only and best objective indicator or standard for structural integration. Peter Schwind5 has already pointed out some of the obvious shortcomings of this view. Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, we should be looking for a number of structural and functional indicators. None of these possible indicators and tests taken by itself will allow us to conclude with any certainty that structural integration has occurred. But all of them taken together might add up to a series of descriptive standards and tests for structural/functional order.

Fortunately, a number of people have been hard at work articulating taxonomies of normal and not so normal structure and function. Some of these taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include clear tests for determining lack of local/global order and, by implication, tests for determining order. I mentioned some of these taxonomies and their creators in the first section of this article. Notice that each of our four meta-taxonomy boxes contains and implies implicit and explicit descriptions of and tests for normalcy. My suggestion is that these taxonomies are where we need to look for our indicators of structural integration. And as we continue to articulate and clarify these taxonomies, we will discover the comprehensive phenomenology and science of normal structure and function we are looking for. Being able to use these taxonomies in conjunction with our principles will allow our work to become more effective.

I am attracted to this diagram and the boat metaphor because together they display the many levels of our systematic discipline of inquiry and reassure us in the understanding of how our system can continue as it constantly and necessarily undergoes criticism, revision, and improvement at every level. Rolfing will sink to the bottom of the sea of obscurity, if it remains mired in the dogmatic ritualism of its past. Just to the extent that we cannot answer the questions, “What do I do first?”, “What do I do next?”, and “How do I go on from here?”, without invoking the authority of a teacher or of formulistic recipe(s) is the extent to which we limit our understanding of the work. The philosophy, science, and art of Rolfing demand critical ongoing investigations into every level and every plank of our wholistic boat.

Footnotes

1 Rolf Lines (Spring 1992), Vol. XX No.2.

2 Quoted in NEUROPHILOSOPY: Toward a Unified Science of theMind/ Brain by PatriciaSmith Churchland (Cambridge, Mass., 1986), P.265.

3 A great deal of this section comes from and rests upon Jan Sultan’s pioneering attempts to teach non-formulisitic Rolfing.

4 Rolf Lines (March, 1993), pp. 60-72.

5 See, for example, Preliminary Considerations For A Theory Of Core, Rolf Lines (Fall,1992) pp. 16-24.[:pb]The Rolfing Domain of Inquiry

Any attempt to understand what it is we do as Rolfers brings us face to face with the fact that Rolfing is not a finished system. What Dr. Rolf left in the hands of her students and teachers was not a closed system of dogmatic claims and attitudes, but a critical and profound third paradigm’ inquiry into the nature and meaning of normal structure and normal function. To define it in one sentence: Rolfing is a third paradigm philosophy, science, and art (or craft) which attempts to structurally and functionally integrate the human body person in space time and gravity through myo fascial manipulation and movement education. Although this definition is a mouthful, it accurately characterizes our domain of inquiry.

Because Rolfing is a third paradigm, wholistic, integrative system, engaging in any one level of this inquiry ultimately requires engaging in all. Of course, some of us have more expertise and interest in the scientific, others in the philosophical, and still others in the practical hands-on aspect of the work. Some of us, of course, are interested in all three. Nevertheless, no matter what our talents and predilections are, Rolfing will be best served if, in the spirit of critical dialogue, we attempt to advance and understand the Rolfing domain of inquiry at every level.

While contemplating the question of what our domain of inquiry looks like, I was reading a number of books in the philosophy of science. I ran across a metaphor for science that seemed especially well suited to Rolfing and stimulated my theoretical imagination. The metaphor was coined by Otto Neurath, a German philosopher of science. He said: “Science is like a boat, which we rebuild plank by plank while staying afloat in it. The philosopher and the scientist are in the same boat 2. ” I We obviously are engaged in the science of Rolfing, and to that extent we are clearly in the same boat. Nevertheless, since Rolfing is its own unique kind of inquiry, our boat should look somewhat different from the science boat.

As a preliminary attempt to display and understand the Rolf boat, I offer two diagrams.

The first diagram displays the hierarchical relation of the three paradigms of practice with some examples. Rolfing is shown as a third paradigm practice. Since I have already laid out the three paradigms in a previous article, I will not say any more about it here.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-1.jpg’>

The second diagram lays out the system of Rolfing. To follow through on our metaphor, the second displays the major outlines of the Rolf boat with some of its most important planks.

<img src=’https://novo.pedroprado.com.br/imgs/1993/390-2.jpg’>

The first two boxes at the top of the diagram concern the definition of Rolfing and its goals. The second box indicates that structural integration and functional economy are the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

As practitioners of the art of Rolfing we are always faced with three related and fundamentally important questions: 1) What do I do first?, 2) What do I do next?, and 3) How do I go on from here?. Every therapeutic system must find some way to answer these questions. Rolfing, like every other system of manipulation and movement education, has created recipes, or protocols, as formulistic guides for answering these questions. Ultimately, however, these questions are best answered when we understand the principles of intervention and can recognize normal and not so normal patterns of structure and function.

Thus, the taxonomy boxes are critically important. A taxonomy is a system of classification. As Rolfers we are interested only in those taxonomies that assist us in developing and sharpening our ability to recognize relevant local and global patterns of normalcy and loss of normalcy. Obviously, the taxonomies we choose as relevant are the ones that are observable in the body person and assist us in achieving the goals of our work.

At this point in time, I believe that there are only four fundamental taxonomy types that are relevant to our work: the segmental/structural, the geometrical, the functional, and the energetic. Under these four types I have included a number of examples of some of the more well known taxonomies, such as Jan Sultan’s Internal/External taxonomy and the old stand-by of lines/blocks/cylinders. These examples are not meant to be exhaustive. I could have included Hubert Godard’s functional/movement taxonomy or Gael Ohlgren and David Clarke’s taxonomy of unencumbered walking or Peter Levine’s neurological shock trauma taxonomy or palintonic lines as a geometrical or energetic taxonomy or some of Hans Flury’s geometrical and structural taxonomies.

Notice that the very attempt to state the goals of Rolfing necessarily implies taxonomies of normal structure and normal function. Some of our taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include specific tests by which to determine local and/or global order and lack of order.

Mastering the information represented in these boxes is essential to our being able to design a session or series of Rolfing sessions. Understanding how, when, and in what order to use these taxonomies and their associated tests most effectively in the designing of Rolfing sessions requires understanding the principles. Designing sessions takes us into the realm of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

A strategy is more general than a tactic. Strategies, for example, concern the number of sessions it takes to achieve certain structural and functional goals. Strategies also concern the general area or areas of the body that are the focus of the session or sessions. Tactics lay out the actual sequence of how the work should best proceed. For example, when you say “This person needs work on the pelvis, legs, and spine”, you have stated a strategy. Now that you have determined the components that need work, you need to determine next what specific areas in the lower body and spine you must address and in what order. You might say, for example, “I will start with the lower legs and feet first and then work the fourth hour line, and finish with back work that specifically addresses these side bending rotations. My reasons for choosing this line of entry are…, etc.” In saying this you have stated a tactic.

Of course, when you put your hands on your client’s body and begin to work, you may discover a number of issues not readily apparent to your eyes. These discoveries may confirm your choices or they may lead you to revise your tactical approach or even change your strategic approach.

Implicit in your strategies, tactics, and what your hands tell you is a sense of what techniques will work best for your unique and individual client. Some places in her body may respond best to light indirect techniques and others to heavier indirect techniques. Some areas may require good old fashioned heavy pressured direct techniques to prepare and open up an area for gentle indirect repositioning of vertebrae. Some clients respond well to mixing in a lot of movement with your manipulations and others do not. All of these considerations concern the art of Rolfing and require an understanding of how to use the principles and taxonomies in the context of attempting to achieve the logically equivalent goals of Rolfing.

How To Rolf Non-formulistically 3

With the help of the above brief explanation of the diagram of our system, let us look in some detail at how to Rolf non-formulistically. There are two sets of related questions that need to be asked; taxonomy questions and principle questions. Let us look at the taxonomy questions first. Begin by asking yourself the following two questions: 1) which component(s) of the body, if organized, will bring the highest possible level of order to the whole?, and 2) which component(s) exhibit the major motion restrictions? Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, the answers to these questions should tar-get the same component(s). Accurately answering these two questions requires a highly developed pattern recognition capacity. It requires being able to understand and use all the relevant taxonomies in conjunction with the ability to recognize normal structure and function. To say it differently, we must be able to recognize, at both the local and global levels, what order and its loss look like. Therefore, we can call these two questions the taxonomy questions.

These two taxonomy questions should not be confused with and limited to the question traditionally posed at the eighth and ninth hours, “Is this session an upper or a lower?” The upper/lower question is much too limited. By focusing only on the upper and lower girdles, this question actually interferes with our ability to perceive other components of the body that very often demand our attention and work. For example, if support and back/front balance have been properly handled and if the body has been properly prepared, then the eighth hour might very well be about the axial complex. Clearly, the axial complex is neither a lower or upper component. Strategizing sessions by looking through the lens of the upper/ lower question, therefore, can very often lead us away from what is required to achieve structural integration and functional economy.

After you have determined the component(s), which, if organized, will best benefit the whole, ask the following three questions: 1) Is this body person prepared to accept and sustain the proposed organization of component(s)?; 2) How is the support? Is there sufficient support for the proposed organization of component(s)?; and 3) Is there appropriate back/front balance and core/ sleeve organization? These questions are formulated from principles and can be called the principle questions. The first question is based on the Preparatory Principle, the second on the Support Principle, and the third on the Palintonic Principle. The Wholistic Principle governs all three principles and says that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are. It reminds us that we must intend and perceive globally while we work locally. It also reminds us that every strategy, tactic, and technique must be considered in terms of its impact on the whole person in gravity.

The principles should be under consideration at all times. How the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions are answered determines the temporal sequence of strategies, tactics, and techniques.

For example, suppose a client is about to receive the first session in a post-ten series. I have already discussed at length the spinal bio-mechanical taxonomy and the strategies and tactics for organizing the spine in RE-THINKING THE C-POSITION.4 In order to keep our discussion short, I will assume knowledge of the information contained in that article as background for our present example. Let us suppose, therefore, you determine that this particular series should concentrate on organizing your client’s spine. On the basis of how you answer the principle questions in relation to the taxonomy questions, you may strategize the proposed work as a three session series. First, however, you must ask the preparatory question: is your client’s body ready and able to accept the proposed level of work? If the answer is no, then you must prepare his body to accept the proposed level of spinal organization. Depending on the level of openness and order already present, the preparatory work may take an entire session or only fifteen minutes. And the preparatory work must be uniquely structured to the needs of this particular client.

If you decide that your client is ready and able to absorb the proposed organization, then the preparatory principle has already been fulfilled and you can move on to the support and palintonic questions. If, for example, support, back/front balance, and sleeve restrictions have not been handled adequately, then you must address these issues before you move into the spinal work. If some of these issues are not a problem, then the principles involved have been fulfilled and you can move on to the next consideration, which may or may not be organizing the spine.

Realize that after you complete the first post-ten session, any combination of preparatory, support, and palintonic issues may surface and need to be handled in the next session. To take a simple example, you may find that you want to “mobilize and warm up the tissue a bit” in an area before you attempt to release articular fixations and derotate associated vertebrae. Your inclination in this case falls under the preparatory principle. On a larger scale, you may discover that the preparatory strategy of the first session upset the support in your client’s body. Thus, you may need to spend some time securing the foundations before advancing to the spinal work.

The amount of time it takes to handle all these issues obviously depends on your client’s unique structural and functional needs. You may discover as you work that your client responds easily and quickly to your work and that a three session series is more than enough time to get the job done. Or you may discover that your strategy of three sessions underestimated your client’s difficulties and that actually five sessions are needed to get the job done.

The very same principle/taxonomy questions considered above in relation to our imagined post-ten series apply equally to the ten series strategy. Before we look at strategizing basic Rolfing according to principles, let us first consider the ten series as a formulistic recipe. Notice that a great deal of the focus of the early sessions of the formulistic recipe is on preparation. This point is especially clear in the first session. Even though the second session of the recipe takes us to the lower legs and feet and hence to support issues, preparation is still the primary issue. The second hour mostly concerns decompensating the feet, lower legs, and spine in preparation for the organization that is to come later. Preparation is still at work in the third hour, but the palintonic issue of back/front order begins to take precedence. The palintonic issue of sleeve/ core organization is present all the way through in these first three sessions in the injunction to begin the series with work on the sleeve.

Although the above look at the first three sessions of the ten series is a bit brief and simplistic, it is perhaps enough to provide a sense of how the principle/taxonomy questions might underlie the recipe(s). However, when we cease looking at and Rolfing our clients through these traditional formulistic lenses, we must realize that the order and progression of the work will probably look somewhat different, and in some cases quite a bit different, than any given recipe(s) can predict.

When we cease structuring our work around recipes and instead formulate our strategies and tactics by means of the principle /,taxonomy questions, we realize immediately that the amount of time it takes to achieve adequate preparation, support, and palintonicity will necessarily vary from client to client and session to session. Furthermore, the level and depth at which any given client is able to own preparation, support, and palintonicity also varies considerably. The issues of preparation, support, palintonicity also always show up in varying degrees of importance and at different levels according to the unique structural and functional needs of each individual client throughout any Rolfing series. For example, in post ten Rolfing, preparation strategies, tactics, and techniques are quite different in application, scope, and depth from the preparation requirements of the early stages of the ten-series. When we drop our formulistic lenses, it is clear that the first three sessions of the recipe(s) are often not enough to achieve adequate back/front order, which is supposed to be the goal of the third hour. In point of fact, for some clients back/front order does not appear until after core/ sleeve issues have been resolved or, in some cases, until after an advanced series.

As I have pointed out in previous articles, recipes are based on principles. Recipes are not principles. They are formulistic patterns of Rolfing. My experience is that a series of ten sessions provides an excellent framework within which to strategize the initial Rolfing series for most clients. However, when the sessions unfold according to the unique needs of the client in accordance with the principles, the work often progresses in ways that look quite different from the way many of our recipes suggest it should. Nevertheless, I am still amazed by the clarity and power of our recipes, both in how effective they are for many clients and in how much structural/functional wisdom is contained there in.

Concluding Remarks

Rolfing is not, and probably never will be, a finished system. To return to Neurath’s metaphor, every box in my diagram of our system is an important plank in the wholistic Rolf boat. No doubt, there are more planks to be discovered. But, no plank should be immune to criticism and every plank should be undergoing careful and intense investigation. We choose which planks are important and relevant to our system on the basis of our understanding of the nature of Rolfing. Because our system is a wholistic integrative inquiry, adding, replacing, or refurbishing planks often reverberates throughout the whole system.

This diagram of our system is useful because it clearly displays our domain of inquiry and the relations between its many levels. It is also useful in our dialogue with other systems of somatic education and therapy, especially with other third paradigm systems. If each third paradigm system could fill in the important boxes with the information relevant to that system, the similarities and differences between each would become immediately obvious. Such comparisons could open the door to many rich and provocative discussions. In turn, such discussions might stimulate more cooperation and cross pollination. One obvious similarity between all third paradigm systems is the Wholistic Principle. At the very least, all wholistic systems would have to embrace the principle that no principle can be fulfilled unless all are.

An interesting and important difference that I have discovered between second and third paradigm practices of manual therapy is that second paradigm practitioners always proceed according to treatment protocols (or recipes) rather than principles. In-deed, I would argue that by the very nature of the second paradigm symptomatic and piece-meal approach to the body, it is not even possible to formulate principles of manipulation. Principles appropriately show up only in third paradigm systems.

On the basis of this diagram let me make one final suggestion. We still stand in need of a clear comprehensive science and phenomenolgy of structural integration. As I understand it, a good part of Hans Flury’s important work is motivated by the recognition of this need. What precisely does structural integration look like? How do we recognize it when it appears?

I would be prepared to argue that no single indicator can be found for determining structural integration. We have assumed for years that the line of gravity was our only and best objective indicator or standard for structural integration. Peter Schwind5 has already pointed out some of the obvious shortcomings of this view. Since structural integration and functional economy are logically equivalent, we should be looking for a number of structural and functional indicators. None of these possible indicators and tests taken by itself will allow us to conclude with any certainty that structural integration has occurred. But all of them taken together might add up to a series of descriptive standards and tests for structural/functional order.

Fortunately, a number of people have been hard at work articulating taxonomies of normal and not so normal structure and function. Some of these taxonomies are purely descriptive and others include clear tests for determining lack of local/global order and, by implication, tests for determining order. I mentioned some of these taxonomies and their creators in the first section of this article. Notice that each of our four meta-taxonomy boxes contains and implies implicit and explicit descriptions of and tests for normalcy. My suggestion is that these taxonomies are where we need to look for our indicators of structural integration. And as we continue to articulate and clarify these taxonomies, we will discover the comprehensive phenomenology and science of normal structure and function we are looking for. Being able to use these taxonomies in conjunction with our principles will allow our work to become more effective.

I am attracted to this diagram and the boat metaphor because together they display the many levels of our systematic discipline of inquiry and reassure us in the understanding of how our system can continue as it constantly and necessarily undergoes criticism, revision, and improvement at every level. Rolfing will sink to the bottom of the sea of obscurity, if it remains mired in the dogmatic ritualism of its past. Just to the extent that we cannot answer the questions, “What do I do first?”, “What do I do next?”, and “How do I go on from here?”, without invoking the authority of a teacher or of formulistic recipe(s) is the extent to which we limit our understanding of the work. The philosophy, science, and art of Rolfing demand critical ongoing investigations into every level and every plank of our wholistic boat.

Footnotes

1 Rolf Lines (Spring 1992), Vol. XX No.2.

2 Quoted in NEUROPHILOSOPY: Toward a Unified Science of theMind/ Brain by PatriciaSmith Churchland (Cambridge, Mass., 1986), P.265.

3 A great deal of this section comes from and rests upon Jan Sultan’s pioneering attempts to teach non-formulisitic Rolfing.

4 Rolf Lines (March, 1993), pp. 60-72.

5 See, for example, Preliminary Considerations For A Theory Of Core, Rolf Lines (Fall,1992) pp. 16-24.[:]Das Boot