Note from Shonnie Carson: This interview was conducted on September 16, 2015. Judith Aston was in Palm Springs, California teaching a workshop and I drove from Phoenix, Arizona to do an interview with her. The chance to be able to document more history of the Rolf Institute® and the early history of the movement work was just too valuable to pass up.

I first met Judith Aston in 1977, at a jogging workshop at Mt. Tamalpais High School, in Marin County, California. I don’t remember much of the content of the workshop (there was some good advice about my elbow position), but I remember Judith herself vividly. One action particularly sticks in my mind: she was demonstrating how we tense ourselves into patterns as we prepare to take action; she said, “I’m going to hit the ball!” as she assumed the stance of a baseball batter – serious, intent on the pitch. It was both comical, a cartoon character, and perfectly illustrative of her point, that she didn’t need all that counterproductive extra effort to hit the ball. And then in a moment she transformed back again. I think she could have made an excellent actress.