Fascia as an Auto-Regulatory System
Bruce Schonfeld: What is the current research saying about fascia being an auto-regulatory system in the body? Tom Myers: It may be hard for some to understand how little was published about fascia in the 1970s. There was a hard-to-follow un-illustrated description of fascial planes by Edward Singer. There was a wonderful, prescient article by […]
Switching Sessions
One way I think about the recipe is that it is a way of understanding how large anatomical segments relate to each other according to a Structural Integration view. This understanding includes a staging of sessions based on certain embedded relationships in the body, an alphabet of relationships which Ida saw, and which we cannot […]
A Rolfer Can Tune Your Body
IDA ROLF Rolf was born in New York in 1896, and her early training was scientific. She received a Ph.D. in biochemistry from Columbia University (1920), did postdoctoral work at the Rockefeller Institute’s Department of Chemistry, and held a 12-year associate position in that institution’s Department of Organic Chemistry. During a leave of absence from […]
Preliminary Considerations for a Theory of Core (reprint)
When I read that this would be the First Annual Science of Rolfing Lecture, I thought this a little bit incongruous with what I have to say: I have chosen the theme of core, because I thought “this is really one of the issues I don’t know anything about.” It reminds me a little bit […]
Ida Rolf on Sutherland and Swedenborg
“…they would not admit me to a class because I wasn’t an Osteopath. Well, you all know me. I rented myself out as a secretary (laughter), so I got my first observation and information about what goes on in the head through that trip. Now I am not belittling Cranio-Osteopathy. It was a very great […]
Acupuncture Points, Meridians, and Stripes (reprint)
I continue in my process of doing the ten sessions with an awareness of the location of acupuncture points, meridians and stripes. This approach continues to yield new insights into human structure and opens new ways of effectively reaching the goals of the individual sessions. Before examining the inner arch of the foot in the […]
An Exploration of the Connection Between Traditional Osteopathy and Rolfing
I would like to use this article to discuss parallels between the philosophies of traditional osteopathy and Rolfing®, and how in my studies and practice they have influenced and informed each other. The following well-known statements by Andrew Taylor Still, the creator of osteopathy, show fascia to be the basis of (or one of the […]
NMT and Rolfing
When a Rolfer tries to establish connections between Rolfing and another soft-tissue discipline, particularly when considering an interface, there is an involuntary knee-jerk reaction from many in the community who see such an inquiry as a potential dilution of the purity of the work. This territorial response stems from the ramifications of igniting the tinderboxes […]
Anatomical Riffs
You might think that the importance of a solid knowledge of anatomy for Structural Integrators would be beyond debate. That speaking this fundamental language of the body with fluency, if not virtuosic facility, would be an irrefutable goal of all practitioners. That every serious student of our work would be constantly working to improve their […]
Three Rolfers in a Lab
There are two quite different kinds of people dealing with the health of human beings. First of all, there are the “real” physicians. After extensive university studies – during which they have to learn by heart more things than even the most able of them could possibly remember – they have to find out in […]