Structural Integration – Vol. 35 – Nº 4

All beings, grass and trees, when alive, are soft and bendingWhen dead they are dry and brittle.Therefore the hard and unyielding are companions of death,The soft and yielding are companions of life.Under heaven nothing is more soft and yielding than water.Yet for attacking the solid and strong, nothing is better;It has no equal.The weak can overcome the strong;The supple can overcome the stiff.Lao Tzu.1

For my friend and colleague Peter Schwind

Ida Rolf’s pelvic lift is familiar to all Structural Integration (SI) practitioners as a primary integrative tool of our work. This article will discuss the history and purpose of this intervention and explore some alternative ways of teaching it for client self-help.

The text presented below is the introduction to my doctoral thesis, entitled “Exploratory Study of the Psychobiological Dimension of the Rolfing Structural Integration Method: Creation, Development and Evaluation of Questionnaires”. It describes how my individual path has been intertwined with the collective path, showing how these two roads have converged: personal concerns and desires evolved as a result of finding resonance with those of others, and in this collective manner were converted to objects of investigation and study.In terms of the evolving science and practice of Rolfing, we can only progress by transforming our individual inquiries into collective ones. This text, therefore, is intended as a stimulus and impetus for others interested in the psychobiological question and many other personal concerns to combine their efforts toward the continued development of Rolfing as a multifaceted art and science.

This article presents and analyzes results from the database of information about Rolfing clients treated at Núcleo De Atendimento, Pesquisa e Educação em Rolfing® (NAPER), which is the research and education center of the Brazilian Rolfing® Association (ABR). I will present a brief history of the creation and development of NAPER. I will also describe the creation and development of the instruments and protocol used to document client processes, as well as the format and development of the database.

Ida Rolf?s Sons Speak About Dr. Rolf and Her WorkIda P. Rolf?s two sons both spoke at the First Annual Fascia Research Congress, held in Boston in October 2007. The following articles are their prepared talks, which they have graciously shared with us. From them, we learn more about Ida P. Rolf as a person, how she came to create the work we know as Rolfing®, and what it was like to grow up under her tutelage.