Bulletin of Structural Integration Ida P. Rolf

Before I became a rolfer, I’d never heard off fascia. I was more than a little surprised, therefore, to learn that Dr. Rolf considered a knowledge of fascia central both to an understanding! of how a human body functions and to any attempts to change that functioning as she had done. Her image that fascia is like the membranes separating the sections of an orange or a grapefruit helped me visualize it; the following article gave me a clearer sense of the ways it ‘works” and can be worked with. In a way, I think this is the most important article to appear in the Bulletin thus far, in its contribution to a “nuts and bolts” understanding of what Structural Integration is all about.K.H

Dear Friends,The purpose of this letter is to summarize a research proposal that is being submitted to the Rolf Institute. The title of the project is:THE MUSCULO-SKELETAL RESEARCH PROJECT PART I – A MOIRÉ CONTOUROGRAPHIC STUDY OF THE EFFECTS OF ROLFING AND ROLFING-MOVEMENT INTEGRATIONON SPINAL GEOMETRY

“Soul and body, I suggest, react sympathetically upon each other; a change in the state of the soul produces a change in the shape of the body and conversely; a change in the shape of the body produces a change in the state of the soul.”-Aristotle

Editor’s note: The following is, to my knowledge, the first time that a case evaluation has appeared in print. Contributing to this assessment are Neal Powers (Neal Winblads Rolfer), and two members of the Education Committee, Peter Melchior and Emmett Hutching. Peter and Emmett viewed the photographs independently. Without bereft of prior consultation with each other or with Neal Powers. Admittedly, photographs provide a limited amount of information about the Rolfing process. Peter expressed concern that “didactic pronouncements about photographs not be misconstrued to “assume the rnagnitude of dogma.” Evaluating the progress of the one client in this fashion, however, is not merely for the purpose of critical assessment of one Rolfers worrk. The intention is more one of mutual education, as well as to lest the language upon which our work relies. Future systematic efforts such as this may go much further toward refining that language.

This is the first of four “allegorical” essays by Frank Wiedemann. They first appeared in United Fields published by Mr Wiedmann in Telluride, Colorado.

This paper is the result of an assignment that Dr. Rolf gave us in my beginning Practitioners class. She objected to a statement, that in a balanced body, the weight goes through the bones; and she assigned us the task of stating what is correct. I was sorely puzzled, since I agreed with this statement; and anyway, I could think in no other terms. Michael Salveson, our teacher, said to me repeatedly, “it’s like a Tensegrity structure”. I had never heard of such things until then; and when I got home, I began to study them and to build them. Gradually, the light dawned on me. Since I knew that others had a hard time understanding these fundamental points, I decided to write this paper, chiefly for beginning rolfers.I dedicate this paper, then, to Michael, my teacher.

A condensed idea of the brain and its coverings, showing the simple control of soul and body, and how important it is to keep the two properly integrated.

Richard Wheeler is an advanced practitioner of Rolf-Aston Structural Patterning In Stillness and Motion. Deborah Wheeler holds her M.S. in Psychology.

Caryl Edwards-Gold Is a Rolf practitioner in Boulder, Colorado who has for the past several years been a student of Da Liu, T’ai Chi master and head of the T’ai Chi Society of New York. She has assisted Master Da Liu in his classes and upon his recommendation taught in growth centers and universities primarily in the Southwest. For the past three years she has held classes in Boulder.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Attorney Jerry A. Green is a legal consultant in the area of medical malpractice and licensing litigation and is writing a book for Random House/Bookworks on emerging professional roles in health care. He teaches at the U.C. School Public of Health and approaches the dynamics of health awareness from the perspective of Structural Integration and Patterning, massage and nutrition.

Dr. Aubrey Westlake directed the following remarks to a meeting of British Homeopaths. and they are reprinted here with the kind permission of The British Homeopathic Journal, from Volume LIV. #3. He begins by acknowledging that he is himself not a member of the faculty of Homeopathy, but takes as his rationale the belief that it is often true that the spectator sees most of the game and maybe it is possible for a sympathetic outsider to see the trend of things better than those directly concerned. Dr Westlake uses many terms unfamiliar to United Stares readers. or for that matter, to laymen in Great Britain: the article is reprinted here for its particular contribution in areas beginning to be of concern to the inquiries into maintaining the health of the whole human.Editor

INTRODUCTION This considerably condensed version of a speech given by Dr. Cohen, currently at the Zieger/Botsford Hospitals, Southfield, Michigan, is a nice discussion of the sensory systems in our bodies which tell us where the parts of the body are in relationship to each other, how they are moving, and how the body is aligned relative to the direction of the force of gravity. The paper is a good refresher for rolfers, emphasizing the diversity and interrelationships of perceptual motor activity systems and their functional importance to the well being of the whole person.Several points seem particularly relevant. One is the emphasis on the crucial role played by the receptors in the connective tissue around joints in performing coordinated movements. Another is the discussion of the great and somewhat overlooked importance of receptors in the neck, based on Dr. Cohen’s experiments with monkeys. The discussion of reflexes also is very interesting, especially the presence of reflex stimulated muscle activity even in the absence of obvious movement, as though from remnants of our evolutionary past. Reflex activities seem to me deserving of further research for rolfers. The complete original paper, with figures and references, is available through the editorial office of the Bulletin. – Lloyd Kaechle, Ph.D.

From remarks prefacing an oral presentation of the first chapter of her forthcoming book at the Conference on Research in Structural Integration, Esalen Institute, May 11-13, 1972.