Structural Integration – The Journal of the Ida Rolf Institute – Summer 2001 – Vol 29 – Nº 03

PREFACE I practice Manual Medicine. My hands are the smartest part of me. My position is that those whom I have trained with and been trained by are physicians. Webster’ defines a physician as “any person or thing that heals, relieves, or comforts” and defines “heal” as “to make sound, well or healthy again; restore to health; to remedy or get rid of grief, troubles, etc.” After I examine my clients and their unique sets of conditions, I treat through education, words o guidance, numerous acts of God and a little manipulation. The purpose of this paper i to address a specific aspect of the latter. I am presenting this paper with a tacit understanding that the reader is a trained Rolfer. That is, you have a working knowledge of gross anatomy, are trained to identify and assess deviations in structure and function, and possess the basic manipulation skills required to address issues and restore function in a wide range of cases.

“When your body is not aligned,The inner power will not come.When you are not tranquil within, Your mind will not be well-ordered.Align your body, assist the inner power,Then it will gradually come on its own.Nei-yeh”Taoist ancient poetry2

The soul of man with all the streams of pure living water seems to dwell in the fascia of his body. When you deal with the fascia, you deal and do business with the branch offices of the brain, and under the general corporation law, the same as the brain itself, and why not treat it with the same degree of respect. Andrew Taylor Still, 1899

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.