Emotional Healing
It can be pretty astonishing what memories emerge in a bodywork session. Clients who come to me at first with vague and seemingly uninteresting body histories may open up to a whole other vista of awareness when we work on certain key areas on their body. This experience is of course different for everyone since our individual histories are so unique.
I once had a client who came to me with nothing apparent going on, she just wanted to develop more body awareness. After we worked for a while she was feeling good about the sessions, but I hadn’t seen any dramatic difference in her structure. When we got to a session where I spent most of my time on the back of her legs she suddenly broke out in a cold sweat around the hamstrings. This is a sign that her fight or flight (sympathetic nervous system) had kicked in, which happens in times of duress. As we worked she spontaneously recounted abuse she had suffered as a child from her mother. They have long since reconciled and she has no bad feelings toward her but this trauma was still in her body.
I’ve studied many traditions of healing that speak about areas of the body that hold emotion. They say we can store emotion in our connective tissue as a way to cope with trauma, for some reason that serves us at the time. When I say trauma I don’t only mean big and life changing things, it could be small or seemingly inconsequential to us at the time. While this dissociation does provide a respite from uncomfortable experiences it leaves those emotions raw.
There are many reasons given for this phenomenon, some more scientific than others. I don’t know if the science is always solid, but I can tell you from the direct and subjective experience of my own body that this is a reality for some.
I make a point not to lead my clients to this, maintaining a certain level of neutrality. There are practitioners who make it a part of their practice to coax these experiences out of their clients. I’m sure if I did this I would have more of these experiences in my treatment room. The fact remains that although I stay open to it, I in no way lead my clients there. Spontaneous and organic emotional expression is an amazing phenomenon to me. I can only sit in awe and do my best to maintain a safe space for my clientele when they undergo this type of transformation.
What happens on the table is a powerful way to consciously move through some emotion that was previously turned away from. As a practitioner I seek to provide a safe and judgment free space where such expression is okay. A space where my client can be themselves, without fear of reprisal.
Sometimes this manifests itself as spontaneous laughter or just seemingly random memories. I cherish these moments, even if we know not where they come from or why they happen. It seems to me that this is necessary, our body is expressing something it’s held onto.
My treatment room is a space where it all is okay, where you can be what you need to be in that moment. Allowing my client to be what they need to be creates an atmosphere of open neutrality.
Awaken the Spine
It is amazing how the journey through an embodied life is full of surprises. I have recently embodied a new way to wake up my spine at a deeper level than ever before, enlivening lethargic muscle tone and finding a clear horizontal. Ida Rolf liked to call this embodiment “The Line”. Over the years I have learned to know it and show others ways to find it, but The Line is a fleeting and illusive experience. Embodying The Line means to embrace fluidity and unimpeded movement with the adaptability required to navigate what life throws your way.
It not only is a way to move closer to geometric symmetry in my body, it is also a way of embodying the concept of tensegrity in my structure. I am feeling parts of my spine open up that have truly been contracted for a while; other parts of my spine are gaining tone and recovering from the chronic lethargy that they have been accustomed to for so long.
I started this journey towards improved alignment and function in my body consciously in 1999. That is when I received my first 10 series of Structural Integration. I had caught wind of this technique when I heard Ed Maupin, Ph.D. speak at an open house in Pacific Beach at IPSB, I was 18. As a trained psychologist as well as a product of the Human Potential Movement in the 70s, Ed spoke words that got me interested in bodywork in a very real way. He connected our physical structure to our psyche and he presented the idea that they are one, inexorably linked. I was amazed at the concept, it spoke to me and I immediately began to know it more and more in my own body.
He was of course speaking of Somatics, the study of the entwined and inseparable mind/body relationship. The concept that the body was a reflection of who we are in our internal world intrigued me. I had grown up thinking of art making in this same way, as a way to communicate with your own subconscious. Could the body also be a vehicle for this same type of communication?
I have come to understand that Structural Integration is first and foremost an exercise in developing self awareness. As a practitioner I can only guide my client through this process of self discovery, but it is their journey of awareness. With awareness comes change in the body, the more we listen to our own internal signals of distress the more power we have to change unhealthy and habitual patterns. This can happen on so many different levels, but the body is a great starting point.
It’s so easy to get caught up in the business of bodywork. After so many years of working with others I can get distracted from my own process. I experience their triumphs and frustration and at some point inevitably plateau in my own awareness. This is a natural cycle that I do my best to embrace, but it feels so good to return to that sense of increased awareness. This new realization in my body is a return to my roots, it reminds me why I started this work and why it matters so much to me.
I’m tearing up a little right now as I write, because I can feel the gratitude flowing out of me. I want to say thank you to all of my clients past and present. You are the reason I do what I do and you are also the impetus for me to continue to look inward and move forward. You are my inspiration.
What is Rolf S.I.?
What is Rolf S.I.?
Introducing Rolf Structural Integration
Therapeutic bodywork can do amazing things for how we feel and relate to our bodies. Touch brings awareness into the body, providing a tool for communication with our own tissue. Using this awareness we can recognize patterns of tension, stress and strain in our body and consciously release them. In Structural Integration we seek to recognize tissue that is not yielding to change. With attention, full breath, deep touch and core movement we can make space for change to take place, melting through held and unchanging connective tissue and allowing it to release from its contracted state. For many clients this work has provided relief from years of chronic tension, acute injuries, as well as emotional stress. Relieving the body from this pain can have profound effects on day-to-day stress, allowing for more energy and emotional clarity.
The body’s adaptability can cause many movements to become easier if repeated over time. We do this by creating tension throughout our fascial matrix. Beneath the skin our body is contained within a matrix of thin, saran wrap-like connective tissue called fascia. This matrix forms sheaths that envelope all our body’s individual muscles, organs and bones. These sheaths are interconnected throughout our structure and support the skeleton as well as all skeletal movement through their tensile strength, balance and adaptability. Tension, often reflected in the body as excessive muscular tone, is a product of the enveloping fascia holding a muscle in a chronic state of contraction. This affects other muscles by binding the neighboring fascial sheaths together originating from the original held contraction. The process can repeat itself, a “domino effect”, as it is transferred through the body. Using this tensile formation of contracted tissue our fascia can create a false support for any repeated movement, relying on shortened muscle for stability instead of bone. Over time these tensions can become severe enough to cause pain and even major dysfunction, resulting in repetitive stress injuries and related problems. Compensation for the held and misaligned tissue can occur as well, causing the body to adjust its movement patterns to “work around” the contracted tissue. This fascial contraction and inability to change old patterns within the body affects our overall stress level and emotional well-being, it can tear us down physically and emotionally. Awareness is an important tool in changing these patterns. Before change can occur and have a lasting effect we must first have the awareness of living in and from our own tissue. Touch acts as a facilitator along with the client’s own participation utilizing breath, communication and movement.
Structural Integration seeks to awaken changes in the body using deep touch, core movement and awareness. Many of us have tension or pain that we learn to live with. As discussed earlier, these tensions can contribute to structural and postural misalignment. This can be holistically addressed through a process of ten 1 ½ hour therapeutic bodywork sessions. This is Ida Rolf’s method of Structural Integration; it’s truly a whole-body approach. The Ten Series reorganizes the body from the ground up and from the superficial to deep layers of connective tissue, providing the client with positive new ways of relating to their body and environment.
The Ten Series starts with opening the “sleeve” (superficial fascial layers) of the body. This frees the breath, allowing more space for it to flow into. Breath is vital to this work; it offers a helpful tool that allows for a meditative and focused presence in the body. The first three sessions prepare tissue as well as the client for a deeper level of work. The following four sessions address the “core” (deeper fascial layers) of the body. This work allows for the client to shift deep patterns that may be unwilling to change. We use aligned movement to engage the client during the sessions, this is a way to experientially learn balanced and aligned movement. When movement is balanced we interact more efficiently with our fascia by shortening only the tissue truly necessary and letting the opposing tissue extend. This allows for ease of movement and an improved level of dynamic stability in the body.
The last three sessions in the series are the “integration” sessions. These sessions have an increased focus on client induced movement, clarifying how we move from our body’s core. Core movement refers to the ability to involve the deep musculature of the body. This deep musculature is called the “intrinsic” layer; it is naturally optimized for smaller movements and core stability. When overlooked in day-to-day movement and awareness this can cause the body to overuse the more superficial larger musculature resulting in more effort in all movement. This, the “extrinsic” layer, is naturally optimized for larger movements that require larger muscles. Overusing either layer can cause imbalance and distortion to occur in the body as well as pain that is associated with excessive contraction. When the extrinsic and intrinsic layers work together they can create a unique balance, creating an efficient way for movement to be expressed. This balance can uncover a sense of ease, efficiency and grace that flow through the body.
Opening awareness to the fascial matrix that molds our body can support a more centered state of being. Typically it takes about a year for clients to truly embody the changes that take place within this series. Continued participation with your body is definitely encouraged; exercises done with a structurally balanced intention can help to maintain this awareness. Structural Integration provides tools that can last for a lifetime. Walking, yoga, sports, swimming, virtually any exercise or activity can be done with awareness of structural alignment. Following the ten series maintenance sessions are encouraged, but not always necessary. A one to three month gap between these sessions might be appropriate, depending on your body’s needs.
Rolfing® is about Core Experience
Rolfing® is about Core Experience
Stated most simply, the goal of Rolfing® is to enable one to move and balance from the core of the body, from the center line of gravity. This has both physical and experiential (psychological, spiritual) aspects which we can discuss separately.
It deserves attention that Ida Rolf, the originator of Rolfing®, was a scientist, a biochemist, who, though she moved far away from her field, never lost her clear attention to physical reality. Both the force of gravity acting upon every body and the fascial tissues she worked to reorganize are real in the scientific sense. At the same time, she understood that the body is the form of our awareness, the lens through which consciousness experiences life, and this “experiential” aspect was never far from her mind.
The Body as a Physical Object in Gravity
The first principle of Rolfing® is that the body must relate continually to the physical force of gravity. The various segments of the body must be more or less aligned one on top of the other, or else the external muscles begin to labor to maintain the upright posture. Pelvis, abdomen, chest and head balance easily when their centers of gravity are in a line, so that the upright balance can come from deep muscles which operate by reflex to relate the body to gravity.
Fascia Shapes the Body
People are ordinarily not aligned in this way, however. The easy relationship to gravity can be disorganized by many factors, including accidents, misguided habits, and deep attitudes of various kinds. Fascia is the all-pervasive webwork of connective tissue which holds the body in its shape. As we struggle to move in a gravity field, the fascial webwork adapts to support our movement, and the shape slowly changes..
Fascia can be Reorganized with Movement
Ida Rolf’s discovery was that fascia can be re-organized with correct movement–movement which is in accord with the geometry of the skeleton–and that this reorganization can be hastened by deep manipulation which holds the fascial tissues in place while the client moves. Her maxim:
“Hold tissues where they are supposed to be and induce movement.”
Through years of experience she developed a series of ten sessions which systematically reorganize the whole body, proceeding from the outside layers to the deeper ones and bringing all the major segments into an integrated system of balance. Rolfers® generally work within this ten-session framework, though they may use quite different procedures to accomplish the same goals. The overall goal is to find a sense of balance which comes from the core, unobstructed by unbalancing distortions in the myo-fascial system.
The Experiential Core
But it is an interesting fact that this core balance which we call “The Line” is closely related to the core feeling of one’s own being. When the outer layers of the body release to permit the inner layers to function, a deeper awareness opens up. “The Line” is not a physical entity, but a sense of inner space. It is no accident that those centers of feeling which Indian yoga calls “chakras” lie along the same central line of gravity.
The usual sense we have of ourselves and the world is based on characteristic patterns of tension. When we release these tensions and rely on the expansional balance of the core, The Line, we move the center of our experiencing into the core as well.
Now, in the most radical terms, the effect of the ten sessions could be a major re-experiencing of one’s Being: a dramatic change of consciousness. Thought patterns based upon one’s contracted ego, would release and be replaced by a different viewpoint. Ida Rolf spoke of “turning people out” by which she meant they are brought into the core so that they exist and relate out into the world from there.
The poet, William Blake seems to be talking about the same thing in this famous quotation:
“If the doors of perception were cleansed everything would appear to man as it is, infinite.
For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro’ narrow chinks of his cavern.” [Marriage of Heaven and Hell, 1793]
Blake was criticizing the viewpoint of scientific materialism which takes the external world seriously as independent and “out there”. It causes us to forget that our experience of the external world is created by the mind, or as Blake would have it, the imagination. Your experience of anything is organized by your habits of perception. It is not in itself. It is not objective in the sense we have been trained to believe it is.
To experience from the core is to take responsibility for the extent to which we create this experience. It is to move away from an externalized “over there” kind of perception into a real continued link with our feelings, perceptions, and responses.
If you think what you’re perceiving is “out there”, you are looking out through your senses as if through chinks in the cavern wall of your dualistic perception.. If you move into a continued contact with your core experience, you are cleansing the doors of perception. Blake is talking about returning to core experience. And most mystics and really good poets have talked about the same shift.
Ida Rolf’s approach to this was to organize the fascia in a physical body in a three-dimensional gravity field. But this is not only working on a material body. This is the body as it is experienced: the phenomenological body. This body is real in an entirely different sense. It exists in the mind. If all of reality is created, in the sense of organized, by your Imagination, the image-ing faculty of your core being, then the body exists in the imagination. In fact, Blake would say the body exists in the imagination rather than the imagination existing in the body.
Releasing Traumatic Emotions and Memories
In the process of moving attention through the outer layers of the body into the core people sometimes re-experience emotions and memories which are stored there. This is a valuable part of the process of becoming more aware, and sometimes people use deep tissue bodywork like Rolfing® as part of a process of psychotherapy. The fact that the person is experiencing these emotions in the context of the body means that they are grounded, less confusing and more safe than might otherwise be the case.
Other people do not experience these dramatic moments of recall. Anyway, what is important is the the increased awareness and presence in the body. Good sessions are almost like meditations which bring deeper levels of one’s physical being into awareness. The awareness remains, and it is this that helps people be more grounded and centered as a result of Rolfing®.
Combining the Physical and Psychological
Arranging the body so that it balances around the actual physical line of gravity is the key to the opening of the core. The work is neither too ethereal and ungrounded in physical reality, nor so purely physiological that it ignores the experience of the person. It is a meditation of a high degree. When one experiences an open balance of some part of the body in Rolfing®, it is often with an interior sense of rightness, of recognition of the body as it was always meant to be. At the same time it has the elegance of a geometry lesson, purified of subjective distortion and confusion. In a sense, Ida Rolf managed what William Blake never did: to combine a scientific understanding with an adequate grasp of soul.
Edward W. Maupin, Ph. D., 1996 www.edmaupin.com
What is Holistic Medicine?
What is Holistic Medicine?
[Originally published in Vision Magazine October 2007]
In the city of San Diego we have an HHP designation, which stands for Holistic Health Practitioner. This title is given to Massage Therapists or Bodyworkers with over 1000 hours of training and who have passed a certification exam. Many of these practitioners do indeed provide holistic services because their approach to the body is designed to enable a natural healing response and harness the power of intention. This recognition of the whole person is both refreshing and unique in our very specialized and compartmentalized culture.
Holistic is a word that’s thrown around often in alternative and complimentary healthcare professions. The word in of itself can relate to many different fields of study and practice. Many have used holistic methods in the past spanning from to Hippocrates in Greece to the Yellow Emperor in ancient China. Although the meaning and theories that fall into this realm of healthcare have evolved, the basic tenets have remained the same. Holistic refers to a method of treating the whole person. Some choose the spelling “wholistic” to emphasize this whole person ideology embodying the power of nature and harnessing the patients belief in the therapy. We even see a faint understanding of this concept in modern western science. Although the allopathic approach has a long legacy of specialization and reduction of the whole person down to their component parts.
Hippocrates practiced medicine around 400 BC in ancient Greece and is known as the “father of medicine”. He believed in the healing power of nature and the body’s innate ability to heal itself. In this way he treated the whole person and recognized the need to nurture the body’s homeostasis through his humble and passive treatment methodology known as Humorism. Quite a legacy has been left to western medicine and the world in the form of his ethical tenets, enhanced professionalism and cleanliness. These practices live on today as reminders of Hippocrates’ influence in modern western medicine.
Eastern medicine has for ages seen emotion and the mind play an important role in health. In the writings of the Yellow Emperor, dating back to 2686 BC, he laid out the major points in Traditional Chinese Medicine. He postulates that all our organs correspond to a specific emotional state and each have an energetic pathway through the body called a meridian. These meridians carry energy and can be affected by emotional states or physical ailments. This energy is called “chi” and when it’s flowing freely we are healthy and happy. Acupuncture seeks to open up these energetic channels when they are blocked with the use of carefully placed hair thin needles, herbs, heat, tinctures and sometimes even lifestyle changes. Positive visualizations and energetic manipulations are used to enhance and direct this energy flow through movement practices such as Qi-Gong and T’ai Chi.
Western medicine has begun to take the placebo effect very seriously. Studies have shown that if you give someone an inert substance (a placebo) that has no legitimate physiological effect on their system, tell them it will make them feel better or heal a disease, then there’s some percentage of success. This isn’t because the substance did anything to these patient’s bodies, rather they believed in the healing effect and therefore their system responded positively. Acceptance of this fact in the scientific community is widespread and opens the door to developing a more holistic approach in western medicine by recognizing the power of intention.
I liken the placebo effect to the ability our mind or consciousness has in regulating our body. The human being is constantly trying to find homeostasis, or balance, even down to a cellular level. Holistic medicine takes this into account and aims to relieve blockages in the body and/or mind to achieve this aim. If there are physical, emotional or mental blockages all of these things have a negative effect on the body’s ability to heal itself. The power of intention and the role of nature are both forces that can shift somebody closer to or further from healing and wholeness.
A holistic approach is needed today more than ever. As a culture we have lost touch with a certain level of humanity and nurturing that these alternative approaches truly embody. But which path to take? We can look to the past for abundant answers and also to current methodologies that are starting to see with a more holistic vision. But ultimately the answers lie in your hands. After all, the heart of holism is simply asking the body what it needs to be a whole being.
Archie Underwood, BA, HHP is a Bodyworker and Rolf Structural Integration practitioner. He maintains a holistic practice in San Diego focused on relieving chronic pain and increasing awareness of posture and movement. Contact Archie at: www.rolfsi.com (619) 861-3232
Physical, Emotional & Mental Healing…
Physical, Emotional & Mental Healing… Experiencing Structural Integration
Structural Integration (SI) is a form of deep tissue bodywork that incorporates movement and posture education. Joy K. came to me for SI sessions about a year ago. Having already received a series of ten sessions, she was ready for advanced work on a physical and emotional level. She takes a very active role in her healing process and is open to the journey of self-discovery that SI provides. This makes her an ideal client; she is self-motivated, aware, and communicative of her process.
Vision Magazine: What prompted you to seek out Structural Integration?
Joy K: I sought out SI because I was in a lot of pain and nothing else, including physical therapy, personal training, or massage, seemed to be working.
VM: What benefits have you received from Structural Integration?
JK: The benefits I’ve received from SI are really physical, emotional and mental. Primarily, it helped me process emotions that had been trapped in my body. It eased my pain tremendously and I was able to resume the active life that I enjoy.
VM: What kind of pain where you having and what kind of relief have you experienced?
JK: I had a lot of injuries from doing Kenpo karate. I also fell very hard on my sacrum. My quadratus lumborum was screwed up and I had tendonitis/bursitis in my shoulder. My pain on a scale from one to ten was probably an eight on a daily basis and it was really hard to function. The work helped my muscles be where they’re supposed to be, the sheath on top of those muscles relaxed, and my body was able to heal itself.
VM: Has SI affected your range of motion or flexibility in any way?
JK: My range of motion is a lot better and my movements seem more fluid. The stiffness in my joints has lessened, as well. I can now move around a lot easier, probably better than I did in my 20s.
VM: How would you describe your response to your first SI session?
JK: After my first visit, I felt like I had taken a muscle relaxer and I couldn’t move. I had to park somewhere for about 30 minutes, and it freaked me out a little bit. Sometimes I would wake up in the middle of the night and feel my muscles moving back into place or something. It was really weird. The first thing I noticed was that my diaphragm was freeing up and I was able to take a deep breath again. I don’t think I’d been able to take a deep breath since I was a child.
VM: Here is the question people wonder about SI: is it painful?
JK: It’s relative. I can handle a lot of pain, but SI is what I would classify as “good pain,” especially if you breathe through it—the breath is very important. The way I know the difference between good pain and bad pain is this: good pain is releasing something and it feels like the kind of pain that the body craves. If I just breathe through it, it subsides very quickly. Bad pain is sharper and radiates a little more. During the fourth session, I had to ask the practitioner to pull back because the pain was too close to the edge. The mark of a good practitioner is that he or she will work with you to determine where your boundaries are. It’s up to the client to let the practitioner know where the pain threshold is.
VM: In SI, the focus is on building more awareness in the body. How has this expanded consciousness changed your relationship with your physical self?
JK: It’s forced me to really be in my body. I have a lot of body image and eating disorder issues, along with a history of body dysmorphia and dissociation from my body. This is why I’ve experienced physical problems: because I’ve ignored my body’s cries for help. I listen to my body a lot more now and I let it tell me what it needs and what it wants—not just through activity but through all of the other sensations I have. It’s been extremely beneficial for me to feel safe in my body and take good care of myself, because this is the only body I will ever have.
VM: Do you feel your posture and movement has improved as a result of SI?
JK: It’s 100 percent better. People give me compliments all the time on my posture. Six years ago, I had horrible posture and I was in a ton of pain. I couldn’t force myself to have good posture when I tried. It made me feel really good to have people compliment me again and again on how good my posture is. But more importantly, it’s just easier to move in the world. It’s easier to sit up and I don’t have back problems like I used to. There’s no other way I could have gotten there without investing in myself and getting this work done.
VM: What advice would you give to people seeking wellness in their lives?
JK: I always encourage people to give to themselves. Health is not just about physical wellness. Some people may not be open to exploring mental and emotional parts of their being, but it’s beneficial on many levels. It’s a huge investment you make in yourself and your health. You maintain your car and you maintain your house, but you’ve got to maintain your body—you can’t neglect it or ignore it.
Archie Underwood, BA, HHP, practices Structural Integration in San Diego, CA. You can reach him at 619.861.3232 or visit www.rolfsi.com.
