The Hand of God: Tom Pathe on Self Rolfing
This is a little heady and metaphysical, but I think it’s also a beautiful description of the deep connection to the body that Structural Integration can be a part of. He specifically refers to doing work on your self, but this applies to any type of somatic work. I love his description of allowing the heart to let go.
The Hand of God: Tom Pathe on Self-Rolfing from Bill Scheffel on Vimeo.
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.
