About The Rolf Method of Structural Integration
The Rolf Method of Structural Integration
(SI) changes your body's shape
for the better.
What it is
It is a system of bodywork that improves posture and elasticity of the body with lasting results. An SI practitioner achieves his or her goals by lengthening and organizing the body's fascia, or connective tissue. As an added bonus, SI can be very successful in treating painful bodily complaints that other treatments and even surgery have not been able to resolve. (See client testimonials)
Fascia
Fascia includes ligaments and tendons, but it is much more than that. It is the body´s ¨organ of structure¨, which functions not unlike the cables in a suspension bridge, holding the body up. Fascia is a protein matrix and extends everywhere throughout your structure. It unifies the whole. It binds muscle to bone, muscle to organ, organ to bone. Its membranes wrap around every bone, muscle, muscle group and organ. In fact, it encapsulates every single muscle fiber (cell) as a micro-thin sheath. That means that there are no two muscle fibers that actually touch each other because there is an interconnecting web of fascia occupying that space between them!
In essence, you are wearing a suit of fascia around your skeletal system. And this suit can develop structural imbalances and functional limitations …
Whether it is emotional trauma, physical injury, surgery, poor bio-mechanics, disease or even just the daily press of gravity from above , life can deal a variety of challenges to our body. If this strain or stress is ongoing, fascia responds eventually by thickening, shortening and tightening to lend structural support to this compromised area. This affects the entire structure of your body: as when there is one point of the whole not right, the rest loses its stability, its integrity. Compensations set-in. A holding pattern gets established. Balance and function are compromised. Slouching or rigidity may become habitual. Lack of energy is symptomatic. Discomforts develop…even pain.
What It Is Not
Sometimes the rolf method is put into the same genre as chiropractic and osteopathy as they all deal with alignment of the body in some way. However, there are some important differences. They are each distinct tools and all tools have their own peculiarities and are appropriate for certain situations.
Chiropractic and much of osteopathy use techniques that directly manipulate bones into alignment. If a bone has been suddenly forced out of line by, for instance, an impact injury, accident or fall, these therapies can prove most efficacious in relieving discomfort and the adjustment is likely to hold.
However, if it is a chronic skeletal deviation - as in postural imbalances that you have lived with for years - a direct adjustment of the bones will often result in only temporary relief of symptoms and the adjustment does not hold. Furthermore, if the same adjustment of the bone is repeated over and over again, eventually the ligaments of the articulation will tend to weaken and joint stability is compromised. That would be a case of the wrong tool being used for the wrong purpose.
Lasting Results
SI is efficient and systematic at working out long term structural deviations because it works at the fascial level—causal level—of misaligned bones. In other words, it is the misaligned fascia that is keeping the bones out of line. Chronic imbalance is fascial imbalance. SI is the tool needed here, because when restricted fascia is freed and re-positioned, the body returns to its structurally optimal alignment. Range of motion is extended and general body mechanics are improved. Less energy is needed. Standing tall is more effortless. Walking becomes fluid and efficient. Breathing is more full and easier. The body looks and feels lighter.