Rolfing Movement

The Rolfing MovementRolfing movement is a system of movement integration based on the principals of Rolfing® structural integration.

RM is very effective for keeping you tuned into the Rolfing process – it helps to consolidate the gains of the Ten Series.

It is gentle and relaxing yet can in itself effect powerfully beneficial change in patterns of perception and movement. RM is designed for people who have finished the Ten Series to encourage appropriate movements and constructive awareness so that the positive changes of the Ten Series can continue.

From the moment we are born we learn to move in relation to our environment. If a movement works we tend to repeat and adopt it, sometimes settling for a movement that is relatively inefficient or harmful to our structure. An example of this is banging the heels on the ground in walking. Although this may not cause an apparent problem in the early years of our development, imagine the cumulative effect of millions of jarring collisions of your ankles on the ground. This pattern will wreak havoc throughout the body and perhaps manifest as ankle, pelvic or lower back pain or dysfunction.

As we grow we build up a comfortable repertoire of movement habits while remaining for the most part unaware of other movement options outside of this defined range of experience and sensations. When a symptom such as pain appears as a result of this constricted aggregate of movement patterns, we are commonly reluctant to part with our familiar tried-and-true behaviour. Rolfing Movement is an effective way of introducing more beneficial options.

Here is an example of how the incorporation of a habit into our normal behaviour pattern can happen unconsciously and in interesting ways. This passage is from Body Stories, by Andrea Olsen:

For weeks, I would lie on the studio floor and find myself reaching with my right arm, wiping it horizontally in front of my body. I recognised this movement as a gesture I had incorporated in many of my dances, combining it with turns or leaps. But it was so determined to appear in my Movement sessions. One day when this movement appeared, I got the image of myself as a little girl in my farmhouse in Illinois. We had a long counter top in our kitchen which collected objects, and it was always a mess in the usual family way. Whenever my parents would argue, I would clear the counter. It was my way of controlling, quieting, bringing order to what I perceived as chaos. The movement pattern in my body was sourced in this childhood activity. And I was still using it in the same way, to bring order and calm (and the safety of the Illinois landscape) to the dynamics of performance.

RM and the structural Ten Series are both part of the same process of alignment and functional freedom in gravity, a process not of fixed ideas but of constantly renewed experimentation. You can start RM whenever you wish and space sessions out in order to get the most from each session.

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