The post Good articles on Rolfing™ appeared first on rolfworks.

Ida. P. Rolf was a pioneer.  Born in the Bronx, N.Y., in 1896, she received her doctorate in bio chemistry from the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1920.  She was, to say the least, one of few women at that time pursuing advanced education.

For 12 years after Columbia University, Dr. Rolf  worked in the departments of chemotherapy and organic chemistry at the renowned Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, attaining the position of Associate Professor.   She studied atomic physics and mathematics at the Swiss Technical University in Zurich and homeopathic medicine in Geneva.

Over the next decade, Dr. Rolf applied her knowledge of science and wellness to seek answers to the health concerns of her loved ones. Unwilling to accept the limitations of medicine at the time, Dr. Rolf embraced a wide range of approaches including osteopathy, chiropractic medicine, and mind-body disciplines such as yoga, the Alexander Technique, and Alfred H.S. Korzybski’s study of consciousness.

Bringing together such a rich variety of perspectives, Dr. Rolf discovered that she could achieve remarkable changes in posture and structure by manipulating the body’s myofascial system. Dr. Rolf eventually named her body of work “Structural Integration” – a holistic system of soft tissue manipulation and movement education that organizes the whole body in gravity.

Recipients found the work dramatically altered posture and structure. Increasingly, people sought out Dr. Rolf to receive Structural Integration as a way to ease pain, address chronic stress, and improve performance in their daily activities.

Dr. Rolf’s ambition to bring Structural Integration to as many people as possible took her all over the world.  She spent a great deal of time at Esalen in Big Sur during the heyday of the Human Potential movement.  Her colleagues and clients included Dr. Fritz Perls, the founder of Gestalt Therapy.  Her desire was to teach future generations the fruit of her life’s work. Dr. Rolf dedicated the rest of her life to developing and teaching the system of body structural organization that was to bear her name.

In the mid-1960s, Dr. Rolf established the Guild for Structural Integration with a three-fold mission: to train practitioners, educate the public, and promote research.  The Rolf Institute for Structural Integration was established in 1971.  Both schools are located in Boulder, CO.  The term “Rolfing®” and “Rolfer” are trademarks owned exclusively by the Rolf Institute of Structural Integration in Boulder, CO.  Students who graduate with certification training from the Rolf Institute are “Rolfers.”

Lynn Cohen, owner of Rolfworks in Milwaukee, WI is a Certified Rolfer.  She attended both the Guild for Structural Integration and the Rolf Institute for Structural Integration in Boulder, CO.

Check out a youtube video featuring Ida P. Rolf herself

Don’t forget to Like Us!

The post Who invented rolfing? appeared first on rolfworks.

“Visceral Manipulation” is a technique of manual therapy developed by Jean-Pierre Barral, Physical Therapist and Osteopath. He discovered that restrictions around the viscera caused tension on surrounding structures, thereby affecting the body’s functioning. By manipulating and freeing the restrictions in the abdomen, the neuro-muscular-skeletal problems his patients came in with often resolved. According to the Barral Institute (www.barralinstitute.com), 90% of myofascial-skeletal restrictions have a visceral component.

Just as injury to our muscles and connective tissue can produce adhesions and scar tissue as a result of the healing process, so can restrictions develop in our viscera as a result of injury or infection. The object of “Visceral Manipulation” is to gentle and precisely release specific restrictions so the organs are restored to their healthy state of motion, allowing for optimal blood flow, chemical exchange, and digestion.

Inside our abdomens, behind ribs and belly button, there are 13 organs which are responsible for the autonomic/involuntary functioning of our bodies. (There are 22 organs altogether, when you include our thorax/chest cavity, and more yet when you include the contents of our skull.) Our lungs, heart, liver, gall bladder, kidneys, spleen, stomach, large and small intestines, appendix, adrenals, reproductive and eliminatory organs are all working, 24/7, to keep us alive and functioning well.

Our organs are packed inside us, sometimes tightly, suspended and connected via ligaments. The liver, for instance, is connected to the diaphragm, to the right kidney, to the stomach, to the colon, and to the abdominal wall. Within this suspensory ligamentous system, our organs need to be able to move–up and down, side to side, and rotationally. There are two kinds of motion: mobility, in which the organ moves to a certain degree in all of these planes of motion; and motility, which is an inherent motion within the organ itself. Motility is thought to be a kind of cellular memory of our embryological development; as our cells divided in a particular motion, our organs themselves “remember” that motion and continue to move accordingly–subtly, but palpably.

When I feel, for example, the underside of my liver beneath my ribs, I should be able to mobilize it up and down, forward and back, and side to side. (Don’t try this at home!) Liver motilityinvolves a motion that is outward, upward and back, then inward, downward and forward, in a cycle of 6-8 per minute. Mobility and motility operate independently of each other. Where motility is “stuck,” the skilled visceral therapist is able to restore this motion.

Sensing the organs, in all their layers, takes a great deal of patience and presence of mind, which is the artistry of this work. My extremely gifted teacher, Joan-Anne Zollers, was able to feel the mobility and motility of each structure independently, simply by placing her hand lightly on my abdomen.  It’s like magic.

The post Consulting your gut appeared first on rolfworks.

Back pain is a complex subject.  There is so much to say about it—what causes it, how to treat it, whether it involves nerves, bony articulations, tight muscles, etc.—and in the end, answers are often hard to find.  According to the National Institute of Health, nearly everyone at some point has back pain that interferes with work, routine daily activities, or recreation.  Thirty one million people suffer from some kind of back pain every day.  Americans spend at $50 billion on low back pain each year.  While some episodes of acute back pain resolve, more or less, without intervention, the acute can become chronic and seriously interfere with the quality of life for many people.

In the therapy I practice as a Rolfer, I am looking for a body-wide balance, an interplay between stability and adaptability–the ability to move when movement is called for.   I’m looking to support and enhance the functioning of the natural curves of the spine so movement can move through the body fluidly.  Many people have restrictions in areas of their bodies that should move, and too much movement in areas that should have more stability.  Particular muscles and joint ligaments provide stability.  We have 360 joints in our bodies.  Joints are designed to move to varying degrees, some more than others.  When muscles and ligaments don’t work properly, either from direct injury or as a result of overuse and/or unskillful movement patterns, the associated joints are prone to hyper-mobility, too much movement, and risk injury.  On the other hand, following an injury, there is often restriction of movement at the injured site long past the point of healing, and that joint is no longer able to move freely.  Whole-body compensation patterns develop, and become part of the way we move around in the world.

Rolfing can release fixations that prevent freedom of movement, but often times, people need strengthening exercises in addition to Rolfing.

“But I do crunches to strengthen my core!”

What do we mean when we talk about “core”?  Depending on who you ask, you’ll get different answers.  From a back pain stability perspective, “core” refers to muscles that stabilize the spine and pelvis during exercise/activity.  Our multi-jointed bodies were not meant for long periods of sitting or lying around watching television.  Our lifestyles have rendered our cores, at least compared to the way our ancestors used theirs, relatively lacking in support.  To make up for it, many people do sit-ups, crunches and many other abdominal exercises that focus primarily on the rectus abdominis muscles (“six-pack” muscles) and the internal/external obliques (“love handles”). Yet back pain persists.  Why?

The single most important abdominal muscle to train in service of preventing back pain is the Transversus Abdominus. The TA is the deepest muscle that forms the abdominal wall.  Its fibers run horizontally around your abdomen like a corset. Its primary function is to compress the ribs and viscera, stabilizing the pelvis and spine.   It connects directly into the fascia of the lumbar spine, which is why it’s such an important stabilizing muscle.  If this muscle is neglected, it becomes underactive and non supportive.  Hence: back pain!

Many core routines and ab exercises inherently activate and strengthen the transverse abdominals in a lesser fashion. Funny enough, isolating the Transversis Abdominus is remarkably easy and can be performed anywhere. Simply suck in your stomach like you are trying to touch your belly-button to your spine. If performed correctly, you should feel an unusual strain on a muscle around your midsection, the worse the strain, the more neglected the muscle. Start off at 5-10 seconds and relax. As the muscle gets stronger, suck in for 30 seconds to a minute at a time. These “vacuum exercises” are easy to do and good for your back and belly. Exercises like planks, side-planks, stabilization and dead bugs are excellent total core strengtheners that should be implemented in everyone’s workout.

The post My aching back! appeared first on rolfworks.

What I usually do not reveal on the first or second meeting: If someone had told me, ten years ago, that I would be spending my life touching people and helping them work through pain in their bodies, I would have nodded, sure, and walked away, thinking that they’d best not try to make a living predicting people’s futures.

Both of my parents were doctors.  My father, a surgeon, had slides from his practice that he used as teaching tools for medical residents.  They showed intestines, guts, blood.  As kids, my brothers and sisters and I would send our friends away squealing after allowing them peeks of these slides.  For me, that had settled it.  No way would I be anything medical!  Bodies were gross!

I began my adult life as a musician.  I played the double bass—a massive, cumbersome instrument that I had managed to master enough to pursue a professional career in an orchestra.  But I realized during my last year at music conservatory, that such a life would be limiting.  I shifted directions entirely, and went for a Masters Degree in Clinical Social Work, drawn by the mysteries of the human psyche.

Over the next few years, I learned so much about the different styles of attachment and the variety of defense mechanisms we develop in order to protect ourselves from psychic harm.  I worked with a variety of clients, from children with severe emotional difficulties, to teenagers in an inner city high school dealing with abuse, neglect, pregnancy, and poverty, to Ivy League college students trying to ease their transition into adulthood, to mid-aged adults going through life crises, to the elderly in need of placement in skilled nursing facilities.   I wouldn’t learn, until much later, how this work would serve me in my Rolfing practice.  But one thing I can say I began to glean: the ways we protect ourselves from psychic harm and the ways our bodies protect us from physical harm can often end up becoming problems in themselves.

In 1993 I met my husband, a cellist, and moved up to New England to be with him.   Ever willing to start over, and having always been a writer, I pursued a degree in Creative Writing.  I wrote short stories, book reviews, poetry, and essays.   I graduated from Emerson College in Boston with a Masters of Fine Arts.  Shortly afterwards, my husband and I relocated to Los Angeles for the musical opportunities it afforded him.

In LA,  I started a dog walking business. It was a great job!  I enjoyed the days scooping up my ‘clients’ and taking them to the park for exercise.  But it was not exactly the most challenging or intellectually stimulating career.  I began to look around for inspiration and direction.  A friend of mine had recently enrolled in massage school.  I went to watch him in class one day.  And it was like a jolt of truth shot through me: I could do that.  I want to do that.  I have to do that.

I researched schools and chose IPSB–The Institute for Psycho-Structural Balance.  I went and got my massage technician certification.  I’d been hearing about Rolfing and Structural Integration.  It seemed to offer a deeper understanding of human structure and the physical troubles we get into.  I investigated several schools, and found myself on an endless path of learning and growing.  The body is an endless source of information and truth.  I founded Rolfworks in 2008 and am so glad I did.

by Lynn Cohen

The post Why I’m a Certified Advanced Rolfer™ appeared first on rolfworks.

More than fifty years ago, Dr. Rolf recognized that the body is inherently a system of seamless networks of tissues rather than a collection of separate parts. These connective tissues surround, support and penetrate all of the muscles, bones, nerves and organs. Rolfing Structural Integration works on this web-like complex of connective tissues to release, realign and balance the whole body, thus potentially resolving discomfort, reducing compensations and alleviating pain. Rolfing SI aims to restore flexibility, revitalize your energy and leave you feeling more comfortable in your body.

Essentially, the Rolfing process enables the body to regain the natural integrity of its form, thus enhancing postural efficiency and your freedom of movement.  Freedom like this!

Rolfing Structural Integration strives to align and balance the body’s components until the entire system is a smoothly functioning coordinated whole. For example, the legs are aligned to the hips, shoulders to rib cage, the body is positioned over the feet, and then all of these joints and related tissue are integrated to one another. A few of the many benefits people have experienced are reduced pain, increased flexibility, an enhanced sense of body awareness, and improved posture.

These wonderful transformations are possible because Rolfing SI addresses the body’s internal system of flexible support, otherwise known as fascia. These connective tissues surround ever muscle fiber, encase all joints and even have a role in the nervous system. Think of the fascial system as an intricate internal guide wire network for the body. If one set of support wires becomes tight or out of place, the excess tension may appear as nagging joint pain, muscle soreness, or a postural shift.

To correct internal misalignments, a Rolfer uses mild, direct pressure to melt or release facial holdings and allow the body to find health through the re-establishment of balance. It is currently believed that the slow, deep strokes of Rolfing SI stimulate intra-fascial mechanoreceptors (sensory neurons of the muscle nerve), which in turn trigger the nervous system to reduce the tension of the related muscles and fascia.

Put another way, Rolfing SI allows the brain and nervous system to “re-boot” areas of the body that are receiving too much electrical stimulation (chronically tight or sore muscles). Once a healthy level of muscle contraction is established, the person’s entire structure is free to express a pain-free form.

The hallmark of Rolfing Structural Integration is a standardized “recipe” known as the Ten-Series, the goal of which is to systematically balance and optimize both the structure (shape) and function (movement) of the entire body over the course of ten Rolfing sessions.

Each session focuses on freeing restrictions or holdings trapped in a particular region of the body. A practitioner also maintains a holistic view of the client’s entire system during each session, thus ensuring that the transformational process evolves in a comfortable and harmonious way.

* from www.rolf.org

The post How does rolfing work? appeared first on rolfworks.

Cast and crew spent three days together in a gorgeous old Spanish house with terra cotta tile floors, cathedral ceilings, arched doorways, and a bricked courtyard with fountains. For twelve hours a day, we shot scene after scene, over and again, waiting for airplanes to pass and for the construction next door to stop. I’d never spent time on a set before. I saw how much attention to detail, patience, and concentration are needed to produce a professional film.

The beauty of the shoot was that form and content dovetailed. What Mary teaches–postural awareness–also requires concentration and attention. In thinking about what Structural Integration accomplishes, one of the words that comes up is ‘balance.’ What is balance? How do we achieve it?

What follows are some thoughts that might inspire appreciation for what most of us take for granted: our bodies’ intricate workings that keep us upright.

Structural Integration deals with, among other things, balance: balancing the connective tissue matrix around joints, front to back, side to side, inside to outside. If you’ve had a structural integration series, you know that part of each session is devoted to body awareness and movement. Most of my clients sense a change in their bodies when they stand up from the table. This ability to feel changes in our structure is critical to postural improvement. It is possible to develop this sensory awareness by tuning in and paying attention.

Try this exercise from Mary Bond’s DVD: in bare feet, stand on a flat surface and pay attention to what you feel. Where is the skin at the bottom of your feet making contact with the ground? After a minute, take a folded towel or blanket and place it on the floor. Now step onto it and, after you feel settled, close your eyes. Notice how your sense of balance changes. Let your knees get soft, remember to breathe. Notice what you do in your body to achieve the sense that you are standing upright. After a minute, open your eyes and step off the towel. Tune in to how your feet feel now, on level ground. You may notice a heightened sense of the surface itself; you may feel your feet more accurately, you might feel more planted. This exercise invites you to experience how your body’s sensory mechanisms cooperate to help you keep your balance.

Balance is a choreographed arrangement that takes sensory information from a variety of organs and integrates it to tell the body where it is in related to gravity and the earth. Staying upright involves an intricate exchange of information between:

1) Our vestibular apparatus of the inner ears
2) Our eyes.
3) Our muscles.
4) Our Joints.
5) Pressure receptors in our skin.

INNER EARS:

The functioning of the vestibular system depends on information from many systems, hearing as well as vision and muscle feedback.

The vestibular system consists of a maze-like structure of semi-circular canals, called the ‘labyrinth.’ These canals are three fluid-filled loops arranged roughly at right angles to each other. They contain sensory hair cells that are activated by movement of inner ear fluid. They tell the brain when our head moves in a up and down, side to side, rotates, or is still.
Our vestibular system works with other sensorimotor systems in the body, such as our visual system (eyes) and skeletal system (bones and joints), to check and maintain the position of our body at rest or in motion.

EYES:

The eyes provide information on orientation and movement using reference points in the visual field. Tracking movement requires complex integration of information.

When we see something moving, the brain needs to know whether the movement is due to the head moving or to the object moving. Sometimes the brain can be fooled, such as when we’re sitting on a non-moving train next to another train. Because the other train fills up the whole visual field, there are no other clues to determine what is moving and what is not, consequently it feels as if the train you’re on is moving.

MUSCLES:

Muscles and tendons have receptors which signal to the spinal cord and brain the degree of stretch in the muscle fibres and the tension in the muscle.

This allows the body to constantly adjust muscle length and tension to cope with whatever posture is adopted. With humans posture control is more complex because we stand on just two legs: four-legged beings are inherently more stable.

All the muscles are important in this but those of the legs, pelvis and neck particularly so.

JOINTS:

Joints have receptors which tell the brain where the limb is in space. Most people can move an arm or leg into a certain position with their eyes closed and know what that position is. The receptors in the joints of the neck vertebrae are particularly important in balance since these receptors provide information on head position.

SKIN RECEPTORS:

The pressure receptors in the soles of our feet play the crucial role in balance by feeding the spinal cord and brain information on different pressures on various parts of the soles of the feet and signal such things as tipping forwards or backwards. When we stand, there is always a small amount of swaying that is recorded by the pressure sensors in the different parts of the soles of the feet. These add to the information on movement from the eyes and ears that the brain receives. Remember Mary Bond’s exercise, standing on the blanket with eyes closed. If you could record the activity in your brain during this exercise, you might be surprised by the amount of continuous, subtle adjustments you make in order to stay upright.

You might remember this the next time you go snowboarding, or bend over to pick up a pen, or look up at the sky.

Resources:
Human Anatomy and Physiology by Carola, Harley and Noback. Pub. McGraw Hill 1992
Neurophysiology by RHS Carpenter. 2002, WebMD

The post Balance appeared first on rolfworks.

I had also been taught, in my bodywork courses, that oxygen was one of the things I didn’t have to consume in moderation. Not so. This condition of over-breathing, or Chronic Hyperventilation, is actually widespread; some estimates claim that 90% of the population suffers from some degree of CHS.* When you survey the list of related symptoms in the article below, you may find that you also have a touch of it. Then, you can find out what to do about it.

*Michael Lingard, “Chronic Hypterventilation & A Proven Solution, Oct. 2007.

Oh, that tempting yawn, that satisfying sigh, that craving for air, that almost-tickle, almost-giggle, where the base of your throat meets the top of your lungs….time for another deep full breath. Or…maybe not.

Craving air when you are sitting or moving moderately–when your muscles and activity level do not demand it–could be an indication that you are already receiving too much oxygen. Those extra deep sighs and fulfilling yawns feel so good, but they can also perpetuate a cycle of neuro-pulmonary dependence and physiological hazard.

Too much breathing can be bad for us. Why?

Very (very) simply: We breathe in oxygen and breathe out excess carbon dioxide, the poisonous waste product of the respiration process. But our bodies can only use so much oxygen at once; if we take in too much, the carbon dioxide concentration of our blood drops to below its normal level, raising the blood’s pH value, making it more alkaline. This initiates the constriction of blood vessels which supply oxygen to the rest of the body, preventing the transport of oxygen and other molecules necessary for the function of the nervous system.

Carbon dioxide regulates the activity of the autonomic nervous system. If carbon dioxide is low, it stimulates our sympathetic nervous system, putting the body on alert: we go into fight/flight mode, which is appropriate in an emergency. But when we continually over-breathe, we end up in a chronic emergency state. Our breath becomes shallow and quick, our digestive system works less efficiently, our blood vessels and smooth muscles constrict and spasm. We might experience ‘brain fog,’ dizziness, lightheadedness, anxiety, and a host of other symptoms (see below).

Asthma is believed to be an extreme case of hyperventilation. In an article entitled Hyperventilation Syndrome and Asthma, Demeter and Cordasco note, “Hyperventilation, whether spontaneous or exercise induced, is known to cause asthma.”2 Meaning asthma is the result of hyperventilation, rather than its cause. The onset of a possible asthma attack can result in a short period of rapid breathing. By controlling this initial ’emergency,’ over-breathing phase, asthmatics can prevent a vicious circle of over-breathing from developing into an asthma attack. By breathing less, an asthmatic (or all of us) can breathe better.

According to Brenda Stimpson, physiotherapist and President of “Breathing Wise, Inc,” in Pasadena, “The brain gets used to an increased breathing volume and it works hard to maintain this higher volume. Sneaking in extra breaths in the form of frequent sighs and yawns is one way the brain keeps chronic hyperventilators hyperventilating.”

Who would have thought it possible: Oxygen addiction!

The urge to sigh or yawn, we all know, is contagious. Even the thought of sighing brings on the desire. But, “It only takes one sigh every seven minutes to maintain chronic hyperventilation,” Stinson says. I know I sigh a lot more often than that.

The most common symptoms of Chronic Hyperventilation Syndrome include: shortness of breath, frequent sighing or yawning, chest pains, heart palpitations, sweating, dizziness, cold, tingling or numb lips or extremities, headache, chest pain, coughing, blurred or double vision, panic attacks, snoring, restless sleep, yawning, sighing, ringing in ears, muscle spasms, twitching, cramps. CHS has been known to be associated with a vast number of other diseases, as well.

While learning how to breathe for health can be a long-term, lifelong process, the most important thing to do is SLOW DOWN your breathing. In the 1960s, the late Konstantin Buteyko, a Ukrainian doctor, developed a series of breathing exercises that focus on nasal breathing, controlled breath holding and relaxation. His method is widely used in the management of ashtma.

In short, to reverse the negative effects of chronic hyperventilation, we need to breathe less. Two things you can do:

1) always breathe through your nose

2) try swallowing when you feel the constant urge to yawn or sigh

Breathing through the nose limits air intake and forces breath to slow down. Proper nose breathing reduces hypertension and stress for most people.

Also, the nostrils and sinuses filter, clean, and warm the air going into the lungs. Mouth breathers bypass this critical cleansing step. Training yourself to nose breathe while waking can help the way you breathe while sleeping. Mouth breathing also accelerates water loss increasing possible dehydration. Nasal breathing is especially important in certain situations such as dehydration, cold weather, laryngitis, and when the throat is sore or dry because it does not dry the throat as much.

Some fitness trainers advocate nose breathing for their athletes. It increases lung efficiency and endurance, and reduces recovery time. (On the other hand, nose breathing while swimming is not advisable!)

I thought I was primarily a nose breather, but once I started paying attention to this, I started catching myself frequently breathing through my mouth. It takes concentration, constant reminders, and patience, but it’s well worth it. Stress goes down. The world feels more manageable.

Swallowing is a way to replace and squelch the urge to yawn or sigh. At first, you may have to keep swallowing, again and again, until your brain ‘gets it’.

https://buteykoclinic.com/

https://breathing.com/

The post Breathing appeared first on rolfworks.

Last weekend I attended my friend Robert’s birthday party. I had just sat down with my plate of food next to my friend Sara, who sat conversing with a man wearing rainbow colored striped socks with sandals. Between bites of food and conversation, I kept sneaking glances at the colorful feet. They were asking to be noticed. And notice I did….

….That is, until a man walked through the room with a step that made the chandeliers shake: clomp, clunk, clomp…hard heel strikes with cowboy boots on wood floors. He walked through the room once, twice, three times, passing back and forth. He appeared to be looking for someone, but at the same time, he seemed to be aware of –and enjoying–the attention he was drawing. Clunk, clunk, clomp…. I wondered what he wanted to say to us with his feet. Something about himself, his own importance, his need to be seen or heard?

I turned back to the rainbow toes, thinking, here were two very different sets of feet drawing attention to themselves, both very effectively. I wondered: Were my feet asking for attention? I looked down at the shoes I’d chosen to wear: open heeled wedgies whose black spandex tops covered my bunions but squeezed my toes together, producing a numbing sensation when I walked. They seemed to be saying, ‘Don’t notice me, please!’

My eyes roamed the room, checking out other feet. A woman filling her plate at the food table stood in wedged heels that made her ankles teeter when she reached for a slice of watermelon. An ankle bracelet, toenail polish. My friend Sara wore delicate strappy sandals to show off her pretty painted nails. My gym-rat husband was oh-so-casual in his Air Jordans.

I tried to forget what I “know” about feet from a structural standpoint–that the tibia articulates with the calcaneus/talus to form the ankle joint, and when these bones do not ‘glide’ properly or when there are rotations among them, it can set off a series of malfunctions all the way down the foot to the tips of the toes, and upwards, through the knees and hips and into the neck…that a balanced body requires a strong and adaptable base of support. I tried instead simply to observe the vast variety and personalities of the feet I was in company with without scrutinizing them for structural disorganization.

When I opened my gaze in a different way, I saw a whole society of feet! I saw conservative feet. Risk-taking feet. Shy feet. Flirtatious feet. Opinionated feet. Whimsical feet. Angry feet. Delicate feet. Macho feet. It made me want to ask my clients: how would you describe the personality of your feet? It might be a good way to find out their attitudes towards their feet and, just possibly, a window into how best to help them solicit support from them. By joining with their feet and inviting them to appreciate the brilliant, complex intricacy of them, perhaps balance would be easier to achieve.

According to the American Podiatric Medical Association, the average person takes between 8,000-10,000 steps a day. Over a lifetime, that’s 115,000 miles–4X the circumference of the globe! When we walk, there are moments during our stride when the pressure on our feet exceeds the weight of our bodies. When we run, that pressure can more than quadruple.

Each of our feet has 26 bones (25% of the total number of bones in our body), 33 joints, 107 ligaments and 19 muscles. With these two small platforms supporting our entire skeleton, and with all those joints and muscles, it seems pretty clear that we were designed for movement. Standing still takes more energy than walking, as the muscular load on our feet and legs while standing is far greater. So the next time you feel exhausted after waiting in line at the bank for a table at a restaurant, you’ll ‘understand’ why!

On the other hand, if our bones and muscles are not properly organized and balanced, the extra poundage our feet endure during walking and running cannot be to good effect. It’s no wonder, then, that during our lifetime, 80% of us will experience foot pain severe enough to consult a podiatrist.

In spite of their great potential for movement, most of us our feet have become rigid and/or imbalanced over time. Our arches go slack or become too tight; we develop bunions; our ankles have been twisted, strained, sprained, jolted; we develop plantar fascitis, capsulitis, heel spurs, hammer toes, etc.

What is a healthy foot? The answer is probably too involved to present here, but let’s start with how a healthy foot functions. During a walking stride, our weight is transferred from heel/lateral arch, then diagonally across to big toe/medial arch, where, with the help of our transverse arch, we push off into the next step.

But many of us have a compromised ability to transfer weight properly through the foot. Some of us walk almost exclusively on the inside or outside of our feet, some of us never use our toes to push off when we walk. Our calf muscles work overtime to correct imbalances that exist in the structure of the feet themselves.

Why is the modern foot so problematic? Well, we seem to forget that we were not born wearing shoes or walking on flat, hard surfaces. We evolved with the ability to run away from predators….to run over variable, uneven, rocky terrain. Our feet had to be supple and adaptable.

Thanks to shoes and concrete, most of us have lost the adaptability in our feet. Certain styles of shoes are particularly hard on feet, namely pointed-toed high heels. (For most women I know, these are a sartorially-required form of torture!) Some foot and sports specialists now recognize shoes’ limiting and detrimental effects and advocate for training in bare feet. This is because the more mobile and adaptable the feet, the stronger, more balanced, and less prone to injury they are.

Which brings me to the second hour in the 10-series of Structural Integration. Hour #2 is devoted to restoring mobility and balance to the intricate configuration of bones and muscles of the feet and lower legs. Muscles in the lower leg contribute to arch support or lack thereof; tight calf muscles can be responsible for such ailments as plantar fascitis and loss of ankle mobility. After the 2nd hour, many of my clients experience a new sensation of lightness and contact with the ground. Some with low back or neck pain have felt much improved from the 2nd hour work, as their feet are now able to provide appropriate support for their structure.

So be in awe of your feet, however they look. They are the MVP of your structure.

The post Love your feet appeared first on rolfworks.

Steve couldn’t remember when it started. “Maybe a year ago,” he said. He couldn’t nail it down. He was a busy guy, working up to 14 hours a day as a software consultant. But he hadn’t had an accident. There was not one singular moment when his back ‘went out’. He was a young man in his 30s who had simply awaken one morning with a sore back. Over the next several weeks, the pain worsened. Before Steve knew it, he had become one of the millions of Americans who suffer from chronic low back pain.Steve went to chiropractors and doctors, bought gadgets sold on TV, did abdominal strengthening exercises, used ice and heat, tried different sleeping positions, orthotics, different shoes, an ergonomically ‘correct’ chair. Some things seemed to help a little, but nothing took the pain away completely. He wanted his old…no, his younger….body back!

Like many of my clients, Steve came to me for help with one of the most common physical ailments in America. According to the National Institute of Health, 90% of Americans suffer from significant back pain at some point in their lives. Back pain is the #2 reason people go to their doctor, second only to colds and flu, and it is the second most common neurological ailment in the U.S., second only to headaches. Americans spend $50 billion each year on treating low back pain.

If you look at the picture above, you can imagine why Steve might have back pain (or neck pain, or tingling down his arms!). There is no support from his pelvis as his lumbar spine collapses back; as his arms reach for the computer keyboard, his neck muscles are working overtime (like he is) just to hold his head up. He could not possibly choose a worse position in which to sit and work.

Neck and low back pain are so common, in part, because these are the most mobile places in our spines. The more mobile a body segment, the more prone to injury it is. For this reason, we must find ways to move that support these mobile places. Support comes from our feet, when standing, and from our sit-bones when seated. Proper alignment can go a long way to avoid injury.

Structural Integration theory suggests that the episodes marking the onset of back pain–the moment your back ‘goes out’–are, with the exception of a traumatic accident, understood to be the cumulative effect of years of structural imbalance within the body. For instance, an ankle sprain in childhood could result in so many imbalances and compensations within the body that, years later, back pain results. A history of dancing or athletics without proper form can become strain and pain in later life. Even the way we wore our diapers can set us up for a future of pelvic distortions that result in debilitating back pain.

The ‘back going out’ is not just because you lifted that heavy box or bent to tie your shoe; your back simply took the brunt of the strain from years of unbalanced movement.

But whether your back pain can be traced back to a childhood injury or to the myriad of other ’causes’, Structural Integration systematically addresses every muscular-skeletal relationship in the body–the ankles as they relate to the knees, the knees to the hips and ankles, the hips to the ribcage and knees, etc–and the series takes people a long way towards re-balancing the whole body in gravity. After the 2nd session, where the focus is on the feet and lengthening the long spinal muscles of the back, Steve felt better than he had in a long time. He could make it through an entire day without pain. We discussed and practiced proper sitting. As he became more aware of his unhealthy habits of sitting and moving, Steve has been able to take control of his body again, and to indeed, reclaim his younger self.

* Steve is a fictional name used in this article for the purposes of privacy.

Written by LynnCohen

The post Low back pain appeared first on rolfworks.