What is structural integration and What Are the Benefits?

The recipe. A ten-session sequence of structural, facial and educational goals which establishes order in human structures.

Structural Integration is a system that induces change toward an ordered pattern. Due to its efficiency in alleviating symptoms, both physical and emotional, there is little doubt that the recipe will survive in various forms as techniques; it is not certain that it can endure as art and craft without the special dedication of those individuals who are inspired by the potency of intention and wisdom of process concealed within.

The recipe is not technique. The recipe is more than a succession of myofascial goals and intentions. The recipe is, rather, a process, based on a set of relationships, which establishes structural balance and order. These relationships are based upon sound theoretical physics as well as some traditional metaphysical hypotheses. Relationships belong to the realm of art. They are not linear. Technique is better suited to scientific and linear analysis. The recipe, as taught in other schools, has been modified or, perhaps, specialized in several ways. Some of these modifications ignore the underlying priorities in Dr. Rolf's teaching.

Dr. Rolf's teaching emphasizes the concept of the "Line." The Line passes through the centers of gravity in the body's vertical blocks. The Line, in our concept of the structurally Integrated human, does not pass through bone, except at the top of the head. In fact, this weight-bearing line does pass through bone in all but the most exceptional human structures. Indeed, it was Dr. Rolf's observation that our species had not yet successfully completed its journey to uprightness. The recipe is designed to offer personal assistance in this evolutionary voyage. The emergence of the unstressed vertical, the line which passes only throughsoft tissue is evidence of progress toward this goal. The Line being defined as a set of theoretical points in space is not real, but experiential, and it can be, perhaps, must be, intentional. The horizon is the horizontal reference for the Line. The shoulder girdle and the pelvic girdle must contain true horizontal balance to define and support vertical extension. The line goes through the top of the head and through the bottom of the feet to infinity. The Line forms a relationship between the field which is man and the field which is earth, the field of gravity. The line is transcendental, it relates the realm of material particles, of basic physics to the non-material, the world of energy fields. While Dr. Rolf's metaphysical hypotheses concerning the line are not original, her use of the recipe as a tool for exploring them is unique. The idea of using a vertical line of extension to integrate one's personal energy field with the energy field of the earth is a compelling idea with both practical and visionary implications. My main teacher Emmett Hutchins recognized the singular importance of the line and believes strongly that a clear sense of vertical extension should be a path for personal growth as Dr Rolf did. And further, that instruction concerning the line is an essential educational aspect of the practice of Structural Integration. This is not so in many other schools of SI.

To the worker of Structural Integration, energy is something so apparent in the body he processes that it is virtually palpable. To the subject who receives the work, the energy change is even more dramatic; when he works or plays, he uses up less of his vital reserve. This happens within all bodies as a degree of balance is called forth. For most people in the real world, the pattern body has been lost or is no longer visible. Therefore, in our culture there is little or no recognition of what this ideal pattern body looks like. In the average person, the pattern has become submerged under layers of fleshy disorder. (I do not mean fat, that is a different problem).

People look in the mirrors and do not like what they see. It does not occur to them that their real dissatisfaction is with their physical structure. With the way they are put together. This lack of recognition is understandable, twentieth-century medicine, which has worked so many miracles, has been chemically, not structurally, oriented. Hence, the lay mind thinks of chemistry as the only outstanding healing medium, a drug for this, a shot for that. Western Physical fitness, another misnomer, is a part of the problem.

The premise of modern psychotherapy is that man's outer circumstances are the projection of his inner, often hidden self. I find from my own experiences that a man's emotional state may be seen as the projection of his structural imbalances. But a man who undergoes integration of his structure experiences the basic link that exists between structure and emotion. As he moves toward structural balance, he knows that his psychological make-up has changed as well. He can experience to his own satisfaction that his psychological hang-ups are literal thorns hooked in literal flesh. They can disappear only as the flesh changes, as the barriers within the flesh are disengaged, and as the free flow of body energy and fluids is established.