Does Rolfing SI hurt?
When some people think of Rolfing Structural Integration, one of the first words that come to their mind is pain. Often, this perception is based on anecdotal accounts of sessions performed during Rolfing SI’s infancy, when it tended to be often a less subtle and more intense discipline, frequently linked to popular emotionally intense types of therapies in the late 1960’s and early 70’s. Part of this reputation can be attributed to an often-quoted complaint of Dr. Rolf during her training classes that her students failed to work deep enough. Apparently, many assumed that what she meant was that they needed to work harder and deeper. However, we now realize that deep work is not necessarily synonymous with physical intensity. Several factors determine the level of comfort or discomfort during a Rolfing session. One is the degree of trauma in the system; other is how long fascial distortions have been in the client’s body. Long-term distortions create more tenacious and widespread compe
