Have you ever wondered how your lower back issues manifest into a nagging neck pain? The body is like an elaborate and harmonic musical composition. Like how when a single note falters, its repercussions are felt in the whole composition, a pain or dysfunction in one area of the human body – an intricate and interconnected system – can potentially affect other parts. Most therapeutic modalities concentrate on the affected area. Structural integration or rolfing, a type of manual therapy, addresses the entire body and the mind to trigger the healing process.
Rooted in the idea that the body and mind are interconnected, structural integration, a therapy developed by Dr Ida Pauline Rolf, tries to balance both the physical and mental aspects to enable holistic healing.
“Structural integration is a holistic approach in which we are not treating a specific condition or not fixing any disability or deformity, but we are healing the whole body, both physically and mentally,” says Sumananand Jha, physiotherapist and certified structural integrator from Dhanbad, Jharkhand.
What is structural integration
Structural integration or rolfing manual therapy seeks to eliminate stress and encourage a healthy flow of energy by systematically realigning and reorganising the body’s physiological processes over the course of ten sessions.
“Structural integration is not a localised approach. It is a wholesome approach to the body,” says Shiv Kohli, a certified structural integrator and physiotherapist from Delhi. “Each session which takes around 45-50 minutes, begins with relaxing the brain and signalling it to prepare the mind and body to perform more in-depth treatment.”
The entire course of treatment begins with the first session, which emphasises on improving breathing quality through manual therapy on the arms, ribcage and diaphragm. It progresses into targeting the deep tissues in the final sessions.
Rolfing’s treatment approach
Structural integration adopts a holistic approach rather than treating a specific problem. It targets the entire body during the session by concentrating on particular body parts in separate sessions, which helps alleviate associated ailments.
“If you experience shoulder pain, we might not address it in the first session,” says Kohli. “We consider the possibility that a back problem is the cause of your shoulder pain. We treat the back in the sixth session. If a back problem is the cause of your shoulder pain, a session for the back will help your shoulder as well.”
The exact cause of pain can sometimes be elusive because of certain factors. The actual cause of pain can be found with the help of structural integration.
“By treating the whole body through structural integration, we work on all links in the body (how each body part is related to each other). It makes it easier to find the exact reason for a pain,” says Jha.
How different is rolfing from other manual therapies
While structural integration (rolfing) strives to bring about long-lasting changes in the body, the holistic approach sets it apart from other therapies.
“All physical therapies fix the physical problem in the body. They are not involved with the mental aspects of life. People are more stabilised and grounded after structural integration,” says Jha.
Kohli recommends attending structural integration sessions over the course of a year to yield maximum benefits.
“If you want your body to be fit, you need to go to a structural integration session once every six months. You need to do structural integration twice a year to take care, integrate and prevent any future injuries or problems in your body.”
Takeaways
- Structural integration/rolfing is a holistic approach in which the whole body is addressed over the course of manual therapy sessions.
- It differs from other manual therapies in that it works on the principle that the mind and body are interconnected.
- Structural integration examines the entire body to hit upon the path to resolve the issue rather than taking a condition-based approach.
