For many years, little has been know about fascia’s function. Dr. Ida P. Rolf, founder of Rolfing® and the Rolf Institute of Structural Integration spent her life exploring the healing possibilities held within the human body and the relatedness of the mind and body.
Fascia is the organ of posture. Nobody ever says this; all the talk is about muscles. Yet this is a very important concept, and because this is so important, we as Rolfers must understand both the anatomy and physiology, but especially the anatomy of fascia. The body is a web of fascia. A spider web is in a plane. This web is in a sphere. We can trace the lines of that web to get an understanding of how what we see in a body works. For example, why, when we work with the superficial fascia does this change the tone of the fascia as a whole?
An effective human being is a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. Form and function are a unity, two sides of one coin. In order to enhance function, appropriate form must exist or be created. Some individuals may perceive their losing fight with gravity as a sharp pain in their back, others as the unflattering contour of their body, others as constant fatigue, yet others as an unrelentingly threatening environment. Those over forty may call it old age. And yet all these signals may be pointing to a single problem so prominent in their own structure, as well as others, that it has been ignored: they are off balance, they are at war with gravity.
This is the gospel of Rolfing: When the body gets working appropriately, the force of gravity can flow through. Then, spontaneously, the body heals itself.
The above statements are taken from Rolfing and Physical Reality by Ida P. Rolf (ISBN 0-89281-380-6).
