Rolfing (sessions)

Rolfing was a form of bodywork therapy offered in sessions in Pune One by various practitioners, including Prageet and Rakesh. It was developed by Ida Rolf. The Community to Provoke God brochure had this as a brief description:

Rolfing is a form of structurally re-ordering the body to bring the major segments -- head, shoulders, thorax, pelvis and legs -- into vertical alignment. It also brings the body into graceful and efficient balance relative to the field of gravity. In a carefully worked-out sequence of deep manipulations, the rolfer reverses the constricting, tightening influence of the inevitable environmental conditioning on the tissues, giving the body back its natural symmetry and balance. Emotional blocks and physical tensions are released simultaneously and energy is able to flow freely and effectively.

And from an entry in a Darshan Diary, Nothing to Lose but Your Head (Mar 1 1976), Osho talks to a sannyasin who feels pain all over her body, and to whom he is assigning a ten-session course of Rolfing:

Rolfing is nothing but making the tissues loose. On a few points on the body the musculature takes a certain shape. If somebody has been worrying continuously, then the body takes a certain musculature which is adjusted to worrying. Then worries may disappear but the musculature remains and it will feel heavy, painful. Its function is no more there, and the body does not know how to dissolve it. If you don’t do anything about it, it will dissolve by and by but it will take a long time. But why wait?

Through Rolfing it can be dissolved by pressure. The musculature disappears, and you will feel almost as new in the body as you are feeling in the mind. Then a new adjustment arises again -- at a higher stage.

It is going to be painful, that's certain. It will be really painful, mm? because the whole of the past is accumulated in the body, and the musculature has to be melted, reabsorbed in the body. That reabsorption is painful, but it pays. And after Rolfing you will feel very very good. So you just do it ... nothing to worry about.

Maneesha adds:

Rolfing, or Structural Integration, is a deep and very heavy massage which, as Bhagwan describes, works on the soft tissues of the body, releasing tension in the muscles and allowing the body to find its natural shape.

As the work progresses, usually in courses of ten sessions, there is much emotional catharsis, as material that has been suppressed for years is released. The technique in itself is extremely powerful. With the addition of daily meditations, and the effect of Bhagwan, its potential is increased dramatically.

Bhagwan has also said that it is helpful to have someone who meditates to rolf one, as he will reach deeper layers in his work, as he has gone deeper into himself. The sannyasin who gives Rolfing here, and who has been trained by Dr Ida Rolf, is assisted by other sannyasins in this work.

And from Be Realistic: Plan for a Miracle (Mar 17 1976), in the context of Osho giving Rolfing sessions to someone who is terrified of Osho and whose body is throwing up all kinds of discomforts as distractions:

Rolfing is available in the ashram through Prageet, a sannyasin who has trained with Ida Rolf and has practised extensively in the States and in England.

He described how psychological stress can be translated into physical terms:

If you look at a person who is depressed, they usually look depressed, compressed. If you were to measure them, they would be shorter than when they were feeling better So what people like Ida Rolf and Wilhelm Reich found out was that there wasn't really much difference between the structure, the functioning of the body and the behaviour and personality of a person. Somehow they all seemed to fit together.

So often when we are working on someone, and they are starting to hold their head up, starting to stand straight, they are actually going to feel better, and they are going to have a release of anxiety.

Prageet went on to talk about the difference in working on sannyasins who are meditating as opposed to patients he had had in the West.

Here I feel there is a high level of responsibility for people who are being rolfed, which is good, because once people start taking responsibility for their own problems and their own bodies, it is much easier for me to work with them, rather than if they are blaming me or somebody else for their problem.

Rolfing seems to be another good example of many in the Human Potential Movement where founders and/or innovators and/or those close to them see the limitations of their work, ie lacking the innermost "work" of meditation,and find their way to Osho.

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