Monday, February 5, 2018. I arrived at Haneda International Airport. Since it was a long two weeks, I’m relieved to be back in Tokyo.
As I wrote in “The State of the Practitioner’s Own Body Is Reflected in the Session,” this workshop spanned 10 days. Together with four Instructors/Assistants and 15 participants — how to raise the quality of a Rolfing session? Partly because all the participants were Rolfers, it was very instructive.
As for Rolf Movement, the influence of the Frenchman Hubert Godard’s Tonic Function is strong, and by this way of thinking entering Movement, the theoretical part was strengthened (for details, see “Confusion in a Good Sense + On Tonic Function“).
On the other hand, as I learned in Rolfing’s Basic Training, it is also important that the three information-gathering systems — vision (Visual system), the inner-ear sense (Vestibular system), and the muscle sense (kinesthetic system) — work in good balance.
This time, I experienced how the body changes when observing a person with both eyes and with one eye (the left or the right), and how close it is possible to approach a partner; and that closing either the left or right eye changes the field of vision.
In Rolfing, it is thought that, by the three information-gathering systems — vision, the inner-ear sense, and the muscle sense — working in good balance, the body can respond to gravity.
Rita Geirola explained that “a human learns to ‘see’ through education and experience,” and spoke of how this contrasts with the other two senses (the inner-ear sense and the muscle sense), which are already in place.
Because vision is learned through experience, it is the easiest of the senses to be aware of. So it tends to become the most dominant. On the other hand, when the sense of the eyes is too strong, the working of the inner-ear sense and gravity become harder to feel. And, because the eyes are connected to the back of the head, overuse of the eyes connects to a stiff neck and stiff shoulders.
The eyes also have a left-right difference. For example, in my case, it was found through the work that, if the field of vision of the left eye is 100 and spherical, the right eye is 60 and slightly biased toward the rear. And closing the left eye and using only the right produced a feeling of tightness in the chest.
There, having the partner make a sound on the outer right half of the brain, and activating the inner-ear sense, the field of vision of the right eye widened, and the feeling of tightness in the chest cleared.
What is interesting is the distance with the paired partner. Closing one eye made the partner’s approaching distance recede; but when the vision was grasped with the sense of seeing the partner from afar, it became possible to approach without tensing. Furthermore, just as organizing the sensation of the feet made the vision feel more stable, a slight change in vision had a great influence on how the body is organized.
Also, in Rolf Movement, I was able to learn that, when integrating the body, various devices are incorporated to widen the field of vision of the eyes.
How to combine the three — vision, the inner-ear sense, and the muscle sense — was something I had not been so aware of in ordinary sessions so far; but in Rolf Movement, by handling this combination of three freely, a great influence can be exerted on the client.
Finally, one more thing. I’d like to introduce Pre-movement, with which dramatic results could be achieved in Part 2.