The first three Rolfing sessions center on organizing the superficial regions of the body, the Sleeve, while sessions four through seven enter the deeper aspect, the Core. Working the Core also means working the deeper parts of the client.
The superficial musculature is easy to handle, since it can be seen. The deep musculature, lying far inside the body, makes it hard in some cases to see where the problem sits. And when entering the deeper parts of the body, accumulated emotion sometimes surfaces; without an established relationship of trust, going deep is not possible. There seems to be good reason why the Core sessions come after the Sleeve.
Observing where the center of gravity falls, front or back, and the movement of the breath and the symmetry of front, back, left, and right, all matter of course — but some things become apparent only through touching the body. Which is to say: what matters is feeling through the whole of the senses rather than relying on the eyes alone. That point was covered in “Seeing with the Eyes, Feeling with the Body.”
During a stay in Frankfurt on October 25, 2014, a fortunate meeting with Takami Kamata, a Japanese Rolfer then living there, made for a wide exchange of information. What proved most interesting was hearing that the emphasis in Rolfing training differs between Europe and the United States.
That the training in Munich values not only anatomy and manual technique but also feeling through the senses has come up repeatedly on this blog. By contrast, according to a colleague who took Phase I in the United States and is now attending Phase II in Munich, the American training drills anatomy hard while, from Phase I onward, bringing in outside clients for practice of the basic manual work so that experience accumulates.
Fifty hours of practice are also required between Phase I and Phase II — no such assignment exists in Munich.
The reason, the colleague suggested, is that the United States is a country of immigrants and the participants are young: enrollment is open from twenty-one there, whereas the European training carries an age limit of twenty-five and above. Clarity is therefore in demand. And anatomy as an academic discipline, along with the basic manual work of Rolfing, belongs to a black-and-white world with nothing ambiguous about it, which makes it easy to grasp.
In the case of Munich, and Europe generally, there is a degree of history and culture, and the society has matured. A deep understanding of human beings runs through it, so rather than simplifying, there is a tolerance for leaving ambiguous what is ambiguous. And a valuing of the interval, of ma (see “Letting Go of Tension (2) — The Importance of Being Aware of Space”). Rather like the Japanese tea ceremony.
Anatomy, after all, is a discipline constructed descriptively on the basis of cadavers, and differs from the living body. This way of thinking may come from the view that the body becomes knowable only through touching it and moving it. And human beings themselves resist being sorted into black and white — all the more once emotion enters.
The American approach that values the foundation and the European approach that also focuses on sensation each have their strengths and weaknesses, of course, and forcing a division into two carries an air of overstatement.
The point is not to argue for one over the other. What drew my interest in this difference is the thought that the willingness to learn from each other’s differences is what creates the diversity within Rolfing. In a European education that also values a sensory basis, how will the refinement of the senses be applied to Session 4? What the teaching holds is something to look forward to.
Note, August 2026
This piece framed the difference in emphasis between American and European training as a contrast between foundation and sensation: the United States a black-and-white world drilling anatomy and basic technique, Europe carrying a tolerance for leaving ambiguous what is ambiguous.
That dichotomy came apart through what followed.
In November 2016 came a workshop with Sharon Wheeler, an American Rolfer who studied directly under Ida Rolf herself. What Sharon described was that anatomy scarcely appeared in Ida’s training. When explanation was needed, Ida left it to others, holding a firm conviction that what is written in books is not the fact.
Asked how Ida taught the seeing of bodies, the answer that came back was: put him into water and let them swim or drown.
The following June, 2017, came a workshop with Peter Schwind, a German Rolfer based in Munich, and the teacher from whom Giovanni Felicioni, Pierpaola Volpones, and Konrad Oppenheimer all learned. Peter’s approach was clinical and problem-solving — how the symptom is resolved, which technique serves that end — carried with precision and fineness of detail. He explains down to the reason for the height of the table (see “Peter Schwind Workshop (1) — For What Purpose Is Technique Used?“).
The American Sharon working the psychological depths, the German Peter specializing in technique: the contrast drawn in this piece had swapped sides entirely.
And the teacher who influenced Peter most was Jan Sultan — an American Rolfer, the one who formulated the five Principles of Rolfing together with Jeff Maitland. Peter also learned from Ida Rolf’s son and revised his thinking about session length accordingly. What looked divided by geography turned out to be traffic running back and forth at the level of individuals.
What was visible in 2014 was probably less a difference of region than a difference of lineage — of whom a person received what from.
One more thing. The closing line of this piece, about valuing the interval, rather like the Japanese tea ceremony, had a sequel. In the 2025 Advanced Training, Hiroyoshi Tahata placed ma, the interval, at the center of his practice and had systematized it as a technique called Yield. What had looked European turned out to have come from Japan.