CHAPTER SEVEN 
    REBIRTHING AND BODYWORK THERAPIES

              Rebirthing is successful to the extent that what you're doing with your body permits you to breathe fully and freely.  In the final analysis, your Body and Mind are one, and your Body and Spirit are one.  Your Body shows you what you're thinking and feelingCor still holding on to from your past.

For example, if you were always apprehensive as a child, your shoulders are probably chronically hunched.  If you were always at the ready to become violent, your arms may be character- istically held out from your sides.  If you were always ashamed to look anyone in the eye, your gaze is probably always cast down with your head shrunk down toward your chest.  If you're always in a rush to get somewhere, being forceful and assertive and aggressive, your body is probably bent at the hips so that the top part of the body is leaning forward like the woman who used to be portrayed on the Old Dutch cleanser can.  Or if you're reluctant to step forward into your future and you're still clinging to your past, you're probably leaning back with your legs going forward, while the upper body is actually at a backwards slant, like the `Keep on Trucking' sign.

Your success with Rebirthing is dependent upon your breathing musculature's being able to relax.  If you've got your shoulders hunched and your chest caved in and your belly stuck out, for example, you're certainly not going to be able to draw a really full breath into your chest.  Various bodywork therapies can help change such habits.  So I wholeheartedly recommend all the forms of body therapy that help you breathe bigger.

During the past thirty years, many forms of holistic treatment have been introduced to the public.  Most of the new, Western forms depend upon hands-on movement and manipulation of the body.

Probably the first one to gain a great deal of recognition was Structural Integration, developed by Ida Rolf and thus usually called "Rolfing".  It is based on the assumption that when a person habitually feels a certain feeling or is habitually demonstrating a particular attitude, by his posture, he holds certain muscles tense and immobilized.  As he keeps these muscles from relaxing and moving fluidly, the fascial sheathes that surrounds each muscle group, as well as each individual muscle cell, shorten and tighten, and this fascia may even, in fact, develop adhesions to neighboring fascial sheathes.  The result is that there is less fluidity to movement and more block-like stasis of the body.  Also, the bodyCand thus the mindCcontinues to experience the emotions that gave rise to the habitual stance.

Whatever the body habitus might be, Rolfing seeks to alter it by forcibly stretching and separating the fascial sheathes around the major muscle groups in the body.  As the Rolfing strokes open up the body, the associated emotional blocks are also opened.  The Rolfing program is usually a series of ten sessions, each concentrating on one part of what Wilhelm Reich called the "body armor."  The first session works on the diaphragm and the intercostal muscles, as well as the muscles of the waist, to free up the breathing.  The second session concentrates on the abdominals that have been held tight, especially by people who have trouble eating too much or not eating enough.  Subsequent sessions work on the muscles of the legs, the arms, the pelvis, the shoulder girdle, etc.

Rolfing is a painful process.  It may cause soreness, even bruising.  Most Rolfers still believe that it is important to feel the pain so that it "can be integrated into consciousness," whatever that term means.  To me, such pain has been essentially meaningless.

I often wondered if it wouldn't be possible to anesthetize an individual and do the Rolfing session on him successfully while he was totally unconscious.  Since it's the muscles and fascia that presumably are holding the old negative thought and feeling, not the Thinker, what difference could it make?  But I was always told that doing anything to reduce the pain was a no-no, and that the pain of Rolfing was part of what made it a therapeutic process.

I myself "did" several series of ten Rolfing sessions.  In fact, moving from my first Rolfer to a second and third, I bought myself almost one hundred hours of physical torture.  I still believe that whatever benefits I received came from the freeing up of my fascia, not from my putting up with the intense pain from the strokes.

Another body therapy that gained wide recognition shortly after Rolfing was first introduced is the form of joint manipulation that was developed by Dr. Milton Trager.  Unlike Rolfing, Trager work is generally not at all painful.  Indeed, it's often quite playful and pleasurable.

Trager work seeks to alter the body's stance, posture, etc., by gently moving, almost playing, with each joint, increasing its movement.  So, for example, the head, while supported in two hands, is bounced back and forth so that the atlas and axis develop more and more freedom of movement. 

In a complete session, the Trager work goes from the neck across the shoulders, down the arms, up the legs, across the back, across the abdomen, up into the chest, and up into the head again.  The person gains an increasing sensation of greater fluidity and greater expansive movement.  He can use his body more effortlessly.  Subsequent sessions go over the body entirely, too, each time increasing its mobility.

I'm not certain that consciousness during the Trager session is important at all.  It seems to me that if passively moving the joint allows it to relax and develop greater freedom of movement, then consciousness is not necessary.  I know that Dr. Trager has indeed worked on people who were anesthetized.

Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais was the innovator of another bodywork which involves not only hands-on work by the Feldenkrais practitioner, but also self-conscious movement by the patient.  Such self-awareness is extremely effective in helping people with birth-related neuromuscular problems like spastic paralysis.

Of all forms of "Western" bodywork, I most enjoy Ortho Bionomy, a form of body work that was developed by Arthur Lincoln Pauls.  Ortho Bionomy seeks to readjust posture and stance by supporting the preferred position rather than trying to alter it.  As such, there isn't very much movement to it and there is almost no discomfort or pain.  It enables the portions of the brain concerned with posture and movement, especially the cerebellum, to readjust the amount of tension held in particular muscles, which in turn hold the skeleton in certain positions.  Having the shoulder supported in the preferred tense position, for example, seems to allow the cerebellum to "decide" that the shoulder's habitual tension is too great.  When the Ortho Bionomist stops supporting a specific muscle group or joint, the cerebellum readjusts and goes back to ordering a normal amount of tension which is experienced as immediate relaxation.

Whatever the cause of the held tension may be, we maintain the chronic position because the metencephalon centers "regard" that posture as normal or necessary.

For example, it's as if our cerebellum were a thermostat that has decided that a certain amount of tension in our shoulder muscles is normal.  Thus, although we know intellectually that our shoulders are tense and hard to the touch, we cannot voluntarily relax the shoulder muscles.  Being stretched by Rolfing allows them to relax.  Being played with through Trager work allows them to develop greater flexibilities and more relaxation.  Deliberately and consciously moving in the Feldenkrais patterns improves movement, too.  And, as just described, Ortho Bionomy also re-sets the muscular tension and creates greater flexibility.

Other forms of bodywork like Reflexology, Applied Kinesiology, Touch for Health, acupressure, and acupuncture all work on the philosophy that there is some disturbance of the flow of energy up and down what are referred to in Eastern medicine as meridians.  If that energy can be re-routed so that all meridians are receiving a normal flow of energy, then the organs of the body, including its skeleton and its musculature, will start performing on a homeostatic basis, an holistically healthy basis.

            All of these Eastern bodywork forms work.  I don't object to any of them.  I think they're all great.  But I have difficulty understanding what the meridians are.  An I also can't understand how we can ever keep our energies going correctly if just rubbing an arm, for example, in one direction rather than the opposite way can seriously disrupt the flow of energy.  What happens if we brush against someone in a crowd?  Or rub ourselves the "wrong" way when we use a towel?  This isn't to say I think these bodywork forms that are based on energy flowing in the meridians are hokum.  I don't.  I like them and enjoy them.  I just can't understand them.

People often ask, "Is it all right to get involved with bodywork therapies while we're also involved with Rebirthing?"

And I reply, "Of course, there's no antithesis between them."

I see all these bodywork techniques as working together with Rebirthing.  I don't see them as opposed to each other in any way.

I recommend to most of my Rebirthing clients that they get involved with Trager work or Ortho Bionomy or Touch for Health work in order to allow their ribcage to open up more fully so that they can take even bigger, more satisfying breaths, more effortlessly.  For people with severely distorted and restricted chests, I recommend Rolfing, although I think that forcibly stretching a muscle isn't as good as getting that muscle to relax because the mind lets it.

Every so often, somebody wants to Rebirth while simultaneously being Tragered or having a Touch for Health session.  I don't go along with that.

I'm not saying that's wrong.  I'm just saying it's confusing and difficult.

After experimenting with myself and several dozen patients, I finally concluded  that it's much easier to simply do one therapy or treatment at a time, with one closely following the other.  

I think it's much better to have the sessions back to back rather than having a body session one day of the week, then a Rebirthing session another day of the week.  To the extent possible, I have people who are involved with bodywork do their body session just before they do their Rebirthing session with me.  I see the bodywork primarily as facilitating the breathwork.

For quite a while, I offered to clients a lovely way to combine therapies by having them come first to have a bodywork session with Louis or any of the other body therapists that I work with most closely.  Then, once they felt relaxed and open, we started the breathing segment, using the ideal Rebirthing breath, breathing for an hour.  I found that people simply blossomed and thrived with that approach.

Another combined approach that I offered consisted of three sessions: first, a conference session with me for an hour or two, in which we worked on establishing specific affirmations to handle the client's negatives; this was followed by a bodywork session with Louis who, being extensively trained in all the bodywork forms mentioned in this chapter, could be eclectic about which technique he used on the client's outstanding restrictions of chest movement; and third, a wet Rebirth session in my hot tub.  The people who came on the weekends when such a Athree-ring circus" was offered all enjoyed it hugely and felt they received immense benefits.

In this connection, I have found that sending Rebirthing clients to bodyworkers who are not involved with the breath or clean diets doesn't seem to work well.