The Power of Fascia

Structural Integration (SI) focuses heavily on fascia—the sophisticated, web-like matrix of connective tissue that wraps around every muscle, bone, nerve, and organ.

Fascia is much more than just "wrapping" for our anatomy; it is a dynamic communication network that distributes tension and force throughout your entire system. When you experience stress, injury, or repetitive strain, your fascia can become dense, sticky, and restrictive. This effectively "shrink-wraps" the body, pulling your bones out of alignment and forcing your muscles to work overtime. Structural Integration gently unwinds these restrictions, restoring your body's natural balance.

What Is Structural Integration?

Structural Integration was created by Dr. Ida Rolf in 1971. Through her research in yoga, physics, osteopathy, and biochemistry, she discovered that by realigning the body with gravity through movement and working on connective tissue (fascia) through manual manipulation, function and balance could be restored with long term results.

A wonderful way to understand Structural Integration is through the concept of tensegrity—tension integrity.

Imagine a structure where stability isn't created by stacking pieces on top of each other like a house. Instead, it is maintained by a continuous, flexible web of tension that holds solid supports in place. In your body, that flexible web is your fascia, and the solid supports are your bones.

Because your body is a tensegrity structure, it "floats" within its own soft-tissue tension.

This explains why:

• Imbalances ripple: A tight spot in the fascia of your foot can pull on the entire web, causing pain up in your hips or neck.

• Local fixes fall short: Treating only the spot that hurts rarely provides lasting relief, because it leaves the rest of the web out of balance.

Structural Integration is built on a simple premise: a body aligned with gravity doesn’t have to work as hard.

By combining hands-on manual therapy with movement re-education, Structural Integration releases deep-seated tension to realign your posture and create lasting change.

Clients frequently experience:

• Reduced chronic pain and discomfort

• Increased range of motion and flexibility

• A deeper sense of ease, comfort and support in their own bodies

Soma Structural Integration was founded in 1977 by Bill Williams PhD, who studied with Dr. Rolf & practiced Dr. Rolf’s signature series, Rolfing. Having a doctorate in psychology, Dr. Williams wanted to expand Dr. Rolf’s technique to include a dedicated are session and also incorporate the mind and spirit with the body as an inseparable whole system in order to to support the person and their full human experience.