by Don St. John, Ph.D.There is a growing momentum toward a holistic health perspective. Values of the holistic framework emphasize prevention, client participation, life-style choices involving nutrition, exercise, and relaxation, and a multi-discipline approach to health maintenance. The old model of “treat the symptom, ignore the person” is fading with the emergence of the viewpoint that recognizes the wholeness of the individual.Within this holistic model is a field known as Somatic Education. Somatic Education addresses the whole person in relationship to movement, physical and psychological awareness, learning, and their environment. The focus is on the body “as experienced from within the body.” Hellerwork is a Somatic Education discipline that is making an enormous contribution to this emerging model of health and well-being.In Hellerwork the entire musculo-skeletal structure of the body is considered and related to the individual’s sense of well-being. Structure is viewed as relationship: relationship of the whole to the gravitational field in which it exists; relationship among parts within the whole; and relationship of structure to function. Isolated changes or symptom alleviation are not the concern of Hellerwork. Changes are perceived in relation to the whole body and whole person, and are aimed at improving the total energetic economy of the individual.Holistic theory states that how we live is central to the health we experience–that is, how and what we eat, exercise, relax, breathe, love, and think. Perhaps most important is how we negotiate those personal psychological issues that weave through the tapestry of our lives. Even at the very best, there are periodic rough spots, occasional frustration, and stress. At the other end of the continuum, there is intense frustration, chronic conflict, and debilitating disease.From the beginning of our lives, we are engaged with issues that set the foundation for our psycho-physical well-being. For example, we begin to develop a deep sense of basic trust in life as we successfully handle the terrain of infancy. If the conditions of our infancy are such that we do not develop that sense of trust, the psychophysical effects can cast dark and negative shadows over many ensuing years.There are issues to be mastered in every stage of life, and typically new stages resurrect old unresolved issues. These issues center around such themes as autonomy, competence, lovability, identity, intimacy, creativity, and spirituality. Our successes or failures in these are most critical to our psychophysical well-being.From the very beginning of our lives, we accumulate tension. Chronic tension is far more prevalent, extensive, and pervasive than most people imagine. Acute tension, is readily felt–such as stiffness in the neck or back. Chronic tension, however is typically outside of conscious awareness. Large areas of the body are simply unavailable to kinesthetic awareness.The strains of life’s frustrations, the wear and tear of navigating our personal ships in rapidly changing sociological waters, the cumulative effect of poor health habits and physical accidents, are all embodied. All can be seen by the trained eye, felt by the experienced hand. All affect the structural integrity of our bodies. All affect the responsiveness and aliveness of our human tissues. All affect the quality of our participation in life.Relieving wear and tear, improving the structural integrity of the human body, and educating the client in developing awareness are central objectives of Hellerwork. The value of improving structural integrity is inestimable and powerfully lessens the effects of aging.Hellerwork is a multi-level educational experience. Much is communicated in the quality of touch. Learning to let go, to accept pressure, to surrender in the sense of yielding and flowing, to create higher levels of aliveness, to learn to “feel” one’s body from the inside, are among the lessons taught in Hellerwork. Physical awareness improves as clients learn to use their bodies in ways that minimize effort and tension.This heightened awareness is paralleled psychologically as clients explore how their thoughts, attitudes, and feelings have an impact in and through their body. Hellerwork works with and educates a whole person. While not interested in symptom relief, it perhaps offers one of the best adjunctive approaches to chronic muscular pain syndromes. It emphasizes prevention and educates clients in self care. It teaches the powerful relationship of the body and the mind. With its potent range of application, Hellerwork is assuming a prominent place in our current holistic health paradigm.

Hellerwork Structural Integration, created by Joseph Heller, expands on Dr. Rolf’s method. In Hellerwork, we address the psycho-emotional aspect of the person and integrate the body, mind and movement connection patterns in order to create complete and lasting change.What really distinguishes Hellerwork from the other forms of Structural Integration are the added components of Somatic Psychology, Active Therapeutic Dialogue and Movement Education.Movement Education in Hellerwork is integrated at every level and is the true context of this work. Our goal is to give our clients a “retraining” in the way that they move through their lives. This is presented on the physical, emotional and psychological levels.By addressing the entire person and not just the body, pain and stiffness on all levels is reduced or eliminated, and fluidity, freedom and ease takes its place. Even though all Structural Integration methods address the structure and function of the body, Hellerwork provides a deeper exploration into the psycho-emotive aspect of the person.Somatic Psychology is the therapeutic dialogue process that occurs during sessions, which assists clients in releasing old patterns stored in the body, therefore allowing them to evolve to a level of increased personal awareness and authenticity in their lives.From our perspective, the individual’s ability to move through life with ease makes all the difference in the way one lives, speaks and acts in the world.There is a complex relationship between movement and self-expression, and simply put, the greater the ease of movement, the easier it is for people to express themselves verbally and emotionally. Movement is encouraged in Hellerwork Structural Integration, and achieved on every level.The first level is the freedom that is created in the physical body, as alignment is improved along with the release of chronic pain and holding patterns.The deeper levels of work are related to the inter-relatedness between the mind, the emotions, and the body.Hellerwork addresses these levels by exploring their relationships and offers facilitation to clients. This process assists in clearing out old and dysfunctional patterns and creates new optimal perspectives and tools that inspire awareness, joy, and freedom. This is all facilitated from a state of unconditional love, which is an important component offered in our practitioner training.Our heart-based approach is healing and transformative by nature because people grow more easily when they experience love and support.A shift in the body is a shift in consciousness.Experience this the Hellerwork way.

By Joseph Hunton for Awareness Magazine. This is the time of year when people traditionally reflect on the past and think about what they can do to be happier and healthier in the future. Along with losing weight and getting more exercise, one of themost common New Year’s resolutions is reducing stress. Unfortunately, like the other two, it’s also one of the hardest resolutions to keep. Stress, and its harmful effects on the body, can be greatly reduced through a form of bodywork that has often been overlooked.Hellerwork is a dynamic, three-part system of deep tissue bodywork, movement education, and dialogue designed to relieve stress and pain, improve posture and alignment, enhance movement and flexibility and increase energy.During the eleven 90-minute session series, tension and stress are released and the natural structural balance of the body is restored to a more aligned and relaxed state through a variety of gentle, “handson” deep tissue bodywork techniques. Movement education is used to help the client develop a better awareness of their body andmovement patterns. Dialogue is used to assist the client in becoming aware of emotional stress that may be related to physical tension.Hellerwork reflects the holistic approach to health, viewing the body as a complete and balanced entity, rather than merely a sum of disparate parts.This unique combination is designed to produce permanent change for lasting good health and personal growth.The Fascia ConnectionTo fully understand the process, it helps to learn about fascia, the connective tissue that Hellerwork directly affects. Fascia is a plasticlike tissue that wraps the muscles and all the fibers that become muscle. It is like a multi-layer body stocking, wrapping muscles and weaving in layers throughout the body. In its optimal condition, fascia is loose and moist, and facilitates movement and flexibility.However, due to chronic physical or emotional stress, lack of movement, or physical trauma, the fascia can become rigid and lose its flexibility. This results in the layers sticking to one another, often causing “knots”, pain, adhesions or restriction of movement. Our own movement patterns often determine how our fascia gets stuck. Also,because it is literally “connective” tissue, tension in one part of the body can affect many other areas of the body, as well.A body that is already out of balance may react to the simple force of gravity as a stressor, and become even more imbalanced and rigid. This is often what causes people to stiffen and shorten as they age.Hellerwork is designed to realign the body by releasing the rigidity from the connective tissue, facilitating change of the patterns that caused that rigidity and imbalance in the first place, and initiating dialogue to raise awareness of the impact of emotions and attitudes on the body.The Three Components of HellerworkThe deep, connective tissue bodywork releases tension in the fascia to systematically return the body to an aligned position. The practitioner achieves this through a “hands-on” process, by manually stretching the fascia back to its normal position. The client often feels a great release of tension, which produces an uncommon, but normal, state of well-being.The movement education teaches the client to become more aware of their body and movements. During sessions, clients will spend part of the time standing, sitting and walking, and are coached on their movement patterns. Simple but effective, easy-to-remember suggestions and visualizations are used to help the client rebalance their movements for optimal alignment and fluidity. Video feedback may be used to enhance this process.The verbal dialogue component helps the client become aware of emotions and attitudes and how they affect the body. The focus of the dialogue begins with, but is not limited to, the theme of each session. These themes highlight common attitudes and emotions associated with different parts of the body.For example, during the first session, the practitioner works primarily on the chest and the theme is “Inspiration”. During the bodywork, the practitioner may ask, “Do you feel inspired? What inspires you?What affects your ability to feel inspired?” This dialogue helps the client become aware of how emotions can impact the body. By becoming aware of these emotional patterns, the process of change in the mind and body can begin.The SessionsEach of the eleven Hellerwork sessions has a theme and each one is designed to focus on a specific area of the body to facilitate better alignment, flexibility and balance. Themes of the sessions are: Inspiration; Standing on Your Own Two Feet; Reaching Out; Control and Surrender; The Guts; Holding Back; Losing Your Head; The Feminine; The Masculine; Integration and Coming Out.There isn’t one standard reaction to Hellerwork, but typical responses to sessions often include a feeling of increased height due to better alignment, ease of breathing, increased range of motion, a more graceful walk, more energy, increased relaxation, enhanced awareness and openness, and often a connection to buried emotionsand intuition.The Hellerwork practitioners are a unique group of extensively trained health educators and professionals who are committed to actualizing the principles of Hellerwork, not only in their sessions, but in their daily lives.

Learn more about training as a Hellerwork Structural Integration Practitioner.

What is Hellerwork? Part I

What is Hellerwork? Part II

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What is Hellerwork Structural Integration? Bodywize...