Hi! I'm Meran Cassidy
Certified Rolfer® and Movement Therapist
My fascination with movement began at age 8. I began attending creative dance and yoga classes. I loved to move. I loved the feeling of moving within the group of dancers. I loved handstands and cartwheels. Later I would assist in younger kids classes to earn pocket money. With the money I paid for upkeep of my horse. Horse riding was a whole other way of moving in space, of meeting the movement of another and moving together.
I was strongly challenged in riding because I didn't have a good 'seat'. My pelvis didn't know how to go down, how to connect with the horse. I always felt like I was levitating. Not a good feeling on such a big animal. Teachers could tell me what was missing but know one could help me find the connection. Then at age 15 I had a bad fall. My mare Jasmine bucked and I toppled over her shoulder and landed on my sacrum. The pain was intense and for the next year I was unable to sit comfortably. I would put one foot under the other knee and hitch up my pelvis to avoid putting my weight down.
A year later it was the intelligent hands of manual therapist who finally treated the ligaments around my sacrum and tail that took away my pain. The pain was gone but my compensatory pattern was fixed. As a person who already found being 'grounded' difficult this increased the challenge and an aching lower back and neck was a common issue for me for many years.
In my early twenties I discovered that working out at the gym helped my back pain. It was the first time I had done something that focussed on strength instead of flexibility. It was very helpful and as my muscles tightened I felt more 'in' my body, more grounded. But soon I started getting injured again and I began to question what was going on.
In 2001 I began studying personal training and massage. I received my Diploma Health Science (Massage) in 2002. I did a year of Pilates Instructor training and a year of Human Movement at Victoria University before I completed Unit 1 of my Rolfing training in 2004. I had been wondering all this time "why does my imagination affect my movement?". Why, if I imagined reaching or folding did the movement become easier and more fluid. Everything fell into place when I began my Rolfing training. I dropped out of my other courses as I knew I had found my place.
My Rolfing instructor was Michael Stanborough, a brilliant Rolfer who opened up this new world of looking at the body and movement. Suddenly so many of my questions could be answered, and my hunger for knowledge satiated. I completed my Rolfing® Structural Integration training in Sydney in 2006.
As I developed my practice I was drawn to the teaching of Hubert Godard. A Rolfer, Dancer and Movement Theorist, Godard's work on perception has widened and modernised many of Dr Rolf's concepts about movement. I studied with Godard in 2010 and since then have continued working with his approach with other wonderful teachers, Pilar Marin, Caryn McHose and Kevin Frank. The 2010 retreat was co taught by Susan Harper who I have continued studying with. She opens the embodiment process into the space of psyche and mythology and organic movement and I am blessed to have her as a Mentor.
For many years I wondered what being 'grounded' meant. Discovering what this elusive 'sense of weight' was and how I could feel it has been a big part of my journey over the last 20 years. As a strongly space oriented person, discovering the other pole, receiving the support of gravity, was one of the best things that I've ever known.
The concept of orientation is the way we relate to space and earth, up and down; through our body, our history and our beliefs. As a Rolfer I get to help people in holistic and specific ways to feel better orientation, to recover joy in movement and rehabilitate from pain and injury. I continue to be amazed and humbled by the people that come into my practice each day and engage with this process of enquiry.
I was strongly challenged in riding because I didn't have a good 'seat'. My pelvis didn't know how to go down, how to connect with the horse. I always felt like I was levitating. Not a good feeling on such a big animal. Teachers could tell me what was missing but know one could help me find the connection. Then at age 15 I had a bad fall. My mare Jasmine bucked and I toppled over her shoulder and landed on my sacrum. The pain was intense and for the next year I was unable to sit comfortably. I would put one foot under the other knee and hitch up my pelvis to avoid putting my weight down.
A year later it was the intelligent hands of manual therapist who finally treated the ligaments around my sacrum and tail that took away my pain. The pain was gone but my compensatory pattern was fixed. As a person who already found being 'grounded' difficult this increased the challenge and an aching lower back and neck was a common issue for me for many years.
In my early twenties I discovered that working out at the gym helped my back pain. It was the first time I had done something that focussed on strength instead of flexibility. It was very helpful and as my muscles tightened I felt more 'in' my body, more grounded. But soon I started getting injured again and I began to question what was going on.
In 2001 I began studying personal training and massage. I received my Diploma Health Science (Massage) in 2002. I did a year of Pilates Instructor training and a year of Human Movement at Victoria University before I completed Unit 1 of my Rolfing training in 2004. I had been wondering all this time "why does my imagination affect my movement?". Why, if I imagined reaching or folding did the movement become easier and more fluid. Everything fell into place when I began my Rolfing training. I dropped out of my other courses as I knew I had found my place.
My Rolfing instructor was Michael Stanborough, a brilliant Rolfer who opened up this new world of looking at the body and movement. Suddenly so many of my questions could be answered, and my hunger for knowledge satiated. I completed my Rolfing® Structural Integration training in Sydney in 2006.
As I developed my practice I was drawn to the teaching of Hubert Godard. A Rolfer, Dancer and Movement Theorist, Godard's work on perception has widened and modernised many of Dr Rolf's concepts about movement. I studied with Godard in 2010 and since then have continued working with his approach with other wonderful teachers, Pilar Marin, Caryn McHose and Kevin Frank. The 2010 retreat was co taught by Susan Harper who I have continued studying with. She opens the embodiment process into the space of psyche and mythology and organic movement and I am blessed to have her as a Mentor.
For many years I wondered what being 'grounded' meant. Discovering what this elusive 'sense of weight' was and how I could feel it has been a big part of my journey over the last 20 years. As a strongly space oriented person, discovering the other pole, receiving the support of gravity, was one of the best things that I've ever known.
The concept of orientation is the way we relate to space and earth, up and down; through our body, our history and our beliefs. As a Rolfer I get to help people in holistic and specific ways to feel better orientation, to recover joy in movement and rehabilitate from pain and injury. I continue to be amazed and humbled by the people that come into my practice each day and engage with this process of enquiry.