Fascial Unwinding – Parts 1 and 2
FASCIAL UNWINDING
with Thomas Attlee
Free online introductory talk on Fascial Unwinding - Tuesday 23rd February 2021 6:00pm-7:30pm (UK time)
This introductory talk is a precursor to a Four Day Online Course in Fascial Unwinding (dates to be confirmed), and to two live Fascial Unwinding days on Sunday 28th March and Sunday 16th May at the British College of Osteopathic Medicine, London NW3.
PART 1: The Arm and the Leg - Sunday 28th March 2021 (£90/£100)
PART 2: The Neck and the Trunk - Sunday 16th May 2021 (£90/£100)
Venue: British College of Osteopathic Medicine, 6 Netherhall Gardens, Finchley Road, London, NW3 5RR
Booking: Please complete the online application form and send payment
Early Bird Fee: £90 each day if fully paid by 27th February 2021 (£100 after that date)
Special Offer: £160 for both days booked in advance by 27th February 2021
Further information: Please contact info@ccst.co.uk or 020 7483 0120
Fascia is now recognised as having profound and widespread significance for many aspects of health, with numerous research programmes in many therapeutic fields. Its significance was first identified by Andrew Taylor Still (the founder of Osteopathy) in the mid 1800s, but it is only recently that his insights are finally becoming widely appreciated and the value of fascia more fully acknowledged.
“The soul of man seems to dwell in the fascia of the body” - Andrew Taylor Still
Fascia holds our physical structure together, maintaining tensegrity
It penetrates deep into the internal structure of cells, to the nucleus of the cell.
It provides an essential communication system throughout the body
It has a vast sensory nerve supply
It makes substantial and profound connections with the autonomic nervous system
It transmits forces, injuries and restrictions throughout the body
It retains memories of injury and trauma (tissue memory)
It carries emotional tensions
Woking with the fascia is an extremely valuable process with potentially profound repercussions – whether working with musculo-skeletal injuries, chronic pain and restriction, emotional tension, profound debilitating trauma, or overall integration of the body-mind.
These two seminars will be very practical and interactive days. They will be led by Thomas Attlee, principal of the College of Cranio-Sacral Therapy, presenting an approach to Fascial Unwinding that is not generally available elsewhere. Thomas’ unique way of working with Fascial Unwinding provides a profoundly effective means of interacting with the fascia, which can be transformative for many circumstances and an invaluable resource in day to day practice.
For those new to Fascial Unwinding these seminars provide an excellent means of understanding and experiencing this powerful and profound process.
For those already familiar with Fascial Unwinding, they provide valuable further insight, detailed attention to refining skills and deepening engagement, enabling increased confidence in working with fascia and its application within the cranio-sacral process.
“I used to think that Fascial Unwinding was a superficial waste of time. Wow! What a difference!! One of my sessions was one of the most profound Cranio-Sacral sessions I have ever received”
“There was so much useful learning in the day. It has really transformed my understanding of Fascial Unwinding”
“Although I have practised Cranio-Sacral Therapy for many years, I had never encountered Fascial Unwinding before. This is a revelation!”
“I had heard that Fascial Unwinding was superficial and not very relevant. These two weekends certainly dispelled any such ideas. I am so pleased to have discovered this remarkable process.”
“I can’t wait to put all this into practice with my patients”
“I feel that I really understand Fascial Unwinding for the first time”
“I used to find Fascial Unwinding a real struggle, but now it’s suddenly become easy”
“I thought I was doing OK with Fascial Unwinding. Little did I realise how limited my skills were - until now! A completely new understanding!”
“I’ve always loved Fascial Unwinding but now I adore it”
“A really enjoyable and useful day”
Fascia:
The significance of fascia was frequently emphasised by Andrew Taylor Still, the founder of osteopathy, who provided many well-known comments on the subject in his Philosophy of Osteopathy (1899):
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‘We see in the fascia the framework of life, the dwelling place in which life sojourns.’
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‘I know of no part of the body that equals the fascia.’
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‘In every view we take of the fascia, a wonder appears.’
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‘By its action we live and by its failure we die.’
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‘When you deal with the fascia, you deal with the branch offices of the brain, and why not treat it with the same degree of respect.’
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‘The soul of a man seems to dwell in the fascia of the body.’

Despite Andrew Taylor Still’s profound insights more than a hundred years ago, the conventional view of fascia has until recently not recognised or appreciated its nature and significance. Fascia has for the most part been regarded merely as packing material that fills the spaces between more significant structures, with a limited mechanical role in the function of the body – allowing free gliding movement between adjacent tissues (muscles over bones, muscle bundles in relation to each other, tendons over bones, etc.) and providing a course for interstitial fluid flow.
Only in the past few years has research finally confirmed Andrew Taylor Still’s insights and the true significance of fascia.
Tensegrity
Fascia provides the matrix within which the rest of the body is contained. It holds our physical structure together, maintaining tensegrity – a system of reciprocal tension through which any pull or imbalance is transmitted through the whole and affects the whole. We might think of the bones and muscles as providing the main support for the body, but it is in fact the fascia which maintains our integrity.

Profound connection
Fascia not only envelops every structure in the body, providing continuity and interconnection throughout the body, but also penetrates deep into the internal structure of cells, passing through the cell membrane into the nucleus of the cell, via molecules known as integrins. Integrins are molecules located within the cell membrane and nuclear membrane, connecting extracellular and intracellular matrices, and enabling continuous interconnection and communication from the surface of the skin to the interior of every cell and nucleus in the body.
Communication system
Fascia provides an essential communication system throughout the body. It acts as a liquid crystalline matrix carrying high-speed messages via electrical charges. These communications travel much faster than the nervous system, transmitting information regarding tension and injury to all parts of the body. As geneticist and evolution scientist Mae-Wan Ho describes it, liquid crystallinity provides exquisite sensitivity and responsiveness and optimises the rapid noiseless intercommunication that enables the organism to function as a coherent coordinated whole.

Sensory supply
Fascia has a substantial sensory nerve supply. Our central nervous system receives its greatest amount of sensory nerves from our myofascial tissue, providing more sensory input than our eyes, ears or skin.
Autonomic nervous system connections
Fascia makes substantial and profound two-way connections with the autonomic nervous system. Fascia is densely innervated by mechanoreceptors, which are responsive to movement and pressure. Stimulation of Ruffini and interstitial mechanoreceptors induces profound changes in the autonomic nervous system, with an increase in vagal activity, which results not only in changes in local fluid dynamics and tissue metabolism, but also global neuromuscular, emotional, cortical and endocrinal changes, leading to muscle relaxation, a more peaceful mind, and less emotional arousal – changes associated with deep and healthy relaxation.
Fascia is also activated by sympathetic nerve stimulation, so stress and trauma can induce tension and contraction throughout the fascial system. Working with the fascia, particularly through fascial unwinding, can therefore significantly reduce sympathetic activity and hyperarousal, settling and balancing the autonomic nervous system, bringing greater tranquility and integration, and countering the many adverse physiological effects of excessive sympathetic stimulation.
Contractile
It is now recognised that fascia contracts independently of muscles. Smooth muscle cells have been discovered in fascia, enabling active fascial contractility, thereby retaining the effects of emotional tension and physical injury. Tonus regulation of fascial smooth muscle cells appears to be activated by the sympathetic nervous system.
Transmits throughout the body
Restrictions or disturbances to the fascia, whether from injury, inflammation or sclerosis, are transmitted throughout the body, potentially inducing adverse consequences in distant parts of the body. The degree to which these fascial restrictions affect other parts of the body will depend on many factors, such as the severity of the restriction, the underlying tension in the fascia as a whole, and the presence of other fascial restrictions or weaknesses imposed on the body by previous injury or disease.

Tissue memory
Fascia retains memories of injury and trauma as tissue memory. This may manifest in two principal forms. The fascia may maintain the effects of physical injury and tension indefinitely even when healing appears to be complete, leading to continuing symptoms – until the fascial restriction is released. Secondly, during fascial release, memories of the incident or circumstances which led to the fascial tension may arise to consciousness, with a corresponding emotional release.
Emotional associations
Fascia carries emotional tensions as well as and in association with physical injury and tension, often enabling the release of deeply held emotions and trauma through fascial unwinding.

Deeper understanding of fascia
Straubesand states that fascia is an actively adapting organ, with much greater functional importance than previously recognised, and the close links between fascia and autonomics may have far-reaching clinical implications.
Kovacs suggests that we view the body as a cybernetic system in which intervention is seen as stimulation for complex internal self-regulatory processes.
Schleip adds that it is more appropriate to assume the role of a facilitator who is skillfully engaging with a self-regulatory process within the organism, rather than as a master practitioner imposing skillful techniques upon the body.
Despite these observations, however, most approaches to working with the fascia are still working through mechanical means.
In fascial unwinding (as taught at the College of Cranio-Sacral Therapy), we are genuinely engaging with the self-regulatory cybernetic system within the body – the body’s own feedback mechanisms, and its own choices as to where and how to move – and we are truly acting as facilitators rather than as interveners.
Fascial unwinding
Working with the fascia, particularly through fascial unwinding, is an extremely significant process with potentially profound repercussions - whether working with musculo-skeletal injuries, chronic pain and restriction, emotional tension, profound debilitating trauma, or overall integration of the body-mind.

Unfortunately, it is not practised or understood by many Cranio-Sacral Therapists. Some Cranio-Sacral Therapists even claim that they don’t need Fascial Unwinding because they are working at a deeper level that renders Fascial Unwinding unnecessary. This simply indicates an outdated lack of understanding of Fascial Unwinding. Fascial Unwinding reaches levels that are not addressed by other branches of Cranio-Sacral Therapy, as indicated by the many examples of patients who have received substantial Cranio-Sacral Therapy on other levels without success, for whom Fascial Unwinding has proved to be the key element that has transformed their health and their life.

Fascial Unwinding is an exceptionally profound and valuable process that is an extremely useful resource in any Cranio-Sacral Therapist’s repertoire, particularly in resolving deep trauma. It is a very valuable aspect of cranio-sacral integration, expanding the therapeutic horizons to further levels, and extending the range of effective application of cranio-sacral therapy. It is an intrinsic part of the treatment process for many patients, often the most effective approach for specific circumstances, and sometimes the only approach that will effectively address certain conditions. Working with fascial unwinding can bring about therapeutic results that are not reached without fascial unwinding.
Case Histories:
Please scroll left or right to see more case histories
Venue: British College of Osteopathic Medicine, 6 Netherhall Gardens, Finchley Road, London, NW3 5RR
Booking: Please complete the online application form and send payment
Early Bird Fee: £90 each day if fully paid by 27th February 2021 (£100 after that date)
Special Offer: £160 for both days booked in advance by 27th February 2021
Further information: Please contact info@ccst.co.uk or 020 7483 0120