A Journey Towards Healing
From a young age, Michael Sokolowski dreamed of pushing the limits of his body. He dabbled in various sports—soccer, field hockey, and skateboarding—before discovering his true passion in tumbling. This led him to join his high school cheerleading team and eventually dive into "tricking," an exciting blend of martial arts, breakdancing, and tumbling.
“Between cheerleading and tricking, I found my niche,” Michael recalls. “Both sports allowed me to perform incredible skills I’d always admired. Growing up, I was inspired by movies like Bring It On and Karate Kid and dreamed of being like the athletes I saw on TV. Ironically enough, I became a blend of both.”
However, Michael quickly learned that achieving greatness required just as much attention to maintenance as to performance. After high school, life took a turn that set him on a path to healing.
In 2015, Michael completely ruptured his right hamstring, which he thought would end his athletic career. Following surgery and physical therapy, his family lost health insurance, making it impossible for him to continue his necessary treatment. He struggled with recurring issues like sciatica and knee pain, leading him to college with hopes of studying exercise science to become a physical therapist—until fate intervened.
While discussing his knee troubles with friends, he was gifted a session of Rolfing, a form of bodywork that piqued his interest. “I continued to see Brian, my Rolfing practitioner, about twice a month to support my tricking training. The progress I made was astounding—I felt stronger, healthier, and more flexible than ever. But then, in early 2017, I partially retore my hamstring again. I was at my breaking point.”
This re-injury led to calcification of scar tissue, severely limiting his flexibility and strength in his right hip, just as he was beginning to realize his potential in tricking. “Without proper range of motion, I doubted I could compete or make a name for myself,” he admits.
That’s when Rolfing came to the rescue. Unlike other therapies, Rolfing addresses the entire connective tissue matrix, known as fascia. “I had heard that Rolfing could improve scar tissue quality, but experiencing it firsthand was truly transformative,” Michael explains.
With a combination of Rolfing, Instrument Assisted Soft Tissue Mobilization (IASTM), and dietary coaching, Michael regained his strength and flexibility just in time to participate in tricking events by the end of the year. In 2018, he traveled across the country for competitions, and in 2019, he achieved a major milestone—winning a competition that granted him guest privileges to Australia’s largest tricking event, “ATG.”
“I remember jumping into the foam pit that night and crying tears of joy when I was announced the winner by my idol, Phil Gibbs. I had achieved my dreams and was recognized for my hard work. I knew I owed it all to my sport and community, but more than anything, to Rolfing.”
In 2019, Michael enrolled at The Dr. Ida Rolf Institute in Gunbarrel, Colorado, to become a practitioner of Rolfing/Structural Integration. He graduated in 2021 and opened his private practice, “Humans Being,” in Boulder in February 2022. Since then, he has continued to practice and travel, sharing the healing power of Rolfing with individuals and athletes around the world.
“Our bodies are more than just vehicles to get us from point A to B,” Michael emphasizes. “They are untapped vessels of incredible potential. The sooner we start viewing our bodies this way, the sooner we can unlock our true capabilities.”
The Rolfing Approach
The general idea of Rolfing is that we are "organized" along a central line in which our body builds its relationship to gravity. Collectively, we call this our posture. When we experience a significant injury, trauma, or anything that encourages us to adopt new patterns of living in our body, we can become "disorganized".
When our bodies are in a state of disorganization, we experience a variety of symptoms, but the most typically tells come in the form of chronic pain, low energy or poor mobility. The process of Rolfing was designed to restore our bodies relationship to this center line by addressing the fascia, a network of connective tissue that's continuous throughout the whole body.