Zero Balancing

Zero Balancing is a type of body-mind therapy developed by Dr. Fritz Smith, MD and Osteopath in the early 1970s. The therapy primarily focuses on the relationship between the body’s structure (physical) and its energy fields (non-physical).
Zero Balancing aims to balance the body’s energy and physical structure. According to the therapy, when energy and structure are out of alignment, this imbalance can lead to pain, stress, or illness. ZB helps release tension in these areas and restore harmony.
ZB uses skilled, focused touch, typically around key joints, bones, and energy points. This touch is gentle, yet firm, and is intended to influence both the body’s deep anatomy and its energy field (through the energetic physiology, particularly of the nervous system).

In these five days, you will learn the entire Core Zero Balancing Protocol.* 

* This 35-hour class incorporates what is normally taught as “ZB I and II” – it is a hybrid course open to people taking ZB for the first time and anyone who has had previous Zero Balancing study.

Unlike many other bodywork techniques that focus on soft tissues like muscles and fascia, ZB practitioners work more directly with the bones and joints. Dr. Smith believed that bones hold deep energy patterns, and by releasing tension in the bones, one could affect deeper energy systems in the body.
Zero Balancing is often described as a non-verbal, meditative practice. While receiving the treatment, the client lies fully clothed on a massage table, and the practitioner applies pressure or traction to certain parts of the body in a very specific manner. The goal is to clear energy blockages and allow the body’s natural healing processes to occur.

Goals of Zero Balancing are:

• Relieve physical and emotional stress
• Improve overall health and well-being
• Balance energy flow within the body
• Promote deeper connection between mind and body
• Improve postural alignment

Course Overview

The progression from ZB I to ZB II is designed to create a strong, intuitive, and technical foundation for practitioners, preparing them to integrate Zero Balancing effectively into their practices.

• The foundational concepts of Zero Balancing are introduced, including the understanding of held energy within the bones and skeletal system.
• Students learn about interface touch, a key ZB technique that involves applying touch in a way that respects both practitioner and client boundaries.
• Exploring the body’s energy anatomy and how it relates to physical structure.
• Understanding the unique energetic, structural and functional roles of the skin, muscles, organs, and bones.
• Improve postural alignment
• ZB’s therapeutic emphasis is placed on the skeletal system as a conduit for energy flow, especially in joints, bones, and key physical-energetic intersections.
• Students learn a step-by-step protocol, focusing on specific techniques that act as fulcrums to encourage a new level of mind/body balance.
• Training in creating effective and supportive fulcrums in key areas in the spine, pelvis, hips joints, ribs, feet, legs, shoulder girdle, arms, neck and head.
• Developing observation skills andsensitivity to subtle shifts in energy flow and physical response during sessions.
• Cultivating presence and an open, neutral state, which is foundational for effective ZB practice.
• Techniques to quiet the mind and enhance receptivity during each session.

About David Lauterstein

Legendary Deep Massage and Zero Balancing educator David Lauterstein shares how Rolfing, and several other transformative encounters, have shaped his forty-year journey affecting people profoundly with touch therapy.

David Lauterstein is co-founder of Lauterstein-Conway Massage School in Austin, TX. He has taught Zero Balancing since 1996 and Deep Massage: The Lauterstein Method, throughout England and the U.S. since 1982. From 2018 to 2023, David has also taught at the Costa Rica School of Massage Therapy. He is one of the most highly respected educators in the massage therapy realm. He was inducted into the Massage Therapy Hall of Fame in 2011, awarded “Teacher of the Year” by AMTA in 2013 and the Alliance for Massage Therapy Education in 2014, and is a faculty member of the Zero Balancing Health Association. 
He is the author of five books, Putting the Soul Back in the Body, The Deep Massage Book, The Art of Massage, Life in the Bones, and, most recently, with Dr. Jeff Rockwell, The Memory Palace of Bones.: Exploring Embodiment through the Skeletal System. His background prior to massage therapy was in philosophy and music composition. He is the composer of the massage CD, “Roots and Branches.” He is known as the foremost educator in bodywork who shows us how to integrate art and science into our work.