One can hardly think of Harbin Hot Springs without thinking of being mesmerized while watching a Watsu practitioner “float” someone, gently and gracefully in the warm and nurturing waters of the meditation pool. Because of Harold Dull and this transformative modality, which we’ve been so blessed to embrace and experience, Watsu has become a large part of who we are at Harbin.
Harold passed peacefully on July 31, 2019. We want to recognize Harold’s incredible contribution to the healing world. Watsu positively affected thousands and thousands of lives worldwide.
Harold was teaching Zen Shiatsu at Harbin in 1980 when he invented Watsu. In Zen Shiatsu stretching someone unblocks and balances the energy flowing through their body. Harold found Harbin’s warm water to be the ideal medium for this. He also found that holding someone, while floating them, takes them to a level beyond that of touch alone. Thus, Watsu was born in the warm pool at Harbin Hot Springs.
Through the 1990’s, Harold and many instructors taught classes in Shiatsu, Watsu and other massage modalities in Harbin workshop spaces through the School of Shiatsu and Massage. In 2001, the Watsu Center was completed on the hillside overlooking Harbin canyon (this facility is now the Harbin Domes) and it became the workshop space par excellence to host all of the School of Shiatsu and Massage classes and programs for certification in Watsu as well as in traditional land modalities. Students and teachers came from all over the world to learn and teach at the Watsu Center. Many graduates who were trained at the Watsu Center went on to become practitioners at Harbin Health Services. For many guests, receiving Watsu sessions at Health Services was a transformative part of their Harbin experience.
As Watsu grew worldwide, Harold began a registry that listed classes and practitioners on the internet, and to store authorizations to practice and teach. This registry created a comprehensive and reliable database for the water modalities we use today. More than 20,000 teachers and students from 90 countries have transcripts at The Worldwide Aquatic Bodywork Registry, https://www.watsu.com/. This includes other forms of aquatic bodywork, such as Waterdance™ and Healing Dance®.
In 2010, we celebrated the 25th Anniversary of Watsu at Harbin. Harold wrote an article for the Harbin Quarterly:
“Watsu began 25 years ago in the warm pool at Harbin when I started floating people applying the stretches of the Zen Shiatsu … Watsu and Harbin have had a truly symbiotic relationship. I doubt Watsu could have developed in any other place or at any other time, and much of the current Harbin community have been drawn here by what is being taught at the school.……………The first motto of our school was “Where East and West meet on land and in water”. Harbin has been the perfect place for that meeting.”
We at Harbin feel the same way. Harold was a perfect fit for Harbin’s healing waters. His spirit lives on in all the water work we do here. We’ll miss him greatly.
From Harold:
“The beauty of Watsu is that it continues to evolve. From water to land, from couples to communities, Watsu adapts and grows in its ability to connect. The boundlessness felt in warm water is the sheath of prana, the warmth within, becoming one with the warmth of the water. During Watsu, when our minds’ chatter becomes most stilled, the more spontaneous and intuitive our moves become, the more they are coming out of our bodies’ innate wisdom, and the deeper we move into rapture. It is said that once an opening is made to the rapture, once we know how to access it, we will be able to see it underlying even the greatest of our sorrows. I can imagine no better goal for Watsu than to help people realize a level of consciousness from which they can face anything—a level as boundless as water.” – Harold Dull
https://www.massagetherapy.com/articles/watsu-way
Watsu® is a registered service mark assigned to Harold Dull
Waterdance™ was developed by Arjana Brunschwiler and Aman Schroter
Healing Dance® was developed by Alexander George
