Lives Change for the Better

We use linguistic analysis of recorded pre- and post-evolution interviews to learn where, on a progressive scale from “Non-Functional” to “Action, implementation, and Positive Change”, participants feel their lives are, pre- and post-evolution. 

Our participants come to our training describing themselves generally as non- or minimally functional.  Two weeks after they go home, they report themselves to be

• starting to see a path out of their dysfunction or
• planning action or
• taking action and implementing positive changes in their lives.

This graph shows, in the black columns, the distribution of a sample of our participants across stages in their “before” interviews.  The red columns show that same distribution from the “after” interviews.

Details of Our Research

As outlined in our first tenant, warfighters must be allowed to determine their own successful outcomes, therefore we tailored our research to account for this self-determination.

We have observed that participants come to us in one of these five stages with one or some of these attributes:

1. Non-Functional – Views self as a broken/disordered/helpless “patient”, house bound or otherwise isolated, requires care to survive, has little or no purpose or hope, likely (but not always) medicated.
2. Minimal Function – prefers to be isolated, un/underemployed, has difficulty with relationships, haunted by memories, struggles with hyper-vigilance/arousal, probably medicated.
3. Light Bulb Transition – realizes origin of issues, what life patterns need to change, not a helpless/powerless patient, hopeful about getting control of life, starting to reconnect with earlier warfighter identity and self-esteem.
4. Acton Plan Development – sets self-directed goals, may be angry because of lost time or harm caused by psychopharmacology, rallies social support, becomes analytically critical about information sources, understand the need to move forward vs. longing for the past.
5. Action, Implementation and Positive Change – implementation of plan at each participant’s individual ability, acceptance of one’s reality, progress assessment, goal reevaluation/realignment, gratitude, service to others.

We define progress as participants moving through these steps toward Stage 5.

To Reiterate Our Research Results

• Our participants come to our training describing themselves generally as non- or minimally functional. Two weeks after they go home, they report themselves to be
  • starting to see a path out of their dysfunction or
  • planning action or
  • taking action and implementing positive change in their lives.

We follow our participants to assess what stage they are in as their lives further unfold post-Warfighter.