VERMONT (Central Vermont) HEALTH REALIZATION LONG- TERM PROFESSIONAL TRAINING (HRLTT)
Preliminary Findings of Pre/Post Test after HR LTT
conducted by Jack Pransky, Ph.D. and Lori Carpenos, LMFT.
submitted 5/16/05
This Health Realization Long-Term Professional Training (LTT) came about as a result of the Root Causes Task Force of the Central Vermont Compassionate Community Collaborative (CCCC) becoming exposed to Health Realization (HR) as part of its work. At the end of an all-day CCCC planning workshop at which the CCCC had divided itself into various task forces, Jack Pransky, one of the workshop facilitators assigned to a different task force, approached the Root Causes Task Force saying he had done a lot of research on root causes for his initial book but now he sees “root causes” completely differently. He volunteered to share this information with the Task Force as it began its work, if they were interested. A meeting led to a one-day Root Causes/ Health Realization introductory training for the Task Force. After this training the Root Causes Task Force became interested in including Health Realization as the foundation training (initially) for a comprehensive prevention/human services training package for Washington County (and Vermont). Meanwhile, Pransky had offered an additional Vermont Health Realization I training, and the Root Causes Task Force decided to spearhead a Health Realization long-term professional training as a pilot, which some of its members attended and which was also opened to other Washington County and Vermont participants who had attended a HR I training.
Twenty-one (21) participants, primarily prevention practitioners, educators and prevention students attended initially, but one had to drop out after the first session because of family health issues. Of those attending, all but one had participated in at least one one- or two-day HR I training prior to the start of the LTT. Some, primarily students from Woodbury College, had also attended a two-day HR II workshop as part of their program. These students received undergraduate credit for this LTT as an official course as part of the Woodbury College Prevention and Community Development Program. Some others received Master’s Level Credit through the Union Institute & University/Vermont College. The training was held on the Vermont College Campus, graciously donated by Vermont College.
The Health Realization LTT met for one weekend per month for 7 months, beginning November, 2004 and ending May, 2005. Jack Pransky, Ph.D. and Lori Carpenos, LMFT, co-facilitated the training.
Goals and Objectives
Research Goal: To determine whether Health Realization training provided to prevention practitioners would yield more well-being, less stress and greater effectiveness in their work.
Objectives:
-Improved perceptions of well-being at work and in the rest of their lives
-Reduced perceptions of stress at work and in the rest of their lives
-Improved perceptions of relationships at work with “clients” and co-workers
-Improved perceptions of effectiveness with “clients” (the people with whom they work)
This Research/Evaluation Study
Data collection for this effort focused on whether change occurred in well-being, stress, work relationships and work effectiveness among LTT participants 1) before initial exposure to Health Realization, 2) at entry into the Health Realization LTT, and 3) after the 7-month LTT program. Because no pre-testing had occurred at the initial Health Realization training, the initial pre-test was conducted at LTT entry, and the design included a retrospective pre-test for prior to Health Realization training. All 20 participants filled out the pre and post–test forms.
At the start of the first LTT session each participant filled out an anonymous (coded) questionnaire on which they were asked to rate on a ten-point Likert scale their perceptions of where they are now on 9 questions. They were then asked to rate retrospectively where they perceived they were in comparison prior to their first exposure to Health Realization. Finally, at the end of the LTT they were given a post-test on which they were asked to rate their responses to the same questions regarding where they perceived were now on the same scale.
The purpose of this instrument was to measure their perceived change from before exposure to Health Realization to after exposure (longitudinally), to post-LTT. Ratings for each question were computed, a mean score was arrived at for each question, and scores were compared.
Preliminary Findings/Outcomes
Table 1 shows perceived mean ratings of answers to questions on a questionnaire comparing the following: pre HR: retrospectively before exposure to Health Realization; post HR/pre LTT: longitudinally from one month to two years (in one case five years) post Health Realization training at entry into the LTT in November, 2003; post LTT: at completion of the HRLTT on July 17, 2004. On a ten-point Likert scale (with 10 being the highest, except where indicated below), scores follow for each question (n = 20).
Ratings on a 10-point Likert scale, 1-10 (10 highest)1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
(mean scores)
1. Rate your general feeling of well-being
you would say you live in at work
(pre HR)------6.5
(post HR/pre LTT)------7.9
(post LTT)------8.9
2. Rate your general feeling of well-being
you would say you live in in the rest of your life
(pre HR)------5.6
(post HR/pre LTT)------7.5
(post LTT)------9.0
3. Rate your general level of stress you would say
you live in at work (10 = lowest stress)
(pre HR)------6.2
(post HR/pre LTT)------7.4
(post LTT)------8.6
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
4.Rate your general level of stress you would say
you live in in the rest of your life
(10 = lowest stress)
(pre HR)------5.3
(post HR/pre LTT)------7.4
(post LTT)------8.8
5. Rate the quality of relationships you would
say you have with the people you work with
(your “clients”)
(pre HR)------6.9
(post HR/pre LTT)------8.5
(post LTT)------9.1
6. Rate the quality of relationships you would say
you have with your coworkers and supervisors
(pre HR)------7.1
(post HR/pre LTT)------8.4
(post LTT)------9.0
7.How much do you see hope for your “clients”
in overcoming their problems and living in
well-being?
(pre HR)------5.6
(post HR/pre LTT)------7.6
(post LTT)------9.3
8. How effective would you say you are
in working with your “clients”?
(pre HR)------6.7
(post HR/pre LTT)------7.9
(post LTT)------8.8
9. How much would you say you apply the Health Realization approach effectively in working with your “clients”?
(pre HR)------4.7
(post HR/pre LTT)------7.0
(post LTT)------8.6
10. How well would you say you are prepared to teach Health Realization effectively to others?
(pre HR)-----2.8
(post HR/pre LTT)------5.5
(post LTT)------8.6
11. Approximately how many times per week do you get into arguments or fights with your kids
(pre HR)3.1
(post HR/pre LTT)1.9
(post LTT)0.6
12. Approximately how many times per month do you get into arguments or fights with your spouse/partner?
(pre HR)4.4
(post HR/pre LTT)2.1
(post LTT)1.1
Only the compiled data appear here. Statisticians are encouraged to apply measures of statistical significance or calculate percentage differences.
Without the luxury of a control group, questions are always raised about whether the program was responsible for changes in participant perceptions or whether the changes can be attributed to other unmeasured factors in participants’ lives. To address this concern, three open-ended questions were also asked of participants, post-LTT. Each paragraph below each question represents an excerpt from a different participant. [Note: MM1 and MM2 are different people.]
- What has changed about you since taking this training?
I have been depressed maybe for the last 5 years. I had postpartum depression and it seems it never went away. I took Prozac…then I started working with…abused children… I still had the morning sickness, and I would cry in the morning while the kids were asleep, and then go on with life… All I really wanted was to be dead... I started working full time for the first time in my whole entire life, and I loved it!!! but I also knew that the day I leave the house for work, my home will fall. And it started with my marriage, financial problems, but I still loved working!!! … Work became my only happiness. My depression was getting more intense, …my house burned, I got a divorce, my ex-husband moved to another state leaving me with 2 kids, and no family around, no help, no money and in danger of losing my house for lack of paying property taxes and my project also ended… I got 5 different job offers.... so life should be good now…but I still wish to die every single morning…and my thoughts totally make sense… HR teaches me how to listen better, and I immediately recognize my habitual thought of my morning sickness been nothing but a habitual thought! I could no longer shed any tear to that dying crying and instead started listening to my breathing, doing meditation, and yoga… There is no better place than in…your inner health, that place inside yourself that follow different rules than the ego rules, or all the above illusions we live under, …and just a different level of perceiving your own reality. The more I experience that real world, the more clear is my thoughts. “Above the line” is [now] my tendency…even under tremendous pressure… Because of HR I have the ability to observe and better discern thoughts from reality, and live in the moment every single minute...
DB
I am always changing, and becoming more clear in one moment, and cloudy again in another moment. It seems that I have more awareness about thinking - in relationship to Health Realization. That seems to be the clearest change. I find myself aware that my thoughts are simply thoughts and I can chose to do whatever I want with them, whether that is to run with them, let them go, replace them with a different thought… Thoughts create stories and people’s “truth.” The idea that reality is simply an illusion is very powerful for me. It allows me such freedom to create any reality that I want and TRUST. So, to be settled within myself, letting go of stories (mine or others) has been reinforced through this training… It is clear that I feel more grounded when I “think” from my heart. This type of thinking feels more like knowing in an expansive and open way – a trusting way - a trust in myself and beyond myself (more spiritual/connected). There is a letting-go that comes with this way of being.
KB
Through this HRLTT, I have come to a deeper and richer relationship with my true self, my health and wisdom, and to the center of all things. I spend less time experiencing my separateness, my ego, and more time experiencing oneness with others and with all of creation. My relationship with my spouse has improved tremendously. I no longer see as reality my habits of thoughts, feelings and reactions to her in the moment, nor her habits in relating to me. I see the behavior of others and the thinking from which it comes with greater compassion. When I do get caught in anxiety or worry or fear, I am able to step back and see it as a creation of my own, and to wonder about the learning I am about to experience as a result when the flow of energy returns.
K
I would say one of the most significant changes has been learning to flow into my health when I am in a down moment. Asking myself what lens I am viewing life from right now is something that I have been making a conscious choice to try and remember to do. Down moments are just that, a moment. I recognize I have a choice as to how much time I want to spend in that moment or thought. Therefore my quality of life has changed considerably… One specific learning moment has been to let things go, really let things go. The absolute power in letting go has been an unfolding process. For myself it removed anchors that I carried around with me and therefore burden my life considerably. By letting things go further it allows me to be much more present in life. Living in the present has led me to cherish each moment…
RF
[After detailing a time being lost in the woods]…I became confused, disoriented, scared and hopeless about finding my way out. I was sure I was going to die in the woods. I am telling this story because it reminds me of myself before HR. I was truly “lost in the woods” for most of my life prior to HR. I was confused, disoriented, scared and felt hopeless about my life. There were times when I wanted to die. Since HR: I have reconnected with my wisdom. I know that wisdom is a choice and it is always there, never goes away, and is available to me at every moment of every day. When I choose to let pure wisdom flow through me I am choosing love and I am able to be a more loving person. I am able to give and receive. I am able to move through life joyfully. I experience lasting inner peace and contentment… I am no longer lost in the woods, no longer confused, disoriented, scared and without hope. I’m glad I’m alive. I am focused and live a happier, more carefree and less stressful life. I am more productive at my job. My relationship with my husband and children is more relaxed and fun. I am very happy.
SB
My thoughts that I have the most of, about who I am, have changed. In the past, I have felt nervous about my decisions, a strong sense of uncertainty. I have also felt somehow deserving of bad things that have happened as a part of my life because I was not smart enough, not good enough, not able to trust myself, I was naïve, I acted in foolish ways, I was selfish, I was mean; therefore I deserved bad things. Where did all of these ideas come from anyway? I just know I have lived with them for a long time. Somehow, though, I have always known deep, deep down that I was O.K. regardless of anything bad, I had an inner strength that has and always would carry me through. It was this idea, though, that I also questioned…was I really O.K.? Was I fooling myself? Did I need therapy of some sort? Was I crazy? Last year, first or second class, I truly realized I was O.K. My past does not determine who I am in this moment. I am thankful for that, and I am humbled by this lesson, which I would not have learned otherwise. A great sense of relief came over me that my innate health is with me through it all. I am a part of something bigger than my thoughts and experience. This is good, this is empowering for me; to know that I made up ideas that were untrue and did not feel good-very punishing AND that I did not have to do that anymore!! So, my strength has always been with me, I just forgot it was there. The sense of relief brings to me a feeling of lightness…I do not have to carry these burdens of thought around with me anymore. I am amazed by IT all…experiences that were considered bad to me do not hold such power…they happened, they sucked, they are over and I am fine. It is amazing to me that it is not such a big deal to me. I am humbled by the three principles, and feel that the core of being is so simple yet so deep as mind, consciousness, and thought. And of course, thankful…thankful for everyday that I am consciously aware of this all; incredible.
AD
When I first heard about Health Realization it was three months after my thirty-year marriage had ended…Training is a good word for what we have been doing. Retraining might be even better. Underlying all of what I have learned from the six months of immersion in Health Realization is still the awareness that I create my own reality…A year ago, in an intellectual way, I could have said yes, it’s true that we create our own reality. But then I’d forget all about it, and go on living as if reality were something out there, something which happens to me. The retraining process has been a slow seeping-in of a new awareness, a reconditioning of my responses to what goes on inside my head and heart…What is different is that I have moments of reflection when I just stop all of it, and I know in the core of my being that it is me that is doing the thinking and making up the story of what is happening—I am the one creating my life! A year ago I needed pills to sleep and an antidepressant to get up in the morning. I stopped taking them a while ago, just realizing one day that I didn’t need them any more. I feel free, alive, and open to the infinite possibilities we all have to create our lives… I learned that I am a good, smart, nice, trustworthy being. …It is gradual and deep change, something like how spring comes in Vermont. It happens so slowly, a subtle, degree-by-degree warming and increase in light. Suddenly you look around you and all you see is green and the world is transformed.
AW
What has changed is my ability to not take my thoughts, myself or events around me as seriously.I still care, but I have developed a loving detachment.I realize that I am more effective when I stay grounded vs. dive into the drama around me by internally matching its frequency.In other words, taking the drama in around me as if it were my own or feeling and believing that I have to take it on.This…way of being in the world allows the channel between the divine mind and your inner self and wisdom to remain open and in constant clear dialogue… This has helped me in my marriage, my work with kids, youth and families, and in friendships…