btr:

New Era is a Lifespring spin-off per the link just posted.

Lifespring had a horrible history of abuse allegations and claimed injuries.

LGATs generally have that history.

You may support New Era and make whatever posts you wish within the rules.

But you should expect that others at this message board may not agree with you.

Your posts are not "neutral."

You are here to support New Era.

If you wish to look at posts in either black and white terms - support or against, then I would be more on the side of support but with the understanding it too does have its limitations. Help some but not all, it is controversial, etc.

Your first three lines resemble the classic: All men are mortal. Socrates is a man. Therefore, Socrates is a mortal.

Yet, this example is a bit fuzzy.

True Lifespring has a murky past history, yes it is a LGAT and so is New Era. There is a link between the two but there may be differences in how it is presented but indeed they follow the same core methodologies (according to the link from trained1). So knowing this it would be to easy to generally write off New Era as just another LGAT, (maybe it is, maybe it isn't) but until these same history of abuse allegations and injuries can be directly connected to this company it remains in the realm of generalizations, anecdotal evidence, and opinions. My comments including.

Do you not agree?

My reference of my earlier posts being neutral was incorrect, I do clearly support my own experience, I mixed up with presenting an opinion that isn't written to persuade a certain point of view just to decide and 'btw this is what I experience.'

I completely understand others may not agree with me and I welcome all kinds of discussions. I was concerned that these boards may be censored by opposing viewpoints, I see now as long as the posts are within rules its ok. Thank you.

btr:

What the Lifespring Web site announces is, "The following is a list of independent training companies who use the Lifespring Training Methodology."

See [www.lifespringnow.com]

The site then lists "New Era" in California.

For anyone reading this thread that is not familiar with Lifespring's sorry history...

See [www.culteducation.com]

FYI -- Philip Cushman, a clinical psychologist, wrote the research paper "Mass Marathon Trainings" based upon his experience with Lifespring.

See [www.culteducation.com]

btr:

Upon a revisit I see that they have updated or changed the page, it now makes that distinction as you have pointed out thank you. And I have checked the State of California website and It is Jim's name that appears as the principal on record . But I would like to point out that either way they a have a close relationship, Jim is or was active with Lifespring and also was involved in Impact, it just seems like there is a quite a bit of name games going on. And its the same people that keep coming up such as Jim he is involved in quite a few of these ventures. And I believe that they are under stating the profitability of this Center it maybe small, but some simple math and some reasonable assumptions re: overhead says that they are making a fairly decent size profit.

Lets face there is no advertising expense. The only people getting paid are Jim and Lynne, and maybe 1 or 2 others that are doing the paper work, the assistants are all volunteers, recruited form prior trainings. I am not saying that that they shouldn't make money, but do resent the remarks that Lynne made about making personal sacrifices because she can't afford to pay herself, I think that's hogwash, oh I did forget to mention that the Mystery Man Lynne's boyfriend or life partner is also on the payroll.

Simple math: There was about 40 people in my group, each paying at least $1400 1400x40=56,000 ite seems to me they try to run at least 1 group a month thru the program plus we had at least 20 that paid for ACT another $900 x 20 = $18,000 granted that these are not huge numbers but considering the low overhead, I think 4 or 5 people could squeeze out a pretty good living based on what I think are conservative numbers. Thats $74,000 per month. Even if they had to pay some ungodly amount of rent say 10,000 per month they are still left with $64,000 to pay what little staff they may and split 3 ways. But being that my wife has a office that her company rents right down the street, I'm pretty sure they are not paying that kind of money for such a crappy building.

Anyway these are just some thoughts I've had regarding New Era, It really pissed me off when Lynne went on a wild rant (previously referenced in the 2nd paragraph) about how much she has sacrificed to bring this gift to all of us, all to lead us to believe that her motives are altruistic , rather than profit driven, I think that's BS.

Lynne and Jim are very good at what they do and I for 1 believe what they do is borderline brainwashing, and does have a cult like flavor to it. Just some of my thoughts....

P.S. It all seems so contrived even the sessions when Jim cries and goes on about personal experiences GAG! sorry just feels that way....



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/07/2008 06:04AM by trained1.

rrmoderator:
I have read the history of Lifespring page months ago, very thorough. I have read the things from Cushman as well.

I don't deny about the link, I acknowledged its existence in my last and earlier posts to trained1. But on that same website you posted you'll find two things - New Era is on the list as an independent center (non licensed by lifespring) and may have modified the core methodologies. I admit I don't have proof if they have or haven't, yet this is the info one can gain from the link you shared.

Yet, do you have any direct allegations towards New Era? You keep drumming up Life Springs sordid history, I'm not denying that to be true but I fail to see direct proof that indicts New Era.

You dodged my previous question, so I will pose it again:
Until these same history of abuse allegations and injuries can be directly connected to New Era all claims are based on generalizations, anecdotal evidence, assumptions and opinions.

Can you refute this, with proof?

Trainer1:

Lets come to at least a simple agreement, without seeing the books we, you or I just don't truly know. And it isn't simple math by taking a head count and multiplying the costs per class. No telling how many are 'freebies' or paying lower rates - which means in a given group the total is variable. What are not variable costs are overhead. Overhead on Sunday is the same on Thursday. That includes renting commercial space, electric, water, and heating. There are only a few people that are on the payroll, you pointed to Jim, Lynn, Lynns partner. You forgot that all businesses have someone on the side updating the books, but still not that many people, right? But taking account that of fixed costs to the variable nature of income, I don't think they are rich or rolling in the dough. Depending on how many people go they go back and forth between red and black (no pun intended). What would you be calling a lot of money? 75K a year? 120k? This is more relative what you consider 'alot'.

I will admit that there is a bit of a blur on the business model and some of the statements you heard. It does follow a business model. They're not at the level of some of the these Hilton 300+ events, and the facility that I attended couldn't even handle that capacity. They are a small fish in comparison.

Here is a post I posted earlier that I feel is relevant to this thread. post # 55405

Just a quick note regarding the link I posted: This is a quote from the link to Lifespring's list page "Other than his son (John Jr.), and business partners (Jim Hellam of New Era and Helen Chang of Key Link)," obviuosly from this quote New Era has more than just methodology connection. Jim Hellam is Actually Hanley's partner.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/07/2008 07:48AM by trained1.

btr:

Thanks for being blunt regarding your real position concerning New Era.

In your initial posts you attempted to come across as more neutral, but now you have made it plainly evident that you are here on a mission to defend New Era.

I suspected as much since you used the standard LGAT supporter apology of "it's not for everyone," as another New Era apologist had previously done.

IMO--LGATs are most often potentially unsafe and not a good idea for anyone.

Thankfully, there are much safer and more credible alternatives readily available to people interested in self improvement.

trained1 has raised some serious issues regarding New Era, calling it "borderline brainwashing" and that it has "a cult like flavor to it."

FYI--No LGAT that I know of has ever attempted to objectively measure its alleged results, i.e. by demonstrating that past participants directly benefited from its training through subsequent career advancement, a lower divorce rate, higher grades at school, increased income, or a lowered need for professional counseling. If such research were done and submitted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal, it might go a long way in proving the fantastic claims of success that many LGATs make.

Instead, LGATs have offered "anecdotal evidence, assumptions and opinions" to support whatever claims they make about the effectiveness and/or benefits of their training.

As far as New Era is concerned what we now know per the posts on this message board and supporting links is that it is an LGAT based upon Lifespring, which is a company with a history of personal injury lawsuits.

New Era is also apparently a for-profit privately owned company, which sells its training to make money for its owners.

But interestingly, it nevertheless functions somewhat more like a charitable nonprofit, in that New Era benefits from volunteers.

Typically, for-profit companies don't depend upon volunteer labor.

Again, New Era fits the familiar pattern of other LGATs like Landmark Education, Sterling Institute of Relationship and Lifespring in its use of volunteers for free labor.

New Era, like other LGATs, what can be seen as "group therapy" that they call "training." But Jim and Lynne lack the education and professional credentials to conduct traditional therapy as mental health professionals and/or licensed counselors.

The liablilities of such training has been discussed in Philip Cushman's paper "Mass Marathon Training."

See [www.culteducation.com]

# They lack adequate participant-selection criteria.

# They lack reliable norms, supervision, and adequate training for leaders.

# They lack clearly defined responsibility.

# They sometimes foster pseudoauthenticity and pseudoreality.

# They sometimes foster inappropriate patterns of relationships.

# They sometimes ignore the necessity and utility of ego defenses.

# They sometimes teach the covert value of total exposure instead of valuing personal differences.

# They sometimes foster impulsive personality styles and behavioral strategies.

# They sometimes devalue critical thinking in favor of "experiencing" without self-analysis or reflection.

# They sometimes ignore stated goals, misrepresent their actual techniques, and obfuscate their real agenda.

# They sometimes focus too much on structural self-awareness techniques and misplace the goal of democratic education; as a result participants may learn more about themselves and less about group process.

# They pay inadequate attention to decisions regarding time limitations. This may lead to increased pressure on some participants to unconsciously "fabricate" a cure.

# They fail to adequately consider the "psychonoxious" or deleterious effects of group participation (or] adverse countertransference reactions.

I went through the first two levels of New Era Trainings (which they have named Explore and Realize). It is the EXACT same thing as Lifespring, word for word, which I found out later. I was quite happy with my experience, having many personal epiphanies along the way. Although I felt relief from these "discoveries", it was temporary, and mostly due to the intense emotional environment at the time (created intentionally).

However, the third level of the training (Act) is purely recruiting others to keep their program going. Of course, they don't describe it like that, and if you don't comply you are harassed to no end about not being "a part of the team", "something bigger than yourself", etc. Its all a bunch of B.S. and luckily I could stand up for myself enough to quit.

By they way, they had us sign a "release" or "agreement" the first day of Act (90 days) stating that there were no refunds from that point on. They expect you to live your normal life, come to 6am meetings (2 hours away), midnight "emergency" meetings, conference calls until 2am, and all other loads of garbage. I know several people whose phone bills were over $400. Talk about mind-control! This "release form" was some basic document typed on Word, and I doubt it could hold up in court as legally binding. Does anyone know? I'm sorry to admit I fell for this scheme and I want a refund! Any advice is appreciated.