On the Verge: Progress Update from Frank Bourke
June 28, 2009 by rfliotta · 3 Comments
I’ve been putting off composing this blog for the last three months waiting for a number of projects to take final steps to actualization so that we could report these GREAT breakthroughs; but here we are…right on the verge of our wildest dreams…but …not …quite …there.
When I proposed the project at IASH in 2006, I knew the proposed forty million dollar trust endowment was a necessary accomplishment if the Project were to be a long term viable research and support organization. Clinical Research has become extremely expensive. Currently, our smallest PTSD clinical research pilot study proposal, at Marshall University, costs out at $350,000. The full three-year study aimed at qualifying the NLP PTSD treatment protocol as evidentiary medicine was submitted to The DOD for $15,000,000 dollars. While development costs (upfront cost of producing a grant proposal) generally run between five and fifteen percent, we accomplished these first steps with dedicated volunteers and our personal resources (my wife has a look which provides the full explanation).
Many project developments have occurred since my last update here. First and foremost, in our sequence of grant developments, the large PTSD treatment grant we were asked to develop for the Department of Defense (as detailed in our last Blog update), was turned down. We have been asked to submit a scaled down pilot study proposal as a first step. In hindsight, we would never have attempted so ambitious a grant proposal without the DOD invitation. While it was rejected in its’ complete form, with normal Washington double speak, its construction leaves us having completed the entire design and collected all the necessary resources to do the entire research, training and dissemination sequence. The independent data analysis companies, research experts, clinical trainers, Washington liaisons, University sponsorships, etc. necessary to make such a proposal, have now all coalesced into a research project team who have seen the efficacy of the PTSD treatment protocol in clinical practice and have become deeply committed to the project. The obvious value of the grant proposal, based on their first hand experience and the extent of the national need, has generated many supporters. While the grants size would have solved all our infrastructure problems and the research put us well on the way to accomplishing the projects ultimate goal of national recognition, the paths to promised lands seldom show themselves as straight lines and are almost always navigated only with plenty of perseverance, flexibility, and hard work.
Despite some disappointments and apparent setbacks, the fact is that we are moving forward on many fronts. I have been heartened by the commitment of our many supporters and the clear momentum the value of the NLP Research and Recognition Project has created. I remember stopping in the middle of combing my hair, the morning before I presented the founding proposal for the Project at IASH in 2006 and saying to the mirror, “you’ve got to be kidding me!” Well amazingly, three years later, in the worst economic conditions since the Great Depression, we find we’ve gone from a possibility to a probability. Now when I look in the morning mirror I just shake my head in disbelief and smile……..The Irish jig and bottle of champagne will wait until the fat lady has sung a couple of bars and a one or two of the Grant proposals being currently circulated are funded but……we’re on the verge….and trying very hard not to break the record for either the longest stay there or never getting past it!
Our major current problem is that our accomplishments have outstripped our capability to support them. Core management staff cannot maintain their regular jobs and give the time necessary to carry on the current Projects needs. The web site, our communication hub, went to information technology hell and has only been recently delivered back alive to us by the NLP archangels, Tsirklin and Liotta. Next we need funding to continue the tremendous progress we have made so far.
With the web site back working, we have appointed a Volunteer Coordinator, Gene Plotkin (see his bio under Communications & Networking Team section of this site) and a Development Coordinator, Larry Templeton (see web site for details soon) to put together the next volunteer generation and to continue Foundation funding development to lead us further toward the promised lands. We must gather more volunteer staff to, among other things, continue the NLP Research Library development, Foundation Fundraising, Networking the Institutes into the Project, and enlarging the Project mailing list to 100,000.
Meanwhile the projects already underway must continue growing. Look for more updates and news on this website soon; regarding: Military PTSD Grants, Foundation PTSD Grants, Canada/Israel PTSD Studies, Institute Pilot PTSD Study, Foundation Infrastructure Grants, NLP practitioner fund raiser, Online Sub-modality Research project, Research Library enlargement, NLP Disaster Response Teams, volunteers networking and communications help, national publicity campaign, NLP Institute support and project integration.
As I imagine his brother once said, while standing beside a huge pile of discarded bicycle parts, “Orville I think we may be on the verge of flying this thing!” We’ll continue to persevere, be flexible, work hard and, if we forgot to mention it, have fun in the process.