Your not wrong Cleveland. The thing is, some people buy into the myth that they were so damaged, so worthless, that this saved them from themselves.
They for some reason don't realize they were for the most part just children going thru normal teenage problems.
As far as the tools, they were 7 of the twelve steps lifted from AA. They were really meaningless in the overall scheme of what "worked" at the seed. I contend you could have replaced them with anything and still got the same result.
The real effective part of the experience were the cultic aspects. The motivating, the forced attention at all times, the public humiliation and confessions, the constant threat of punishment, the love bombing, the restriction of freedom and thought, the forcing of demonizing all pre-seed memories, the isolation from the rest of the world, the us and them mentality...
these are the real techniques. The steps and "signs" were just fluff IMO, especially in light of the fact that they were using addiction treatment "steps" on mostly non addicted kids.