Keynote Speaker

The Courage to Be Real: Leading with Emotional Authenticity

We live in a culture that often rewards perfection, productivity, and performance over humanity and heart. Yet the leaders and caregivers who last the longest and leave the greatest impact are those who have the courage to be real. In this keynote, Nicole Walton, forensic nurse, nonprofit founder, and speaker, shares her journey of moving from performance-driven leadership into authentic, vulnerable presence. Attendees will leave with a renewed understanding that leading authentically is not weakness, it is the most sustainable and transformative strength we have.

Breakout Leader

Pace for Success

This dynamic breakout session introduces the PACE framework—a powerful tool that combines goal-setting with color psychology to enhance performance and self-awareness. Participants will learn to assess their current abilities across four key areas using an intuitive color-coded system: Red (Attention/Needs Help), Yellow (Opportunity/Growth Area), Green (Quality/Performing), and Blue (Productive/Excellent). Through interactive exercises, attendees will identify their personal goals and map their PACE progress using colors that psychologically support growth and motivation. The session emphasizes "showing up with heart and harmony" rather than operating from fear, helping participants build confidence through honest self-assessment. Participants will leave with a personalized PACE worksheet, understanding of how color psychology impacts motivation, and practical strategies for tracking progress in a visually engaging way that promotes sustained success.

Breakout Leader

Naked Truths: Speaking Desire, Disappointment, and Vulnerability in Intimacy

Participants will gain more confidence in expressing vulnerability, desire, and even disappointment in their sexual and romantic relationships. They’ll gain practical tools for honest, empathic communication that honor both their own needs and their partner’s, creating space for real connection without fear or shame. Participants will explore ways to turn lonely moments into closeness, navigate difficult conversations with courage, and embrace what it truly means to be seen, wanted, and emotionally present. By leaning into authenticity and speaking their truths, participants will leave with actionable skills to deepen intimacy, strengthen trust, and engage in relationships with both boldness and heart.

Breakout Leader

Unlocking Resilience: The Four Tendencies as a Path to Emotional Health

Understanding how individuals respond to expectations is key to supporting emotional resilience, preventing burnout, and sustaining satisfaction in both personal and professional roles. This interactive session introduces Gretchen Rubin’s Four Tendencies framework—Upholder, Questioner, Obliger, and Rebel—and explores how these personality patterns shape stress responses, boundaries, and self-care practices. Participants will identify their own tendency, gain insight into how others may view expectations differently, and learn strategies to strengthen resilience in the workplace and beyond. Through engaging discussion and practical application, attendees will leave with tools to better understand themselves and those they serve, fostering healthier communication, improved collaboration, and sustainable emotional well-being.

Breakout Leader

The Light That Brought You Here: An Embodied Collage Experience

This experiential breakout session invites participants into a gentle, creative process of reconnecting with their inner light—the part of themselves that has always known healing was possible. Using Melanie Taylor’s method of Embodied Collage™, attendees will create a symbolic, visual representation of the self that survived, hoped, and believed—even in silence.

Through guided reflection, sensory prompts, and hands-on creative exploration, this session offers a unique opportunity to slow down and listen inward. No artistic experience is needed—just a willingness to engage with your story in a new way. This process is both soothing and revealing, and participants often leave with a sense of grounded clarity, emotional presence, and deeper connection to their authentic self.

Breakout Leader

Journaling for Self-Care

Journaling is one of the most common forms of self-care. Learn some practical tips on setting your intention, selecting a place to journal, what types of books/journals to use, and how to start getting those thoughts out of your head onto paper.

Breakout Leader

Building Resilience: Thriving Through Life's Challenges

In this engaging workshop, participants will learn practical strategies and tools to develop resilience, enabling them to overcome obstacles, adapt to change, and emerge stronger from life's challenges.

Breakout Leader

Motivation to unmask and reveal your authentic self.

Are you feeling stuck? Do you ponder who am I and where do I fit in this world? Engage in an interactive session of self reflection to rejuvenate your journey to self actualization.

Co-Breakout Leader

Wellness in Full Color: Exploring the 8 Dimensions of a Radiant Life

This breakout session offers an overview of the Radiant Life program through an engaging exploration of the 8 Dimensions of Wellness. As an excerpt from the full Radiant Life presentation, this session highlights the key aspects of each dimension—emotional, physical, social, intellectual, spiritual, occupational, environmental, and financial—to promote a deeper understanding of overall well-being. Participants will gain insight into how each area connects to create balance and fulfillment, empowering them to live a more radiant and intentional life.

Co-Breakout Leader

Wellness in Full Color: Exploring the 8 Dimensions of a Radiant Life

This breakout session offers an overview of the Radiant Life program through an engaging exploration of the 8 Dimensions of Wellness. As an excerpt from the full Radiant Life presentation, this session highlights the key aspects of each dimension—emotional, physical, social, intellectual, spiritual, occupational, environmental, and financial—to promote a deeper understanding of overall well-being. Participants will gain insight into how each area connects to create balance and fulfillment, empowering them to live a more radiant and intentional life.

Breakout Leader

Sound Healing Meditation: A Journey to Renewal

This immersive sound healing meditation is designed to help professionals release stress, restore balance, and reconnect with their inner peace. Through the soothing vibrations of crystal singing bowls, chimes, and other therapeutic sounds, participants will experience deep relaxation and nervous system regulation. This session provides a sacred space for rest and renewal, allowing the mind and body to reset amidst the demands of caregiving. No prior meditation experience is necessary—simply arrive, breathe, and receive the healing frequencies. Join us for this transformative journey and discover the power of sound as a tool for sustainable self-care.

Breakout Leader

Finding Capacity: Yoga as a Tool for Emotional Balance

Emotional overwhelm is not a personal failure but often a reflection of nervous system capacity. In this experiential breakout session, participants will explore how yoga and breathwork can be used as a practical tool to increase emotional regulation, build resilience, and widen your window of tolerance. Through guided somatic practices, breathwork, and gentle movement, attendees will learn accessible strategies to shift from reactivity toward grounded responsiveness.

This session blends brief education with embodied experience, offering tools that can be integrated immediately into personal and professional settings.

Breakout Leader

Exploring the Five Behaviors of a Team

Amy Langston, leadership coach and founder of RGB Wellness, presents a keynote on the Five Behaviors™ model—Absence of Trust, Fear of Conflict, Lack of Commitment, Avoidance of Accountability, and Inattention to Results. Drawing from two decades in leadership and wellness, Amy explores how these dynamics undermine team performance and offers real-world examples and practical strategies to build trust, foster healthy conflict, promote accountability, and focus on results. Attendees will engage in mindful leadership practices, such as pauses and check-ins, to reduce burnout and embed well-being into organizational culture. The session provides actionable tools for leaders to immediately enhance team alignment and drive sustainable performance.

Seven Directions to Unwind

This gentle, re-energizing yoga class is designed to release tension from sitting and reset the spine after a full day of conference learning. Through simple, accessible movements, light standing flow, and breathwork, participants will restore circulation, improve mobility, and leave feeling clear, steady, and refreshed for the closing session. No yoga experience required. Modifications will be available. 

Closing Session

The Matters of Mattering: I, You, We Matter

In The Matters of Mattering: I, You, We Matter, Lynette Thrower invites us into a powerful exploration of belonging, validation, and why we long for both.

Rooted in the 2026 theme of Emotional Authenticity, Lynette challenges us to reflect on how we assign value — especially in seasons where performance, productivity, or position feel like measures of worth.

What if emotional authenticity requires us to first believe that we matter — not because of what we produce, but because of who we are?

As an accomplished writer, lecturer, and higher education leader, Lynette brings a thoughtful, poetic, and grounded voice to conversations about identity, belonging, and shared humanity.

This session will not simply close the conference. It will send you back into your work rooted in purpose — and reminded that I matter. You matter. We matter.

Breakout Leader

Building a Foundation of Ownership: Practical Lessons for Leaders, Teams, and Everyday Life

This presentation explores what ownership really looks like in leadership, management, and everyday life. We will focus on practical strategies that help leaders set the tone, strengthen accountability, and promote a culture where people step up instead of stepping back. Through real stories and lessons drawn from my and other's work experience and relationships, participants will learn how ownership creates stronger teams, healthier workplaces, and more resilient individuals.

Breakout Leader

Burnout and Compassion Fatigue: Effects and How to get Stuff Done

Compassion fatigue and burnout result from the emotional strain of working with patients suffering from the consequences of traumatic events. Repeated exposure to emotional strain associated with caring for trauma patients without taking time for self-care can lead to a gradual lessening of compassion over time, and more dangerously, self-destructive behaviors. Caregivers and providers must be vigilant regarding compassion fatigue to be able to provide healthy, compassionate care to the patients they serve. The purpose of this presentation is to define compassion fatigue and burnout, discuss symptoms of compassion fatigue and burnout, illustrate approaches of the caregiver/provider when dealing with compassion fatigue and burnout, and identify approaches for managing compassion fatigue and burnout.

Breakout Leader

Trauma Informed Leadership

Trauma-Informed Leadership equips healthcare leaders to create safe, supportive workplaces by recognizing the impact of trauma on staff and/or patients. This presentation covers core principles—safety, trust, collaboration, empowerment, and cultural awareness—while offering practical strategies to reduce burnout, strengthen communication, and foster resilience. Leaders learn how to model empathy, respond to stress effectively, and build organizational systems that promote well-being, teamwork and high-quality care.

Breakout Leader

Rooted in the Senses: A Sensory Practice in Noticing, Tolerance, and Choice

This experiential space offers a beginning taste of tuning into subtle nervous system shifts. Rather than teaching techniques to change your state, the room invites curiosity about how your body automatically responds to different stimuli — and how you typically manage those responses.

Through simple sensory stations and brief reflection prompts, participants observe patterns of activation and settling in real time. The focus is not on fixing, but on noticing.

Participants will leave with a clearer understanding of what it means to attune to their whole experience by intentionally allowing and honoring sensory information as foundational — not secondary — to thoughts and emotions. This room offers a beginning step in learning to listen to the body’s signals and how they shape perception, response, and meaning.