Recent research in neuroscience suggests that we can harness the brain's power to achieve optimal well-being and help others do the same. This highly interactive and fun skillshop will offer positive, powerful, productive, playful, and profound processes to: identify what brings you pleasure, what fully engages you, and what stimulates your purpose and passion in life. In a supportive atmosphere, you'll have a chance to build these health-giving forces into your life on a daily basis. You'll also have an opportunity to focus on the key concepts of healthy and effective caregiving- how to best support those for whom you care and how to keep yourself going for the long haul. You'll come away with a care package full of practical strategies for healthy living, compassionate caregiving, activating your sense of humor, building your HUMOResilience, tickling stress, and inviting HAHA (Healthy Aging Humorous Aging).

Margie Ingram, Co-Director of The HUMOR Project, is one of the pioneers in the fields of stress management and the humor-resilience connection. Margie is a popular speaker and workshop leader throughout the U.S. and abroad.

She is also a very successful life coach helping individuals and small groups to create fulfilling lives, move gracefully through life transitions, identify and build on personal and professional strengths, and overcome obstacles by optimizing optimism with a touch of humor.

Margie has been an educator for the past 44 years. A public school teacher from 1968-1975, she went on to supervise student teachers and teach grad courses at many colleges on effective teaching methods and developing effective classroom environments. Margie's speaking career, which began 39 years ago, grew out of her love of teaching. Her programs are lively, engaging, and practical as she creates opportunities for participants to apply the content to their immediate lives and jobs.

Margie has also served as coordinator of The HUMOR Project's international conferences for decades. She was honored with the Distinguished Service Award from the Reed Foundation and the Prevention Council as well as the Hometown Hero Award. In her spare time, Margie loves kayaking, walking, completing challenging puzzles, and spending time with family and good friends. She practices what she teaches about creating intentional balance in life.

Join this team-building guru for a full day of his very best, favorite, and newest team and community-building activities from around the world. This active workshop will share dozens of simple and powerful exercises that you can use, adapt, and apply in classrooms, meetings, and groups that you teach, lead, and facilitate. From painless icebreakers to large and small group activities, from leadership tips to creative debriefing techniques, this single workshop will share the best practices and a wide variety of activities that address such topics as: leadership, creative problem solving, communication, group building, trust, collaboration, and teamwork. This program will also include an introduction to one of the most unique team building tools, known as a Raccoon Circle- you'll learn how you can use this simple tool to lead over 200 activities- with only a single piece of rope.

Jim Cain, Ph.D., is the founder and creative force behind Teamwork & Teamplay. Through this active-learning company, Jim has delivered over 1500 presentations in 47 states and 23 countries in the past 15 years (including a team-building program for the NASA Lunar-Mars extended missions project). He is also the author of eight books (so far) on team and community-building activities- Teamwork & Teamplay received the Creativity Award presented by the Association for Experiential Education. With two Masters and a Doctorate in Mechanical Engineering, Jim also served as Senior Development Engineer at Eastman Kodak for 15 years. In addition to being a third-generation square dance caller and musician (guitar and mandolin), Jim also makes and throws boomerangs (and catches them, too!).

Have you ever wanted to perform stand-up comedy? Have you thought about it but don't think you have anything funny to say or don't know how to get started? Would you like to nurture your ability to create positive humor that you can add to your life, work and/or presentations? Are you up for surprising yourself with your ability to create and perform humor? If so, you've come to the light place! In this fun, participatory, outstanding stand-up workshop, you will learn: the "Rules" of comedy (Rule of 3, Rule of 9, IITWEIT), stand-up terminology and techniques, stand-up styles (e.g., one-liner, storytelling, observational), how to find and write your own humor, and more! Each participant will have time to write 1-2 minutes of material and (if you'd like) perform in front of a very warm and encouraging group... so that you can give the performance of a laughtime.

Andrew Tarvin is a corporate humorist, author, and comedian. As Chief Humorist of Humor That Works, Andrew has worked with many organizations on such topics as humor in the workplace, communication, relationships, problem-solving, productivity, strategic disengagement, and leadership. He also has had "day jobs" as Customer Solutions and Initiative Manager and Product Innovation Solutions Manager at a Fortune 25 corporation. In addition to performing stand-up (100+ shows in venues around the country) and improv comedy (300+ shows), Andrew loves drinking milkshakes and is obsessed with the color orange.

Improvisers make stuff up, collaboratively, on-the-spot with no pre-planning or knowledge of what will happen next. Sound familiar? In fact, this is what people do all the time, right? Who wakes up to find a script for the day on their bedside stand? In order to succeed at their daunting challenge, improvisers have developed philosophies and practical, powerful techniques that are applicable to any situation in which humans wish to interact creatively and collaboratively. Do you want to feel calmer? More powerful? More flexible? More popular? More understanding? More inventive? Improv may be the key to unleashing your untapped reserves of imagination, strength, and creativity. Find out how wonderful you can be in this highly-interactive, supportive, and way-fun workshop that will help you to integrate impactful improv skills and attitudes into every day of your life.

Kat Koppett is the eponymous founder of Koppett & Co., a training and consulting company specializing in the use of theatre and storytelling. Her book, Training to Imagine: Practical Improvisational Theatre Techniques to Enhance Creativity, Teamwork, Leadership and Learning is now in its second edition (jest in time for our conference). Kat has worked with corporations, teachers, administrators, doctors, engineers, lawyers, and young people everywhere from India, Brazil, and France to Oklahohohoma. With a Masters in Organizational Psychology from Columbia University, her areas of specialty include leadership and communication skills, creativity and innovation, teamwork and conflict resolution, and presentation coaching. Kat is also the Co-Director of the funtastic Mop & Bucket improv troupe. FYI... Kat makes a mean banana cream pie!