At this time, it is my pleasure to introduce our 2024 keynote speaker, Eric Wall. Our next speaker is a graffiti artist who made big waves on the international lecture circuit by challenging organizations to break free from business as usual. His breakthrough thinking has earned praise from the likes of top influencers in both art and business. Eric's book, The Spark of the Grind, explores the essential components of igniting ideas into disciplined action. The book launched a CEO Reads bestseller list within the first week of publication. And his number one bestselling book and CEO Read of the Year, Unthink, has been hailed as the blueprint for leveraging creativity to achieve superior levels of performance. Eric consults regularly as a business strategist for the largest corporations in the world, including Disney, Microsoft, FedEx. He's also a TED Talk guest lecturer on TED Talk and at the prestigious London School of Business. His sought-after artwork has raised millions of dollars for charity and can be seen hanging prominently in executive offices all over the world. Please help me welcome and recognize artist, creativity scientist, and business strategist, Eric Wall. Thanks, sir. This is super fun for me. I'll actually get to the keynote in just a second. But I just wanted to let you guys know, sincerely, I've had this date circled on my calendar since October of last year. I've been looking forward to it for a couple of reasons, the first of which is I'm from here in San Diego. This is my hometown. I love when I get to do local shows and it doesn't get any more local than this. The second reason, and maybe this is more of a confessional, several years ago I did some work with an organization called the American Society of Anesthesiologists. I know, I'm sorry. I was young. I was naive. I needed the money. I didn't yet know about their inflated egos, but I actually, my father prior to his passing away a couple of years ago was a practicing physician up in the Pacific Northwest. So I grew up with a dad, with a leader who had built his practice around bedside care and he, like all of you, had dedicated his entire life, his work, to giving back and to providing quality care for those in need, regardless of their ability to pay. So in saying that, if nothing else from this morning or this afternoon's keynote experience, I just want to re-remind all of you of the heroism of the work that you're doing and that it matters. You are giving patients and their families their lives back. You're changing lives. But it maybe begs the question, you know, what is the connection between science and art? Maybe even, you know, further back, you know, what is the purpose of art? And I ask that not rhetorically or metaphorically, but naturally, curiously, what do we say is the purpose of art? Because I would suggest that the purpose of art, it's actually not to produce a finished product. Rather, the purpose of art is to produce thinking, dynamic thinking, game-changing thinking, the kind of thinking that wakes up our mind, shakes up our brain cells to be able to unlock intellectual curiosity. And that's really why I am here, because intellectual curiosity is the porthole to higher dimensions of critical thinking and complex problem solving. So I do, as we're looking to connect, to advance, and to discover, I do, I want to talk about innovation. I want to talk about automation, and continuing education for nurse accreditation, and globalization and mobilization, hospitalization, risk mitigation, and patient sedation for invasive operations, precise calculation for anesthetic medication, maybe a little creative exploration, maybe a little validation, Olympic validation of Simone Biles' domination, all amidst the backdrop of the escalation of inflation, interest rate manipulation, regional bank capitulation, JCO regulation. For some here, it's maybe some lingering frustration with supply chain constipation, or maybe greater personal frustration with physician altercation, with their condescending communication just gaslighting the situation, but I'm very well aware, it's not lost on me, that the only thing now standing between you and your favorite cocktail libation at tonight's party with a purpose celebration is me and this presentation. So without any further obfuscation, it's a word, Google it, without any further obfuscation, let's awaken the fascination of our imagination, because today, it's a beautiful day to party on the USS Midway. 🎵 Music 🎵 🎵 The heart is aglow, shoots up through a stony ground, there's no room, no space to hide, when in this town, you're out of luck, and the reason that you had to care, the traffic is stuck, and you're not moving anywhere, you thought you found a friend, to take you out of this place, someone you could lend a hand, in return for grace, it's a beautiful day, sky falls, you feel like it's a beautiful day, till you're licking away, on the road, she's got no destination, in her mind, in a maze of her imagination, we love you in style, even if that doesn't ring true, you've been all over, and it's been all over you, it's a beautiful day, till you're licking away, it's a beautiful day, touch me, take me to that other place, see the tuna fleets, clearing the sea out, fires at night, see the oil fields at first light, and see the birds with a leaf in their mouth, back to the floor, all the colors came out, it's a beautiful day, till you're licking away, it's a beautiful day, touch me, take me to that other place, release me from my hopeless place, what you don't have, you don't need it now, what you don't know, you can feel it somehow, what you don't have, you don't need it now, don't need it now, it's a beautiful day, so we wanted to open with something just a little bit different, but actually it's a little more interactive type of a keynote, you can see I've actually got a few more brushes, a couple more canvases, so I just want to see if I quick show of hands, who here can draw? Okay, I too am a numbers guy based on empirical evidence, I just say eyeballing it, it was a little less than half of you said you could draw, but actually don't feel bad, I ask that question of every audience that I speak to, regardless whether it is financial services, HR, IT, healthcare, educators, I will rarely, if even once, get a single brave soul that's going to raise their hand and say they can in fact draw, but if I were to go down to your high schools, secondary school, anywhere throughout the country, really anywhere throughout the world, so students ages 13 to 17, I would ask them who can draw statistically, I'm going to get between almost 8 to 10 percent of those students who can say that they can in fact draw, but if I were to go down to your preschools, any preschool, anywhere through the entire country, I would say hey kids, who here can draw? What's the response that I'm going to get? 100 percent of the time these kids are practically bursting at the seams just dying to share with me their creative energy. At what age, Ben, do you think that creative river that once did flow so freely and effortlessly through each and every one of us, at what age do you think it started to kind of dry up? Yeah, young, early. Pablo Picasso said, you know, every child is an artist. The challenge will be how to remain an artist once we grow up, how to retain that childlike passion, that childlike ability to differentiate and creatively solve challenges, then ultimately plug it back in to our professional lives, back into that process of clinical excellence, patient safety, and quality. So I wanted to do things a little bit different here, and contrary to what my fourth grade teacher, Ms. Williams, taught me, I actually do encourage in-classroom daydreaming. If you'd like, you're even doodling, drawing, texting, tip-talking over the course of this presentation here. Did anyone by chance bring with them to this afternoon's general session their box of Crayolas? You guys remember these bad boys, that box of 64 with the sharpener in the back? Yes. So when I'm brainstorming with various different groups, I actually request that all meeting notes are taken using Crayola, because at that point, in going in search of that which has not yet been invented, I'm not looking for the most operationally efficient form of a writing implement, but I'm looking to go in search of those bold, new, courageous type ideas that historically I found Crayola has that better chance to foster. Incidentally, a study at Yale University has shown that Crayola is one of the top 20 most recognizable smells in the adult human experience, except that it's what, dill pickles? Or morning coffee? It's even shown that the smell alone of Crayola has been proven to reduce blood pressure in adults downwards 10 points. So if you've ever had any particular personal frustration, you just finished a grueling 18-hour workday, and the next shift is a no-show, go ahead and pull out your box of crayons and take a drag. See if that doesn't ease our frazzled nerves for just a bit. I could actually teach anyone to to draw, because drawing is a learned skill, exactly like reading or writing or arithmetic, yet because virtually every facet of our industrial factory educational system, even oftentimes after a hierarchical structure, is set up to reward only analytical, logical, rational thinking. That's been those creative ideas, those ideas as adults by which we're able to master complexity, those ideas as adults by which we're able to navigate ambiguity in an increasingly social, mobile, and cloud environment, increasingly technologically literate, increasingly artificially intelligent. Those skills have almost simply attributed over time, but certainly of course painting or drawing, that's not the ultimate goal, that's not itself going to create breakthrough opportunities for you or your practice or your hospital, but I think it is through activities like drawing, traveling, discovering new organizations, new cultures, new ideas that we're able to tap into that creative side of our mind, because it's actually only through tapping into the creative side of our mind that we are going to come up with new and holistic ways around patient-centered progress that we haven't explored yet today. So it's actually operating as health care as unusual, business as unusual, and to help get us out of that mindset, I want to do kind of a thought leader exercise. There's a television show is hosted by a gentleman by the name of Joe Rogan. The title of that show is actually called Fear Factor. Now for those of you who aren't familiar with this show, or you know of course in a professional setting like this, would not admit to being familiar with the show. I'll give you kind of the cliff notes version of what it was, but in an effort to challenge these individuals to break outside of their comfort zone and have them perform is just simply outrageous different stunts. Sometimes eat or consume some very challenging food items, and sometimes even do it in front of a live studio audience. Yeah, so is it down there? Yeah, what I'm going to need here is a volunteer. Thank you, sir. Welcome to the to the presentation. You were just helping out. You're being helping. Hey, listen, can I get your name real quick? Mark. You all saw what Mark did there, right? Yeah, the ball was lost. He stood up. He went and grabbed it to be helpful, and now you're sitting here in front of all of your friends at this year's Annual Conference. Come right over here, Mark. Where are you from? I'm from Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Mark in the hizzy. Mark, is it fair to say that technology for CRNAs has changed a bit in the last 10, 15 years? Yeah, I would say so. Even the technological changes in all the business in the last 10, 15 years? Yeah. And your heart rate in the last 10, 15 seconds? Probably, yeah. Okay. Thank you. What I've got here is a set of fear factor instructions that my new friend from Sioux Falls, South Dakota, Mark, is going to go up on stage and to perform in front of all of his friends here to open up this year's Congress. So, hey, and that's... You guys are very generous, and Mark and I are both very appreciative of your enthusiasm because I'm actually going to do something I don't normally do. And now I'm going to allow you, Mark, if you would like, to be the leader of this exercise. And if you would like, you may now delegate or select anyone else in the room that you think might be fun to hop on stage to perform that set of instructions. So, everyone's kind of noticed the program's taking a little bit of an interesting dynamic turn here. Mark, yeah, a smile has crept across your face as blood's returning to your faculties. You're getting a little bit of your swagger back. And if you also notice, those who just moments ago were enthusiastically rooting you onto the stage have all of a sudden quieted up, starting staring down at their shoes, trying not to make eye contact. It's fine. I actually call that its own form of risk management. But, Mark, is there someone who you've got in mind that you'd like to see hop up on stage and perform that set of instructions? I'm sure. Let's see. Let's go with our president, Drew Riddle. Let's do it. Drew Riddle. I applaud the boldness of that move right there. Where is... He might even be backstage. Did he already duck out? Hey, does anyone have a Drew that has crawled under the table trying not to be noticed? Should I give Drew an out here? Oh, there he is. Drew, you are a great sport. Thank you very much. Would you all do me a favor and give Mark a big round of applause? Your work here is done, my friend. That'll be dry and waiting for the end of the presentation. Drew, you're the man. Come on up here for just a moment. Are you familiar with the show Fear Factor? You are a little bit. Okay, do you have any experience doing freestyle rap? No, but I feel like this is going to be a great opportunity. Okay, look at this guy. He's a baller. Drew, where's home for you? Fort Worth, Texas. Fort Worth, Texas. Fantastic. So I'm going to hand this envelope over to Drew, and you're going to open this and form that set of instructions that are open there. And just go ahead and open that up and read that aloud. I'm just going to step slightly out of harm's way. The painting of Bono is yours to keep. Congratulations. Y'all, you can ask Mark later. That was not planned, and we went with the program and selected our president, so thank you, Drew, for coming up here and braving that in front of all of your peers, but sometimes it does pay to take a risk. So that will be dry and waiting for you at the end of the presentation. You're welcome to do whatever you like with that. Just as an entrepreneur and even as an artist on this value proposition, I've always been curious where value is generated from. Why some art is worth so much, really most art really isn't worth all that much, so I would just be curious here, Drew. I've got a hundred bucks that I'm willing to trade you. So I get the Bono painting back, but you get the hundred. You're going to keep the painting? Okay. Would you do me a favor and give this to our mutual friend, Mark, as a thank you for participating in our little freestyle experiment? Enjoy that artwork, Drew. Thanks for being my brave. That was epic. Mark, thank you. Drew, thank you. Sometimes it pays to take a risk, to take ownership and take action on an idea, because if we were to follow the trail of breadcrumbs from almost any unmet goal, any unmet expectation would almost always lead back to fear in one way, shape, or form that of fear. And I am a disruptive strategist. That's what I do for a living, both as an artist as well as an entrepreneur, is look for ways to defamiliarize the ordinary to create breakthrough pockets of innovation or opportunity. So one of the things that I did several years ago is I stopped selling all of my art. So I don't make any of it available anywhere. I don't sell it online. I don't do shows in galleries. I don't do commission pieces. To see if there's a way that I could disrupt even those traditional laws of supply and demand. So discontinued all supply to the marketplace, but continued to escalate or raise demand through various different performances that I would do for foundations or for charitable causes to see if there's a way that I could shift that notion of art from simply being a noun, you know, something that hangs dormant inside of our libraries or offices or museums, and kind of encourage it into being an active verb or something that maybe in some way would have the opportunity, the ability to lessen the suffering of the world. Well, I was doing a performance in Los Angeles for a foundation to end domestic violence. That night I was doing a performance painting of Marilyn Monroe. And a young gal named Alicia Moore ended up outbidding everyone else to take home that particular painting, which wouldn't normally be that big of a deal other than the fact that she also is celebrity rock star pink. In front of the global paparazzi, immediately and disruptively escalating the value of every single one of my pieces of artwork across the board overnight in one simple tweet. Back then it was called a tweet. I actually didn't sign off on the name change, so I still call it Twitter and tweets, but disrupted the entire economy for the value of my art. So, you know, I don't know for sure whether Drew is a fan of street art or graffiti or even a fan of U2 or Bono himself, but that's no longer really the relevant financial question. The question for you, Drew, now as the sole owner of this particular asset for its time here in San Diego, or of course its extended time on eBay, is Drew going to be an art collector or an art broker? So have some fun with it, Drew, that is yours to keep and decide whatever you'd like to do with it is yours. But sometimes it does pay to take a risk. Now, I had the chance to chat with Drew prior to coming up. We actually had several chats on as we were setting up this year's program and I was writing the show. And I know that Drew is a practical guy and like me, you know, he's thinking cool, new artwork. How am I going to fit that in the overhead bin on my flight back to Dallas? And I took that into consideration as well. I ship all of my artwork just in these cardboard boxes wherever I'm performing around the world. So I wanted to give Drew a safe vessel by which to ship that home and then he can decide for himself at what point is it on that spectrum of value creation? Is maybe one person's trash possibly another person's treasure? So, Drew, this is yours to keep and have some fun with your FedEx delivery man on the way home. But sometimes it does pay to take a risk, to take ownership, take action on an idea. And really if we were to follow that trail of breadcrumbs from any unmet goal, any unmet opportunity, almost always in some way, shape or form, trail back to that of fear, fear of the unknown. I saw this acronym years ago. What does fear oftentimes represent? Really nothing more than in so many cases false evidence appearing real. Anxiety, worry, concern over those things which in so many cases we don't have any business concern ourselves with in the first place. We allow these fears to paralyze that creative thought process. And truly more than anything else in the future leadership of our country, in the future leadership within nursing and the healthcare system, I think it's going to be fear that cripples that performance. Because truly at what point, what is a creative idea worth? What is the ROI on a truly holistic, how do we solve those challenges from a truly human perspective? Not just an artificially intelligent perspective, not just simply a technological perspective. And you know, what is the value of expanding even our own personal definition of risk beyond the structured approach to minimizing liability and to begin looking at the risk even associated with being too structured along the way. As I've been preparing for this show in a lot of ways in my preparation, my homework, my DD, I come up and do a lot of different writings and paintings along the way to get familiar. And every time I sat down to write this presentation, it led me back to the mother of nursing, the lady with the lamp. And I know I just had given that one piece of artwork away to true one to give this back to AANA as a thank you for the opportunity to perform. Maybe they can auction this off for charitable cause later on. She truly was that embodiment in her effort to let patients feel cared above and beyond what was done during the day. She would walk around with a light at night, letting these soldiers know that they were being cared for, that they were being loved, that their service mattered. That was over a decade ago, not quite a decade ago. Almost a decade ago, she led that fight forward to empower nurses to take that opportunity to step forward as a leader, not just a follower. And Albert Einstein said that imagination is even more important than knowledge. And that's not to discredit knowledge or experience. They're gonna play a critical role on the future operational efficiencies and what it takes to bring best practices to healthcare for the best patient outcome. But I think it's through that practice of analytics and knowledge can end up being actually two of the single greatest factors that ultimately hold our patients and the system back. You guys know that the way our mind is set up, the way it's designed is we've got this analytical, logical, rational problem-solving space of our mind. We've also got this intuitive kind of emotional, vulnerable, risk-taking problem-solving space of our mind. Yet, particularly in the Western hemisphere here as adults, as professionals, we actually exist in that analytical, logical, rational problem-solving space. The vast majority of our adult waking life were naturally resistant to venturing out. And just sometimes it can feel like that uncharted, vulnerable, authentic risk-taking portion of our mind. But I also hold to the fact it's not our fault as adults or as professionals or even as parents because for the most part, we were all taught and trained and programmed and disciplined from the time that we first entered school to be logical, to take all those wonderful, different, cool, multidimensional type ideas and solutions and then trained to narrow them down. Which is one standardized answer. One proper solution that everyone else sitting in straight, well-behaved line rows also came up with just one singular solution. And that got a little worse as we became adults, entered positions of responsibility or leadership. Because on top of that, we were taught to become increasingly risk-averse. Increasingly operationally efficient. And a lot of which is simply increasingly busy. So I've been increasingly vocal as I've been sharing this part of my message with the healthcare organizations that I've had the privilege to share with because it has created a life of paradox. We talk about innovation and best practices and continuous learning. But when it comes time to making a big decision, we oftentimes revert right back to what has historical precedent. What has been proven by the analytics or by the numbers. Now, I also wanted to pause here to impress upon you that it is not at the expense of analytics or logic that we're gonna pursue innovation, creativity, or holistic best practices. Because those elements, they're absolutely necessary. All of that logic, all of that data is completely necessary. Yet, I would also suggest that it's no longer sufficient. No longer sufficient as we move towards an artificially intelligent future. Where really anything that can be automated will indeed become automated. Artificial intelligence is accelerating at an exponential rate. And those artificial intelligence is going to continue to disrupt, distort, and dehumanize our perception of reality. A lot of the question, the single biggest question in tech circles in Silicon Valley right now is are we going to harness and regulate AI? Or is it too late and open generative AI is going to obsolete us? Now, it becomes a little bit of an existential dilemma there, but we can't solve problems from a place of fear. We must be resolved to solve them from a place of hope. Albert Einstein also said that problems can't be solved at the same level of consciousness that created them. And it truly has created a breakthrough opportunity here. Where the future, the remote control to the future now we can hold in the palm of our hands. The degrees and academics that we all worked so hard to pursue aren't worth as much as they used to be. And that's okay, the future's going to be different. How do we use AI to be human powered? Augmented by artificial intelligence, but it is still a human powered solution to healthcare holistic system. How do we use those capabilities around us? Which is why I think the number one most important meta skill to pick up in healthcare today, right now, starting in every school, in every classroom, everywhere around the world, regardless what grade, it's important in school, it's important now for adults. And that meta skill is mental flexibility. Mental agility, to be able to let go of that singular one right answer that we pursued to get to this point. And now use that collaborative scale of all sorts of different ways to be able to solve challenges. Not just simply the one right answer, to have the courage, to be able to have the resiliency, to hold and understand that one right answer, but then to explore all the different answers that might come in and around that, that could also be used to answer that question. And my presentation, it's very loosely titled the art of vision in healthcare, but truly that art, it is couched firmly in the science of reprogramming our mind, the science and the discipline of intentionally slowing down, looking at all the artificial intelligence, looking at all the data, looking at all of the challenge that are currently put into, that have been landed within the healthcare community. Now, looking for ways to build back into that equation and emotional human connection, it's gonna drive future healthy outcomes. ♪ And the blood will dry underneath my nails ♪ ♪ And the wind will rise up to fill my sails ♪ ♪ So you can doubt and you can hate ♪ ♪ But I know no matter what it takes ♪ ♪ I'm coming home, I'm coming home ♪ ♪ Tell the world I'm coming home ♪ ♪ Let the rain wash away all the pain of yesterday ♪ ♪ I know my kingdom awaits and they've forgiven my mistakes ♪ ♪ I'm coming home, I'm coming home ♪ ♪ Tell the world I'm coming home, still far away ♪ ♪ From where I belong, it's always darkest before the dawn ♪ ♪ So you can doubt and you can hate ♪ ♪ But I know no matter what it takes ♪ ♪ I'm coming home, I'm coming home ♪ ♪ Tell the world I'm coming home ♪ ♪ Let the rain wash away all the pain of yesterday ♪ ♪ I know my kingdom awaits and they've forgiven my mistakes ♪ ♪ I'm coming home, I'm coming home ♪ ♪ Tell the world I'm coming, I'm coming home, I'm coming home ♪ All the pain of yesterday, I know my kingdom awaits. And they've forgiven my mistakes. I'm coming home. I'm coming home. Tell the world I'm coming home. If it weren't, if it weren't, if it weren't for the brave sacrifice that our men and women in uniform haven't already made, presentations like mine on the art of healthcare, presentations like mine on innovation or creativity really even wouldn't be possible. So just with the debt of gratitude that I perform this second painting, but I would just be curious, in a room this size, how many of you have served or are serving in the armed forces or have a loved one that is currently serving in the armed forces? Would you do me a favor and just go ahead and stand up? Thank you. From the bottom of all of our hearts, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for even the opportunity to be an artist at all, to have this opportunity to share with that debt of gratitude that I perform that second painting. One of the things that you might find somewhat curious about me is that I've not always been an artist. In fact, I just started painting for the first time in my life after I turned 30 years old. I knew as a kid, I knew as a kid that I loved painting and drawing and coloring. But unfortunately, I was told by my fourth-grade school teacher, Ms. Williams, that I wasn't that strong of an artist because I didn't color within the lines, because I went too fast, because I didn't, you know, Eric, slow down, pay attention to detail, because I didn't draw the red apple red or the orange pumpkin orange, and so I quit. When I sit down with my crayons and brushes, and I didn't really begin not once for another 20 years, and as I went through that very systematic process, I think wrongly what we still call excellence in education, I did, I got pretty good. I got pretty streamlined on figuring out how to punch out those grades. I became very operationally efficient on figuring out how to just really simply memorize those very homogenous formulas and then to retain that information just long enough so that I could regurgitate it back to my teachers and then my professors. But along the way, I became almost an impenetrable facade of no-nonsense business-like seriousness. I didn't have time for stuff like the arts. I didn't certainly have time for whimsical notions like creativity, because for me, if it didn't have a direct ROI for me to get a better letter grade, a better advanced degree, a better promotion, or a better paycheck, I didn't have a lot of interest in it. So it wasn't until a series of events that happened in my own life, both personally as well as professionally, that my business, the one that I'd worked so hard pouring myself into with great work ethic instilled in me by my father, who was a service member and also a physician, first in, last out, fall seven times, get up eight. But I was blindsided because all of a sudden, unexpectedly from nowhere, all of a sudden, my business spun out into financial free fall. I was wrecked. It made me physically nauseous because everything that had been trained and programmed into my hard drive from the time that I was little about what it meant to be successful, what it meant to do or be, or even define myself as a man, I felt like it was taken from me. I think looking back in retrospect, probably what disgusts me the most is somehow somewhere along the way that system of regulation and compliance is I allowed my self-worth to be directly tied to my net worth. And as one evaporated, so did two go the other. I was completely lost, wrestling with this nightmare of a paradigm. And a friend of mine who was a behavioral psychologist was at first just kind of observing me from a safe distance. How does this subject deal with loss? What is his resiliency equation? Until he got scared and he broke protocol and intervened and said, buddy, Eric said, you've got to disconnect from this, if even only for a moment, if not for my own health and safety, then certainly for the health and safety of my family. He said, you've got to disconnect from this downward death spiral. And so he recommended that I go and that I travel, or at least that I do something as a cathartic release to break this downward spiral that I was trapped in. You know, maybe even something that I did as a kid, like painting or drawing. But I just lost everything that I had. I didn't have any disposable income by which to go and to travel and bravely refine myself. So it was probably by my own personal financial default, maybe nothing else, to just placate him and get him off my back that I reluctantly went and bought a brush and some paint, went into my backyard and went through the motions of physically putting paint on canvas. But it was at that point, of physically putting paint on canvas, that all of a sudden the right side of my mind, that side that had been intentionally repressed, intentionally held dormant or trapped or suffocated by logic, all of a sudden began to creep open a little bit. Again, I began to see a lot of these challenges that were taking place in my life from a little different perspective. I even began to see a lot of those formulas that I'd worked so hard to memorize in business school, I began to see them from a little different perspective. That's really where this presentation was born from. Certainly, please don't mistake this as a battle cry for you to quit your positions as CRNAs and grow your hair long and start splashing paint around the world. Frankly, I don't need the competition. But what it is, is a re-reminder of that concept of breakthrough thinking, that concept of connecting with patients on a human level, that concept of creativity itself. I think it's been wrongly diagnosed in adults as being a genetic trait that we either were born with or without. Now, what I've learned, what I've not only researched and written about, but also experienced real time in my own life, is that it is a practice and discipline skill that every single one of us in this room has access by, which to be able to tap into, not just simply tap into, but to plug back into your healthcare system, back into your hospital, back into your private, independent contractor, entrepreneurial business, back into maybe your communities, and maybe even back into your own family. So the question's really no longer, when I got opened up in jest, who here can draw? I think the question now is actually how. How are we gonna reawaken that intellectual curiosity? How are we gonna reawaken our own beginner's mind, that curious mindset to look at the future of AI, generative AI, open AI, technology, and to plug it back into your system, but to also know that the competitive advantage, as everyone's moving towards automation, is we've got that increased human connection coming from the back. I wanna be clear on creativity and context. If this afternoon, later this evening, I am the unfortunate recipient of a heart attack, and I'm brought into the local San Diego hospital, and I'm in the ER, and my surgeon comes walking in the room, I don't want that to be the time that she comes up with new and different, cool, creative ideas that she has to open me up and to anesthetize me. I want her to use the same practice that she's done thousands of times before in helping me back to health. But as we understand creativity and context, before you cross that threshold into the patient's room, you take all of these different ideas and solutions and opportunities and technology, and certainly that human connection, and you devise that game plan collectively with all levels of the hospital. Communication with the anesthesiologist, communication with the administration, communication with the chief nursing staff, and all the staff that are going to be taking care of this one individual patient, and you solidify that game plan, and then you're freed up to be able to engage with that patient and to make that contact with them that you care, and you're giving them your unconditional love, your unconditional care that you've got their back. You're gonna do everything in your power to bring this to fruition, to make them healthy again. With their family members, that same kind of authentic human connection. As things become more automated, there's more opportunity to stand out in those opportunities, and to be able to connect that humanity back into holistic care. Outside exploration, inside execution and discipline. That's really the secret sauce to innovation. And the interesting paradox is that it is actually structure that creates freedom. It's freedom by design. Our ability to have that blueprint so dialed, so locked in, that we can take all kinds of different opportunities, which is solve questions around that, and then return back to that execution. Out into expanded consciousness, and then contract back into execution, and back out into expanded consciousness, and then back into execution. And as we're talking about complex ideas like challenging the status quo in healthcare, challenging the hierarchical process, I think it would also be important for me to let you know that I am also a father. I am a dad to three alpha dog young men that my wife of 30 years and I, we have learned a lot about discipline. We've learned a lot about accountability, and being young men of consequence, young men of action. Because we do, as the leader of our family, my wife and I collectively together, the leader of our tribe is we do, we want to continually breathe fresh life into them. We want them to expand their consciousness, and to truly think and believe that they can become anything that they want. We want them to be dreamers. But at the exact same time, in that exact same sentence, we want them to be young men of consequence, young men of discipline, young men of action. We want them to be doers. And therein lies the opportunity, the yin yang of success. Not either or, but rather yes and. To have that ability to become the dreamer that does, the two coming together. Because really, creativity without discipline, it's like a river without banks. We need to have that structure, that actual data by which to be able to execute again and again, expand out into possibility, into the holistic human care experience, and then contract back into execution, back into precision, back into flawless details on what it takes to bring that patient to health, and then communicate with their family in an authentic human way. Again, outside of technology altogether. You have their back. You're here on their behalf, unconditionally going forward. That human connection. And for me, if any of you have gone through a tough time, struggled in darkness with insecurity or shame, if you have friends or family, maybe, that are struggling with something similar, with their own mental or behavioral health, I hope you, I hope they have a support system like I had. For me, it came in the form of my wife of 30 years, Tasha. And as you've been brave and shared your authentic self with me, in the spirit of human connection, I also wanted to share with you, my wife of the last 30 years. This is Tasha, who... It was never just me. It was never just me. For anyone who has been married for any period of time, you know that suffering doesn't happen in a vacuum. When one person suffers, you both suffer. And as I had lost myself, if it wasn't for Tasha's nurturing me back to health, her belief in me more than I believed in myself, helped me fight my demons of self-doubt, my insecurities, my shame. If I didn't have that kind of support, I wouldn't be here today. And so we changed TAC and we changed our definition of success. And it went from financial security and 401ks and our kids' college education. It came back into this idea that if we can have a good meal at the end of the day with our family, that was our new definition of success. That's where we started to rebuild back out. And that's where this message was born from. We've crafted it together. We've built it together. We've been a team together. And for me not to recognize her wouldn't be appropriate. So this is my wife of the last 30 years who's nursed me back to health. She's my best critic, my biggest fan. And I know because we crafted this together, I know she wanted to also express her gratitude for you and for taking a risk on someone like us. Thank you. I just want, thank you. I want to just, this is one of our favorite audiences to be able to speak to is healthcare. And for me, particularly nurses, we have been through some really rough things as the majority of humanity has been. But Eric had to have back surgery about seven years ago and it was really scary. But the nurses were my humanity. They held my hand for every single one of the birth of our boys. I remember those communications with that nurse that was in the room. That was the person that could calm me down. That was the person that kept me feeling safe inside my own skin, safe, handing Eric off before he had surgery. We've, with three boys, we've had a number of hospital visits. I'm sure you can imagine. And Harley, our youngest, is here today. Thanks for coming, babe. He had a pretty bad tib-fib break when he was younger. And again, the nurses were who helped me get by. And I just am so grateful to you guys. And I, probably the nurses that were in those rooms aren't here, but I'm standing here as a patient to be the voices of your patients, saying thank you for the times that you stop and you take the time to hold hands, to be personal, to be human, to make a difference. It matters so much and I'm grateful. So I wanted to say thank you to the nurses that were able to care for my family that came alongside us when Eric's dad was passing away, that sat with me and cried, that held my hand. Thank you so much. And thank you also to AANA for having us come. We are a very different kind of speaker and they took a risk on us. And I'm just super grateful for the opportunity to be here and speaking in our hometown. So thank you guys so much. Thank you. We also have some of our friends who are currently at the prestigious UCSD School of Medicine studying to become doctors. I invited them here today, not for them to come see me or us, but rather for them to see you as future physicians in whatever practice they enter, that it is a team. It's a collaboration. It is a unit that comes together successfully. Physicians and nurses and hospital administration and then the parents and the family all rallying around together. Not one over the top of the other, but I wanted them to see and experience you firsthand, for them to watch you in the future that they have before them, to be collaborative, to be cooperative. And so I wanted to thank Suraj and Danny for coming, from taking a day off of med school to come and watch this show. I wanted to thank them, but that idea of imagination as being the starting point for breakthrough success in healthcare, breakthrough success for holistic practices, it means a lot to me because one of my personal heroes subscribed to that theory, and although he, in a lot of ways, was labeled and even disabled because he was really told flat out by the system and the structure around him that he wouldn't be successful, really couldn't be successful. He didn't think exactly the way everyone else thought. He didn't act the way that everyone else is really supposed to be acting. He went on to use that little bit of difference, that different way of seeing and experiencing the world to create extraordinary opportunities, simply by seeing the world through different eyes. Oh, where do we begin, the rubble or our sins? Oh, where do we begin, the rubble or our sins? And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we lost, The great clouds rolled away, the hills bringing darkness to us. But if you close your eyes, does it almost feel like nothing changed at all? And if you close your eyes, does it almost feel like you've been here before? How am I gonna be an optimist about this? How am I gonna be an optimist about this? If you close your eyes, does it almost feel like nothing changed at all? Arguably one of the greatest creative minds of the last century ended up saying this quote about innovation and creativity and breakthrough thinking meant to him. He said, creativity is really nothing more than seeing logically what the rest of the world around us physically sees with their eyes. See the increased automation, see the data challenges, see even those opportunities. But to think like no one has ever thought before, that's exactly what creativity and the future of healthcare, being a collaborative holistic care model going forward, to see what those around you see, see the future of AI, but to have the courage to take that vision, and like Albert Einstein did, to twist it, and ultimately unthink like no one has ever thought before. And I think that's the art of vision in healthcare. Thank you guys so much for the opportunity to be a part of your Congress, to be a part of your journey. On behalf of me, my family, my wife, my boys, namaste. We're very grateful. Have a great rest of your time here in San Diego.

Eric Wall

graffiti artist

creativity

healthcare

innovation

art and science

keynote speaker

live painting

professional practice