Keynotes and Invited Speakers

Dr. Ken Paller is Professor of Psychology and Director of the Cognitive Neuroscience Program at Northwestern University, where he holds the James Padilla Chair in Arts & Sciences. He received a Director’s Pioneer Award from NIH in 2024. He is Associate Director of the Training Program in the Neuroscience of Human Cognition, which is funded by NIH/NINDS and charged with training the next generation of cognitive neuroscientists.

His research focuses on the human mind and the intricate relationships between brain activity and conscious experience. He seeks to uncover how memories are formed, stored, and later re-experienced — sometimes unconsciously influencing our thoughts and actions. His lab group developed new methods to strategically influence the mind during sleep, which in turn can improve many aspects of the waking mind, including memory, creativity, and psychological well-being. He also collaborates with Tibetan Monastic Scholars in research on sleep and dreaming. His hope is that scientific research can reveal additional ways to harness the sleeping mind to improve people’s lives.

 Loma K. Flowers, MD

Dr. Flowers earned her medical degree from the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine. She is actively engaged in education, serving as a voluntary Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at UCSF, where she has been honored with esteemed teaching accolades. Her extensive clinical background is centered on exploring the intricate interplay between individuality and universality. In 1971, she authored “Psychotherapy: Black and White,” a groundbreaking work that anticipated the importance of cultural competence in mental health practice.

Dr. Flowers’ professional interests coalesced in 1994 with the development of an emotional competence curriculum. This initiative aimed to support low-income, high-potential, but underperforming high school students, as well as faculty and parents. Recognizing the transformative potential of emotional competence, she established the nonprofit organization Equilibrium Dynamics (EQD) in 2005. Through EQD, Dr. Flowers endeavors to disseminate essential principles, concepts, and practices related to emotional competence while training a new generation of specialists in the field. Notably, she holds the distinction of being an APA Distinguished Life Fellow and was honored as the recipient of the 2019 Solomon Carter Fuller Award.

Diane Hennacy, MD

Dr. Diane Hennacy is a practicing psychiatrist with over four decades of experience in medicine, neurology, and psychiatry. After earning her medical degree in 1983, she completed her postdoctoral training at Johns Hopkins, where she began her lifelong investigation into autism alongside Sir Michael Rutter. Renowned as an expert on autism and savant syndrome, Dr. Hennacy has witnessed and studied the dramatic rise in autism diagnoses—an increase of up to 20,000 percent in certain populations since she began her work thirty years ago. Voted one of San Diego’s fifty-five most influential people by First Thursday in 1992, she is also an award-winning clinician, author, and public speaker who has presented everywhere from international scientific conferences to mainstream media outlets, including Dr. Phil. Now retired from active practice as of early 2024, Dr. Hennacy continues to pursue independent research focused on the neuroscience of extraordinary states of consciousness and anomalous human experiences.

Invited Speakers

William G. Domhoff, PhD

Interweaving Dreams, Sleep, and Consciousness: A New Synthesis

G. William Domhoff is a Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He is the author of The Neurocognitive Theory of Dreaming (2022), which won the American Association of Publishers; 2023 Prose Award for the best book relevant to Clinical Psychology and Psychiatry, and Dreams, Sleep, and Consciousness: Interweaving the Neurocognitive Theory of Dreaming with a New Theory of Sleep and a New Theory of Consciousness (2026).

This talk weaves together the neurocognitive theory of dreaming, the adaptive inactivity theory of sleep, and the multistate hierarchical model of consciousness. These recent theories were developed separately and independently by three psychologically trained empirical researchers, who did not construct their theories until late in their careers. All three theories build on a combination of neuroimaging, lesion, and developmental studies, which led to many unexpected findings and conclusions.

Claire Johnson, PhD

Lucid Dream Healing: Somatic Simulation & the Joy Factor

Dr. Johnson presents a road map of psychological and physical lucid dream healing, integrating sleep science and clinical findings with original techniques built on her doctoral research. Drawing on her Prana Dream Body Hypothesis (2017), she proposes a multi-sensory kinesthetic simulation model of how lucid dreams may support physical healing. Johnson references work with paraplegic clients and injured athletes to illustrate both the boundaries and successes of this approach.  

Johnson illuminates the mechanisms of psychological lucid dream healing and explores how lucid interventions can support PTSD trauma resolution, grief processing, and broader mental health. She emphasises the “joy factor” – how euphoric lucid states replenish the dreamer, creating an optimal mindset for transformation and healing.

Dr. Clare Johnson is an internationally known lucid dream pioneer. Former President of the International Association for the Study of Dreams, in 2006 she became the first person in the world to do a PhD on lucid dreaming as a creative tool. Her eight books include The Complete Book of Lucid Dreaming, The Art of Transforming Nightmares, Dream Therapy, and Elixir of Sleep. Clare offers ocean retreats in Hawaii and Portugal to help people unlock the genius of their sleeping intelligence. She runs a successful online school offering video classes, live workshops, and guided lucid dream meditations, and she hosts the Sleep & Deep Lucid Dreaming podcast. www.DeepLucidDreaming.com