I’m a gamer, so I like to have goals. I special missions and secret objectives. So here’s my special mission for this talk: I’m to try to increase the life span of every single person in this room by seven and a minutes. Literally, you will live seven and a half minutes longer you would have otherwise, just because you watched this talk.
Some of are looking a little bit skeptical. That’s okay, because check it out — I have math to prove it is possible. It won’t make much sense now. I’ll explain it all later, just pay attention to number at the bottom: +7.68245837 minutes. That will be my to you if I’m successful in my mission.
Now, you have a mission too. Your mission is to figure out how you to spend your extra seven and a half minutes. And I think you should something unusual with them, because these are bonus minutes. You weren’t going to have them anyway.
Now, I’m a game designer, you might be thinking to yourself, I know what she wants to do with those minutes, she wants us to spend them playing games. Now is a totally reasonable assumption, given that I have made quite a habit of encouraging to spend more time playing games. For example, in my first TED Talk, I did propose that should spend 21 billion hours a week, as a planet, playing video games.
Now, 21 billion hours, it’s a of time. It’s so much time, in fact, that the number unsolicited comment that I have heard from people all over world since I gave that talk, is this: Jane, are great and all, but on your deathbed, are really going to wish you spent more time playing Birds?
(Laughter)
This idea is so pervasive — that are a waste of time that we will come regret — that I hear it literally everywhere I go. For example, true story: Just a weeks ago, this cab driver, upon finding out that a and I were in town for a game developers’ conference, around and said — and I quote — “I games. Waste of life. Imagine getting to the end of life and regretting all that time.”
Now, I want take this problem seriously. I want games to be a for good in the world. I don’t want gamers to regret the time they spent playing, time that encouraged them to spend. So I have been thinking about this question a lot lately. When we’re our deathbeds, will we regret the time we spent playing games?
Now, this may you, but it turns out there is actually some scientific research this question. It’s true. Hospice workers, the people who take care of us the end of our lives, recently issued a report on the frequently expressed regrets that people say when they are literally on their deathbeds. And that’s what want to share with you today — the top regrets of the dying.
Number one: I wish I hadn’t worked so hard. Number two: I I had stayed in touch with my friends. Number three: I wish I let myself be happier. Number four: I wish I’d had the courage express my true self. And number five: I wish I’d a life true to my dreams, instead of what others of me.
Now, as far as I know, no one ever told one the hospice workers, “I wish I’d spent more time playing games,” but when I hear these top five regrets of the dying, I can’t but hear five deep human cravings that games actually help us fulfill.
For example, wish I hadn’t worked so hard. For many people, means, I wish I’d spent more time with my family, with my when they were growing up. Well, we know that games together has tremendous family benefits. A recent study from Brigham University School of Family Life reported that parents who spend time playing video games with their kids have much stronger real-life relationships with them.
“I wish I’d stayed touch with my friends.” Hundreds of millions of people use social games like or Words With Friends to stay in daily contact real-life friends and family. A recent study from the University Michigan showed that these games are incredibly powerful relationship-management tools. They help us stay connected with in our social network that we would otherwise grow from, if we weren’t playing games together.
“I wish I’d let be happier.” Well, here I can’t help but think of the groundbreaking trials recently conducted at East Carolina University that showed that online games can outperform pharmaceuticals treating clinical anxiety and depression. Just 30 minutes of online game play a day was enough create dramatic boosts in mood and long-term increases in happiness.
“I wish I’d the courage to express my true self.” Well, avatars are a way express our true selves, our most heroic, idealized version who we might become. You can see that in this alter ego portrait by Robbie of a gamer with his avatar. And Stanford University has been doing research for five now to document how playing a game with an idealized avatar changes how we think and act real life, making us more courageous, more ambitious, more committed our goals.
“I wish I’d led a life true my dreams, and not what others expected of me.” Are doing this yet? I’m not sure, so I’ve left a Super Mario mark. We’re going to come back to this one.
But in the meantime, perhaps you’re wondering, who is this designer to be talking to us about deathbed regrets? And it’s true, I’ve worked in a hospice, I’ve never been on my deathbed. recently I did spend three months in bed, wanting to die. Really to die.
Now let me tell you that story. It two years ago, when I hit my head and got a concussion. The concussion didn’t properly, and after 30 days, I was left with like nonstop headaches, nausea, vertigo, memory loss, mental fog. doctor told me that in order to heal my brain, I had to it. So I had to avoid everything that triggered my symptoms. For me that meant no reading, writing, no video games, no work or email, no running, no alcohol, no caffeine. In other — and I think you see where this is — no reason to live.
(Laughter)
Of course it’s meant to be funny, but in all seriousness, ideation is quite common with traumatic brain injuries. It happens to one in three, and it happened me. My brain started telling me, “Jane, you want die.” It said, “You’re never going to get better.” It said, “The pain will never end.”
And these became so persistent and so persuasive that I started to legitimately fear for life, which is the time that I said to after 34 days — and I will never forget this — I said, “I am either going to kill myself I’m going to turn this into a game.”
Now, why a game? knew from researching the psychology of games for more than a decade that we play a game — and this is in the scientific literature — we tough challenges with more creativity, more determination, more optimism, and we’re likely to reach out to others for help. I wanted to bring these gamer traits to real-life challenge, so I created a role-playing recovery game called Jane Concussion Slayer.
Now this became my new secret identity, and first thing I did as a slayer was call twin sister — I have an identical twin sister Kelly — and tell her, “I’m playing a game to heal my brain, I want you to play with me.” This was easier way to ask for help.
She became my first ally in the game, my husband joined next, and together we identified and battled the bad guys. Now was anything that could trigger my symptoms and therefore down the healing process, things like bright lights and spaces. We also collected and activated power-ups. This was anything I could do on even my worst to feel just a little bit good, just a little bit productive. Things like cuddling my dog 10 minutes, or getting out of bed and walking around the block just once.
Now the game was simple: Adopt a secret identity, recruit your allies, battle the bad guys, the power-ups. But even with a game so simple, within just a couple of starting to play, that fog of depression and went away. It just vanished. It felt like a miracle. Now it wasn’t a miracle cure the headaches or the cognitive symptoms. That lasted for more than a year, and it was hardest year of my life by far. But even I still had the symptoms, even while I was still in pain, stopped suffering.
Now what happened next with the game surprised me. I up some blog posts and videos online, explaining how to play. not everybody has a concussion, obviously, not everyone wants be “the slayer,” so I renamed the game SuperBetter.
And soon, I started hearing people all over the world who were adopting their own secret identity, recruiting their own allies, and were getting “super better,” facing challenges like cancer and chronic pain, depression Crohn’s disease. Even people were playing it for terminal diagnoses ALS. And I could tell from their messages and their videos that the game helping them in the same ways that it helped me. They talked about feeling and braver. They talked about feeling better understood by friends and family. And they even talked about feeling happier, even though they were in pain, though they were tackling the toughest challenge of their lives.
Now the time, I’m thinking to myself, what is going on here? I mean, how a game so trivial intervene so powerfully in such serious, in some cases life-and-death, circumstances? I mean, if it hadn’t worked for me, there’s no way I would have it was possible. Well, it turns out there’s some science here, too. Some get stronger and happier after a traumatic event. And that’s what was happening to us.
The game was helping experience what scientists call post-traumatic growth, which is not something we usually hear about. usually hear about post-traumatic stress disorder. But scientists now know that a traumatic event doesn’t us to suffer indefinitely. Instead, we can use it as a springboard to our best qualities and lead happier lives.
Here are the five things that people with post-traumatic growth say: “My have changed.” “I’m not afraid to do what makes me happy.” “I feel closer to friends and family.” “I understand myself better. I know I really am now.” “I have a new sense of meaning and purpose my life.” “I’m better able to focus on my and dreams.”
Now, does this sound familiar? It should, the top five traits of post-traumatic growth are essentially the direct opposite the top five regrets of the dying. Now this interesting, right? It seems that somehow, a traumatic event can unlock ability to lead a life with fewer regrets.
But how does work? How do you get from trauma to growth? Or better yet, is there way to get all the benefits of post-traumatic growth without the trauma, without to hit your head in the first place? That would be good, right?
I wanted to the phenomenon better, so I devoured the scientific literature, and here’s what I learned. There are kinds of strength, or resilience, that contribute to post-traumatic growth, and there are scientifically validated activities that you can every day to build up these four kinds of resilience, you don’t need a trauma to do it.
I could tell you what these four types strength are, but I’d rather you experience them firsthand. I’d rather we start building them up together right now. Here’s what we’re going to do. We’ll play a game together. This is where you earn the seven and a half minutes of life that I promised you earlier. All you have do is successfully complete the first four SuperBetter quests. And I feel like you can it. I have confidence in you.
So, everybody ready? This is first quest. Here we go. Pick one: Stand up take three steps, or make your hands into fists, them over your head as high as you can for five seconds, go! right, I like the people doing both. You are overachievers. Very good.
(Laughter)
Well done, everyone. That worth +1 physical resilience, which means that your body withstand more stress and heal itself faster. We know from the research that the number one thing can do to boost your physical resilience is to sit still. That’s all it takes. Every single second you are not sitting still, you are actively improving the of your heart, and your lungs and brains.
Everybody ready your next quest? I want you to snap your fingers exactly 50 times, count backwards from 100 by seven, like this: 100, 93… Go!
(Snapping)
Don’t give up.
(Snapping)
Don’t the people counting down from 100 interfere with your to 50.
(Snapping)
(Laughter)
Nice. Wow. That’s the first time I’ve ever seen that. physical resilience. Well done, everyone. Now that’s worth +1 mental resilience, which you have more mental focus, more discipline, determination and willpower. We know from the scientific research that willpower actually like a muscle. It gets stronger the more you it. So tackling a tiny challenge without giving up, even as absurd as snapping your fingers exactly 50 times or counting from 100 by seven is actually a scientifically validated to boost your willpower.
So good job. Quest number three. one: Because of the room, fate’s really determined this you, but here are the two options. If you’re inside, find a window and look out of it. you’re outside, find a window and look in. Or a quick YouTube or Google image search for “baby [your favorite animal.]”
Do it on your phones, or just out some baby animals, and I’ll put them on the screen. So, what we want to see? Sloth, giraffe, elephant, snake. Okay, let’s see we got. Baby dolphin and baby llamas. Everybody look. that? Okay, one more. Baby elephant.
(Audience) Oh!
We’re clapping that? That’s amazing.
(Laughter)
All right, what we’re just there is plus-one emotional resilience, which means you have the ability provoke powerful, positive emotions like curiosity or love, which we feel looking at animals, when you need them most.
Here’s a secret from the scientific literature you. If you can manage to experience three positive emotions for every one negative over the course of an hour, a day, a week, you dramatically improve your health and ability to successfully tackle any problem you’re facing. And this is called the three-to-one emotion ratio. It’s my favorite SuperBetter trick, so keep it up.
All right, pick one, last quest: someone’s hand for six seconds, or send someone a quick thank by text, email, Facebook or Twitter. Go!
(Chatting)
Looking good, good. Nice, nice. Keep it up. I love it! All right, everybody, that is +1 social resilience, means you actually get more strength from your friends, neighbors, your family, your community. Now, a great way boost social resilience is gratitude. Touch is even better.
Here’s one more secret you: Shaking someone’s hand for six seconds dramatically raises the level of in your bloodstream, now that’s the trust hormone. That means that all of you who just shook hands biochemically primed to like and want to help each other. This will linger the break, so take advantage of the networking opportunities.
(Laughter)
Well, you have successfully completed your four quests, let’s if I’ve successfully completed my mission to give you and a half minutes of bonus life. Now I get to share more little bit of science with you. It turns out that people who boost these four types of resilience — physical, mental, emotional social — live 10 years longer than everyone else. So is true. If you are regularly achieving the three-to-one positive emotion ratio, if are never sitting still for more than an hour at a time, if you reaching out to one person you care about every single day, you are tackling tiny goals to boost your willpower, will live 10 years longer than everyone else, and here’s where math I showed you earlier comes in.
So, the average life expectancy in the U.S. the U.K. is 78.1 years, but we know from more than 1,000 peer-reviewed studies that you can add 10 years of life by boosting your four types of resilience. So single year that you are boosting your four types of resilience, you’re actually earning .128 years of life or 46 more days of life, 67,298 more minutes of life, which means every single day, are earning 184 minutes of life, or every single hour that you are your four types of resilience, like we just did together, you earning 7.68245837 more minutes of life.
Congratulations, those seven and a half minutes are all yours. You earned them.
Yeah!
(Applause)
Awesome. Wait, wait, wait. You still have special mission, your secret mission. How are you going to spend these minutes bonus life?
Well, here’s my suggestion. These seven and a bonus minutes are kind of like genie’s wishes. You can your first wish to wish for a million more wishes. clever, right? So, if you spend these seven and a minutes today doing something that makes you happy, or that gets you physically active, puts you in touch with someone you care about, or just tackling a tiny challenge, you’re going to boost your resilience, so you’re to earn more minutes.
And the good news is, you keep going like that. Every hour of the day, day of your life, all the way to your deathbed, which now be 10 years later than it would have otherwise. And when you there, more than likely, you will not have any of top five regrets, because you will have built up strength and resilience to lead a life truer to your dreams. And with 10 extra years, you might have enough time to play a few more games.
Thank you.
(Applause)