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