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