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I'm a gamer, so I like to have goals.

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I like special missions and secret objectives.

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So here's my special mission for this talk:

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I'm going to try to increase the life span

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of every single person in this room

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by seven and a half minutes.

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Literally, you will live seven and half minutes longer

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than you would have otherwise,

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just because you watched this talk.

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Okay, some of you are looking a little bit skeptical.

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That's okay, because check it out --

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I have math to prove that it is possible.

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And it won't make a lot of sense now.

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I'll explain it all later,

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just pay attention to the number at the bottom:

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plus-7.68245837 minutes

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that will be my gift to you if I'm successful in my mission.

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Now, you have a secret mission too.

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Your mission is to figure out how you want to spend your

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extra seven and a half minutes.

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And I think you should do something unusual with them,

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because these are bonus minutes. You weren't going to have them anyway.

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Now, because I'm a game designer, you might be thinking to yourself,

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I know what she wants us to do with those minutes,

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she wants us to spend them playing games.

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Now this is a totally reasonable assumption,

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given that I have made quite a habit of encouraging people

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to spend more time playing games.

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For example, in my first TEDTalk,

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I did propose that we should spend 21 billion hours a week

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as a planet playing video games.

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Now, 21 billion hours, it's a lot of time.

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It's so much time, in fact, that the number one unsolicited comment

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that I have heard from people all over the world

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since I gave that talk, is this:

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Jane, games are great and all, but on your deathbed,

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are you really going to wish you spent more time playing Angry Birds?

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This idea is so pervasive -- that games are a waste of time

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that we will come to regret -- that I hear it literally everywhere I go.

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For example, true story: Just a few weeks ago,

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this cab driver, upon finding out that a friend and I were in town

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for a game developer's conference,

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turned around and said -- and I quote --

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"I hate games. Waste of life. Imagine getting to the end of your life

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and regretting all that time."

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Now, I want to take this problem seriously.

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I mean, I want games to be a force for good in the world.

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I don't want gamers to regret the time they spent playing,

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time that I encouraged them to spend.

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So I have been thinking about this question a lot lately.

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When we're on our deathbeds, will we regret

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the time we spent playing games?

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Now, this may surprise you, but it turns out

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there is actually some scientific research on this question.

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It's true. Hospice workers,

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the people who take care of us at the end of our lives,

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recently issued a report on the most frequently expressed regrets

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that people say when they are literally on their deathbeds.

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And that's what I want to share with you today --

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the top five regrets of the dying.

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Number one: I wish I hadn't worked so hard.

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Number two: I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

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Number three: I wish I had let myself be happier.

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Number four: I wish I'd had the courage to express my true self.

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And number five: I wish I'd lived a life true to my dreams,

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instead of what others expected of me.

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Now, as far as I know, no one ever told one of the hospice workers,

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I wish I'd spent more time playing video games,

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but when I hear these top five regrets of the dying,

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I can't help but hear five deep human cravings

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that games actually help us fulfill.

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For example, I wish I hadn't worked so hard.

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For many people, this means, I wish I'd spent more time

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with my family, with my kids when they were growing up.

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Well, we know that playing games together has tremendous

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family benefits.

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A recent study from Brigham Young University

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School of Family life reported that parents who

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spend more time playing video games with their kids

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have much stronger real-life relationships with them.

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I wish I'd stayed in touch with my friends.

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Well, hundreds of millions of people

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use social games like FarmVille or Words With Friends

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to stay in daily contact with real-life friends and family.

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A recent study from [University of Michigan] showed

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that these games are incredibly powerful

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relationship-management tools.

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They help us stay connected with people in our social network

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that we would otherwise grow distant from,

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if we weren't playing games together.

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I wish I'd let myself be happier.

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Well, here I can't help but think of the groundbreaking clinical trials

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recently conducted at East Carolina University

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that showed that online games can outperform

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pharmaceuticals for treating clinical anxiety and depression.

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Just 30 minutes of online game play a day

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was enough to create dramatic boosts in mood

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and long-term increases in happiness.

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I wish I'd had the courage to express my true self.

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Well, avatars are a way to express our true selves,

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our most heroic, idealized version of who we might become.

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You can see that in this alter ego portrait by Robbie Cooper

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of a gamer with his avatar.

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And Stanford University has been doing research for five years now

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to document how playing a game with an idealized avatar

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changes how we think and act in real life,

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making us more courageous, more ambitious,

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more committed to our goals.

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I wish I'd led a life true to my dreams,

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and not what others expected of me.

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Are games doing this yet? I'm not sure,

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so I've left a question mark, a Super Mario question mark.

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And we're going to come back to this one.

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But in the mean time, perhaps you're wondering,

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who is this game designer to be talking to us

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about deathbed regrets?

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And it's true, I've never worked in a hospice,

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I've never been on my deathbed.

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But recently I did spend three months in bed, wanting to die.

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Really wanting to die.

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Now let me tell you that story.

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It started two years ago, when I hit my head and got a concussion.

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Now the concussion didn't heal properly,

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and after 30 days I was left with symptoms like nonstop headaches,

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nausea, vertigo, memory loss, mental fog.

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My doctor told me that in order to heal my brain,

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I had to rest it.

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So I had to avoid everything that triggered my symptoms.

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For me that meant no reading, no writing, no video games,

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no work or email, no running, no alcohol, no caffeine.

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In other words -- and I think you see where this is going --

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no reason to live.

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Of course it's meant to be funny,

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but in all seriousness, suicidal ideation is quite common

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with traumatic brain injuries.

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It happens to one in three, and it happened to me.

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My brain started telling me, Jane, you want to die.

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It said, you're never going to get better.

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It said, the pain will never end.

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And these voices became so persistent and so persuasive

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that I started to legitimately fear for my life,

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which is the time that I said to myself after 34 days --

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and I will never forget this moment --

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I said, I am either going to kill myself

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or I'm going to turn this into a game.

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Now, why a game?

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I knew from researching the psychology of games for more than a decade

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that when we play a game -- and this is in the scientific literature --

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we tackle tough challenges with more creativity,

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more determination, more optimism,

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and we're more likely to reach out to others for help.

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And I wanted to bring these gamer traits to my real-life challenge,

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so I created a role-playing recovery game

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called Jane the Concussion Slayer.

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Now this became my new secret identity,

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and the first thing I did as a slayer

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was call my twin sister -- I have an identical twin sister named Kelly --

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and tell her, I'm playing a game to heal my brain,

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and I want you to play with me.

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This was an easier way to ask for help.

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She became my first ally in the game,

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my husband Kiyash joined next,

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and together we identified and battled the bad guys.

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Now this was anything that could trigger my symptoms

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and therefore slow down the healing process,

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things like bright lights and crowded spaces.

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We also collected and activated power-ups.

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This was anything I could do on even my worst day

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to feel just a little bit good,

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just a little bit productive.

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Things like cuddling my dog for 10 minutes,

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or getting out of bed and walking around the block just once.

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Now the game was that simple:

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Adopt a secret identity, recruit your allies,

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battle the bad guys, activate the power-ups.

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But even with a game so simple,

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within just a couple days of starting to play,

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that fog of depression and anxiety

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went away. It just vanished. It felt like a miracle.

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Now it wasn't a miracle cure for the headaches

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or the cognitive symptoms.

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That lasted for more than a year,

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and it was the hardest year of my life by far.

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But even when I still had the symptoms,

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even while I was still in pain, I stopped suffering.

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Now what happened next with the game surprised me.

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I put up some blog posts and videos online,

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explaining how to play.

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But not everybody has a concussion, obviously,

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not everyone wants to be "the slayer,"

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so I renamed the game SuperBetter.

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And soon I started hearing from people all over the world

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who were adopting their own secret identity,

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recruiting their own allies, and they were getting "super better"

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facing challenges like cancer and chronic pain,

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depression and Crohn's disease.

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Even people were playing it for terminal diagnoses like ALS.

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And I could tell from their messages and their videos

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that the game was helping them in the same ways

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that it helped me.

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They talked about feeling stronger and braver.

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They talked about feeling better understood by their friends and family.

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And they even talked about feeling happier,

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even though they were in pain, even though they were tackling

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the toughest challenge of their lives.

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Now at the time, I'm thinking to myself, what is going on here?

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I mean, how could a game so trivial intervene so powerfully

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in such serious, and in some cases life-and-death, circumstances?

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I mean, if it hadn't worked for me,

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there's no way I would have believed it was possible.

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Well, it turns out there's some science here too.

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Some people get stronger and happier after a traumatic event.

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And that's what was happening to us.

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The game was helping us experience

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what scientists call post-traumatic growth,

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which is not something we usually hear about.

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We usually hear about post-traumatic stress disorder.

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But scientists now know that a traumatic event

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doesn't doom us to suffer indefinitely.

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Instead, we can use it as a springboard

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to unleash our best qualities and lead happier lives.

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Here are the top five things that people with

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post-traumatic growth say:

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My priorities have changed. I'm not afraid to do what makes me happy.

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I feel closer to my friends and family.

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I understand myself better. I know who I really am now.

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I have a new sense of meaning and purpose in my life.

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I'm better able to focus on my goals and dreams.

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Now, does this sound familiar?

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It should, because the top five traits of post-traumatic growth

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are essentially the direct opposite of the top five regrets of the dying.

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Now this is interesting, right?

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It seems that somehow, a traumatic event can unlock our ability

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to lead a life with fewer regrets.

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But how does it work?

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How do you get from trauma to growth?

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Or better yet, is there a way to get all the benefits

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of post-traumatic growth without the trauma,

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without having to hit your head in the first place?

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That would be good, right?

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I wanted to understand the phenomenon better,

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so I devoured the scientific literature, and here's what I learned.

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There are four kinds of strength, or resilience,

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that contribute to post-traumatic growth,

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and there are scientifically validated activities

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that you can do every day to build up these four kinds of resilience,

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and you don't need a trauma to do it.

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Now, I could tell you what these four types of strength are,

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but I'd rather you experience them firsthand.

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I'd rather we all start building them up together right now.

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So here's what we're going to do.

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We're going to play a quick game together.

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This is where you earn those seven and a half minutes

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of bonus life that I promised you earlier.

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All you have to do is successfully complete

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the first four SuperBetter quests.

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And I feel like you can do it. I have confidence in you.

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So, everybody ready? This is your first quest. Here we go.

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Pick one: Stand up and take three steps,

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or make your hands into fists, raise them over your head

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as high as you can for five seconds. Go!

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All right, I like the people doing both. You are overachievers.

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Very good. (Laughter)

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Well done, everyone. Now that is worth plus-one

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physical resilience, which means that your body can

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withstand more stress and heal itself faster.

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Now we know from the research that the number one thing

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you can do to boost your physical resilience is to not sit still.

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That's all it takes.

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Every single second that you are not sitting still,

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you are actively improving the health of your heart,

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and your lungs and brains.

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Everybody ready for your next quest?

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I want you to snap your fingers exactly 50 times,

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or count backwards from 100 by seven, like this: 100, 93 ...

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Go!

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(Snapping)

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Don't give up.

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(Snapping)

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Don't let the people counting down from 100

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interfere with your counting to 50.

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(Laughter)

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Nice. Wow. That's the first time I've ever seen that.

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Bonus physical resilience. Well done, everyone.

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Now that's worth plus-one mental resilience,

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which means you have more mental focus, more discipline,

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determination and willpower.

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We know from the scientific research that willpower

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actually works like a muscle.

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It gets stronger the more you exercise it.

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So tackling a tiny challenge without giving up,

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even one as absurd as snapping your fingers exactly 50 times

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or counting backwards from 100 by seven

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is actually a scientifically validated way to boost your willpower.

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So good job. Quest number three.

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Pick one: Now because of the room we're in,

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fate's really determined this for you, but here are the two options.

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If you're inside, find a window and look out of it.

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If you're outside, find a window and look in.

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Or do a quick YouTube or Google image search for

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"baby [your favorite animal.]"

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Now, you could do this on your phones,

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or you could just shout out some baby animals,

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I'm going to find some and put them on the screen for us.

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So, what do we want to see?

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Sloth, giraffe, elephant, snake. Okay, let's see what we got.

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Baby dolphin and baby llamas. Everybody look.

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Got that?

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Okay, one more. Baby elephant.

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We're clapping for that?

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That's amazing.

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All right, now what we're just feeling there

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is plus-one emotional resilience,

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which means you have the ability to provoke powerful,

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positive emotions like curiosity or love,

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which we feel when we look at baby animals,

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when you need them most.

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And here's a secret from the scientific literature for you.

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If you can manage to experience three positive emotions

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for every one negative emotion over the course of an hour,

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a day, a week, you dramatically improve

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your health and your ability to successfully tackle

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any problem you're facing.

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And this is called the three-to-one positive emotion ratio.

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It's my favorite SuperBetter trick, so keep it up.

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All right, pick one, last quest:

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Shake someone's hand for six seconds,

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or send someone a quick thank you

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by text, email, Facebook or Twitter. Go!

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(Chatting)

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Looking good, looking good.

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Nice, nice.

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Keep it up. I love it!

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All right, everybody, that is plus-one social resilience,

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which means you actually get more strength from your friends,

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your neighbors, your family, your community.

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Now, a great way to boost social resilience is gratitude.

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Touch is even better.

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Here's one more secret for you:

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00:16:11,507 --> 00:16:13,581
Shaking someone's hand for six seconds

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00:16:13,581 --> 00:16:16,812
dramatically raises the level of oxytocin in your bloodstream,

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now that's the trust hormone.

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That means that all of you who just shook hands

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are biochemically primed to like and want to help each other.

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This will linger during the break,

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so take advantage of the networking opportunities.

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(Laughter)

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00:16:30,502 --> 00:16:33,132
Okay, well you have successfully completed your four quests,

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so let's see if I've successfully completed my mission

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to give you seven and a half minutes of bonus life.

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And here's where I get to share one more little bit of science with you.

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It turns out that people who regularly

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boost these four types of resilience --

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physical, mental, emotional and social --

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live 10 years longer than everyone else.

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So this is true.

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If you are regularly achieving the three-to-one

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positive emotion ratio,

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if you are never sitting still for more than an hour at a time,

360
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if you are reaching out to one person you care about every single day,

361
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if you are tackling tiny goals to boost your willpower,

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you will live 10 years longer than everyone else,

363
00:17:08,333 --> 00:17:10,719
and here's where that math I showed you earlier comes in.

364
00:17:10,719 --> 00:17:15,095
So, the average life expectancy in the U.S. and the U.K. is 78.1 years,

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00:17:15,095 --> 00:17:18,223
but we know from more than 1,000 peer-reviewed scientific studies

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that you can add 10 years of life to that by boosting

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your four types of resilience.

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00:17:21,574 --> 00:17:23,543
So every single year that you are

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00:17:23,543 --> 00:17:24,998
boosting your four types of resilience,

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you're actually earning .128 more years of life

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00:17:27,271 --> 00:17:32,247
or 46 more days of life, or 67,298 more minutes of life,

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00:17:32,247 --> 00:17:36,561
which means every single day, you are earning 184 minutes of life,

373
00:17:36,561 --> 00:17:39,519
or every single hour that you are boosting your four types of resilience,

374
00:17:39,519 --> 00:17:43,327
like we just did together, you are earning 7.68245837

375
00:17:43,327 --> 00:17:44,342
more minutes of life.

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00:17:44,342 --> 00:17:46,301
Congratulations, those seven and a half minutes

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00:17:46,301 --> 00:17:48,005
are all yours. You totally earned them.

378
00:17:48,005 --> 00:17:49,240
(Applause)

379
00:17:49,240 --> 00:17:53,296
Yeah! Awesome.

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Wait, wait, wait.

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You still have your special mission,

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00:17:57,692 --> 00:17:58,804
your secret mission.

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How are you going to spend these seven and a half

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minutes of bonus life?

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00:18:01,868 --> 00:18:03,212
Well, here's my suggestion.

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These seven and a half bonus minutes are kind of like genie's wishes.

387
00:18:06,981 --> 00:18:10,725
You can use your first wish to wish for a million more wishes.

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Pretty clever, right?

389
00:18:11,748 --> 00:18:15,228
So, if you spend these seven and a half minutes today

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doing something that makes you happy,

391
00:18:17,892 --> 00:18:20,028
or that gets you physically active,

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00:18:20,028 --> 00:18:22,765
or puts you in touch with someone you care about,

393
00:18:22,765 --> 00:18:25,476
or even just tackling a tiny challenge,

394
00:18:25,476 --> 00:18:27,404
you are going to boost your resilience,

395
00:18:27,404 --> 00:18:29,055
so you're going to earn more minutes.

396
00:18:29,055 --> 00:18:31,647
And the good news is, you can keep going like that.

397
00:18:31,647 --> 00:18:34,396
Every hour of the day, every day of your life,

398
00:18:34,396 --> 00:18:35,828
all the way to your deathbed,

399
00:18:35,828 --> 00:18:38,124
which will now be 10 years later than it would have otherwise.

400
00:18:38,124 --> 00:18:41,645
And when you get there, more than likely,

401
00:18:41,645 --> 00:18:45,364
you will not have any of those top five regrets,

402
00:18:45,364 --> 00:18:48,179
because you will have built up the strength and resilience

403
00:18:48,179 --> 00:18:51,219
to lead a life truer to your dreams.

404
00:18:51,219 --> 00:18:55,399
And with 10 extra years, you might even have enough time

405
00:18:55,399 --> 00:18:57,030
to play a few more games.

406
00:18:57,030 --> 00:18:58,187
Thank you.

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00:18:58,187 --> 00:19:09,142
(Applause)