1 00:00:24,881 --> 00:00:27,975 Host: One here, please. 2 00:00:27,975 --> 00:00:30,020 Ken Hughes: This will cost you 10,000 euros. 3 00:00:30,020 --> 00:00:31,600 (Laughter) 4 00:00:32,110 --> 00:00:33,772 Good afternoon. 5 00:00:33,772 --> 00:00:37,500 As a playologist, I'd like to encourage you all 6 00:00:37,650 --> 00:00:43,383 to look deeper to find that spark of creativity that lies within us all 7 00:00:43,851 --> 00:00:45,322 and let it out. 8 00:00:47,880 --> 00:00:50,890 I want you to imagine for a moment that you are dead. 9 00:00:52,027 --> 00:00:54,887 It's not the most inspiring way to start a talk, I know. 10 00:00:54,887 --> 00:00:55,971 (Laughter) 11 00:00:55,971 --> 00:00:58,097 You follow that white light, through, 12 00:00:58,722 --> 00:01:00,961 you come out into a warehouse, 13 00:01:01,371 --> 00:01:02,582 an empty hangar, 14 00:01:02,582 --> 00:01:04,209 and on the ground in front of you 15 00:01:04,209 --> 00:01:09,411 are thousands of Polaroid photographs lined up one after the other in a row. 16 00:01:09,950 --> 00:01:14,571 Each photograph represents a day of your life, a life just ended. 17 00:01:16,130 --> 00:01:17,830 And now you walk. 18 00:01:18,060 --> 00:01:22,021 You walk along those photographs, looking at the various memories. 19 00:01:22,302 --> 00:01:24,849 You remember your first day at school. 20 00:01:25,409 --> 00:01:27,467 I'm not too sure I quite understood school; 21 00:01:27,467 --> 00:01:29,157 I think I thought I was emigrating. 22 00:01:29,157 --> 00:01:30,677 (Laughter) 23 00:01:30,677 --> 00:01:31,994 So you walk on, 24 00:01:32,146 --> 00:01:34,862 and you walk past your first kiss. 25 00:01:35,122 --> 00:01:38,030 This one isn't me, by the way, this is a stock image. 26 00:01:38,030 --> 00:01:40,500 I didn't hire a photographer to hide in the trees 27 00:01:40,500 --> 00:01:43,421 to record my first kiss - I wish I had. 28 00:01:43,421 --> 00:01:45,180 So you walk past all these big days: 29 00:01:45,180 --> 00:01:48,660 the day you graduated university, the day you got married. 30 00:01:48,660 --> 00:01:51,630 You remember all these big days as you walk along these rows. 31 00:01:51,630 --> 00:01:54,823 There'll be some memories you walk past, each day that you remember. 32 00:01:54,823 --> 00:01:58,389 There'll be small things like the day your eight-year-old son and his friend 33 00:01:58,389 --> 00:02:00,417 took your brand new Converse runners 34 00:02:00,417 --> 00:02:02,888 and filled them with mashed banana for a joke. 35 00:02:03,331 --> 00:02:05,470 These days will stand out to you. 36 00:02:05,632 --> 00:02:08,091 And on your walk - my point is this: 37 00:02:08,091 --> 00:02:12,039 each photograph on the floor in front of you is a unique day. 38 00:02:12,039 --> 00:02:14,515 The photograph is the thing that happened on that day 39 00:02:14,515 --> 00:02:16,908 that was different to every other day of your life. 40 00:02:16,908 --> 00:02:18,672 Different from before and from after: 41 00:02:18,672 --> 00:02:21,429 the new thing that you learnt, the new experience you had. 42 00:02:21,429 --> 00:02:23,480 In the early years as a child or a teenager, 43 00:02:23,480 --> 00:02:25,298 the pictures are quite interesting 44 00:02:25,298 --> 00:02:28,480 because when you're young, you're adventurous; you flirt with risk. 45 00:02:28,480 --> 00:02:30,488 But I want you to think about those rows 46 00:02:30,488 --> 00:02:34,407 that represent your late 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, 47 00:02:34,407 --> 00:02:36,066 the days that become a routine, 48 00:02:36,066 --> 00:02:38,836 days slipping into weeks, into months, into years. 49 00:02:38,836 --> 00:02:40,370 You do the same thing every day: 50 00:02:40,370 --> 00:02:42,952 you get up, you go to school or college, your work, 51 00:02:42,952 --> 00:02:44,932 you come home, you sit on the TV. 52 00:02:45,132 --> 00:02:47,113 These days, think about the photographs, 53 00:02:47,113 --> 00:02:50,104 and how many of those photographs are black. 54 00:02:50,236 --> 00:02:53,852 Blank because you didn't do anything that day that was unique 55 00:02:53,852 --> 00:02:56,199 that you had never ever done before. 56 00:02:56,253 --> 00:02:58,399 Think of the rows and rows of photographs 57 00:02:58,399 --> 00:03:01,159 as you walk along that are completely blank. 58 00:03:01,219 --> 00:03:04,360 A life that could have been full of all sorts of new experiences, 59 00:03:04,360 --> 00:03:06,795 new skills, new people, new places, 60 00:03:06,795 --> 00:03:08,607 but it was just a routine life. 61 00:03:08,607 --> 00:03:11,377 A life lost to the routine. 62 00:03:12,251 --> 00:03:14,467 It's a little bit depressing, isn't it? 63 00:03:14,841 --> 00:03:17,894 And such are the thoughts of a man facing his midlife crisis. 64 00:03:17,894 --> 00:03:19,516 This year I turned 40. 65 00:03:19,786 --> 00:03:21,191 Now, I know I don't look it; 66 00:03:21,191 --> 00:03:24,173 I drink the blood of virgin unicorns every morning at dawn. 67 00:03:24,173 --> 00:03:25,825 (Laughter) 68 00:03:26,393 --> 00:03:30,493 But nevertheless, half my life is potentially over. 69 00:03:30,629 --> 00:03:33,478 Now at the same time, while I'm having my midlife crisis, 70 00:03:33,478 --> 00:03:36,415 my father, who is a healthy 73, 71 00:03:36,415 --> 00:03:39,904 he's having his - I guess you could call his end-of-life crisis. 72 00:03:39,904 --> 00:03:43,262 It's the same as mine except he is more concerned 73 00:03:43,262 --> 00:03:46,314 with things like when the day does actually come, 74 00:03:46,314 --> 00:03:49,572 how many fireworks I'm going to be able to sneak into his coffin 75 00:03:49,572 --> 00:03:51,857 before it's sealed for the crematorium. 76 00:03:52,087 --> 00:03:54,151 Because he thinks this will be great fun. 77 00:03:54,535 --> 00:03:55,653 He's that kind of guy. 78 00:03:55,653 --> 00:03:58,723 So we got talking about time last Christmas, 79 00:03:58,723 --> 00:04:02,073 and he was having a conversation with me that started with, 80 00:04:02,073 --> 00:04:05,110 "I remember being 65, and now I'm 73, 81 00:04:05,110 --> 00:04:08,244 "I have no idea where the last eight years have gone." 82 00:04:08,244 --> 00:04:10,789 He said that time seemed to be moving much faster 83 00:04:10,789 --> 00:04:13,060 now that he was older, and I started to laugh. 84 00:04:13,060 --> 00:04:16,024 I thought, "What? You're blissfully retired. 85 00:04:16,024 --> 00:04:18,873 All you do every day is drink coffee and do some gardening. 86 00:04:18,873 --> 00:04:23,163 Surely your days stretch out in front of you slowly, and time drags." 87 00:04:23,163 --> 00:04:24,633 But apparently not. 88 00:04:24,633 --> 00:04:27,377 He said that no, time slips past faster and faster, 89 00:04:27,377 --> 00:04:30,754 the less you do, oddly, the faster time passes. 90 00:04:30,837 --> 00:04:33,183 For most of us, time is a mental construct really. 91 00:04:33,183 --> 00:04:36,055 You look back on a week or month or year that just passed, 92 00:04:36,055 --> 00:04:38,299 and really it's your memories that you are using 93 00:04:38,299 --> 00:04:40,387 to decide how effective that time was. 94 00:04:40,387 --> 00:04:41,866 So I wondered if that was true. 95 00:04:41,866 --> 00:04:44,582 If my father was right, and he usually is, 96 00:04:44,582 --> 00:04:46,726 what would happen if you reversed that? 97 00:04:46,726 --> 00:04:49,526 If you filled your days and your weeks with new things, 98 00:04:49,526 --> 00:04:52,910 could you, in fact, slow down time? 99 00:04:53,220 --> 00:04:54,990 Just take an average day. 100 00:04:55,088 --> 00:04:58,739 An average day has a start and an end. 101 00:04:58,739 --> 00:05:01,252 So think about it as two fixed points, 102 00:05:01,252 --> 00:05:04,008 like two pins in a cork board, the morning and the night. 103 00:05:04,008 --> 00:05:07,345 And take a piece of string, and run that string from morning to night, 104 00:05:07,345 --> 00:05:09,468 and let's take that as your average day. 105 00:05:09,468 --> 00:05:11,748 And on to that average day, we will put things. 106 00:05:11,748 --> 00:05:13,430 We put things that we do every day: 107 00:05:13,430 --> 00:05:15,170 we get up, we have our breakfast, 108 00:05:15,170 --> 00:05:18,697 we commute to work or college, we spend the day in the office, 109 00:05:18,697 --> 00:05:21,697 and even the things we do on occasion, maybe every week or two, 110 00:05:21,697 --> 00:05:23,900 like that yoga class or soccer training, 111 00:05:23,900 --> 00:05:26,150 these are things that are routine in our lives. 112 00:05:26,164 --> 00:05:27,823 So eventually, each day, each week 113 00:05:27,823 --> 00:05:31,001 becomes this quite predictable straight line. 114 00:05:31,001 --> 00:05:34,555 Morning to night, day after day, week after week. 115 00:05:34,555 --> 00:05:37,469 And I started to think, "I wonder if you took something new, 116 00:05:37,469 --> 00:05:39,775 a brand new experience that you'd never ever done 117 00:05:39,775 --> 00:05:41,982 and dropped that pin into that notice board, 118 00:05:41,992 --> 00:05:45,252 that's a new point that that string has to go round on that day. 119 00:05:45,252 --> 00:05:48,200 So you clearly are going to need a longer piece of string. 120 00:05:48,200 --> 00:05:50,006 Same fixed points, morning and night. 121 00:05:50,006 --> 00:05:52,185 Your day hasn't actually got longer. 122 00:05:52,185 --> 00:05:55,636 But what you do within that day, you are going to bend time. 123 00:05:56,423 --> 00:05:57,540 And that's the concept. 124 00:05:57,540 --> 00:05:58,860 I give you Time Bending: 125 00:05:58,860 --> 00:06:00,563 bending the time you already have, 126 00:06:00,563 --> 00:06:03,533 stretching time, to make more out of your life. 127 00:06:03,656 --> 00:06:05,566 So on the first of January this year, 128 00:06:05,566 --> 00:06:08,996 I set out to complete a 365-day experiment. 129 00:06:08,996 --> 00:06:11,096 Could I spend an entire year 130 00:06:11,096 --> 00:06:14,024 where every single day I did a new experience, 131 00:06:14,024 --> 00:06:16,732 something that I have never ever done before? 132 00:06:17,240 --> 00:06:19,790 Could I bend time? Could I stretch time? 133 00:06:19,790 --> 00:06:21,322 So I decided to keep a journal, 134 00:06:21,322 --> 00:06:24,241 and every day I had to have written something in that journal 135 00:06:24,241 --> 00:06:27,967 that I had done that day that was unique and I'd never ever done before. 136 00:06:28,094 --> 00:06:29,204 And that challenged me. 137 00:06:29,204 --> 00:06:31,244 And If I lost just one day along this year, 138 00:06:31,244 --> 00:06:32,935 I failed the entire experiment. 139 00:06:32,935 --> 00:06:35,005 At the beginning of course, it's quite easy. 140 00:06:35,005 --> 00:06:37,584 We all have things that we've wanted to do in our life 141 00:06:37,584 --> 00:06:38,960 that we have yet to do. 142 00:06:38,960 --> 00:06:40,260 It's like your bucket list. 143 00:06:40,260 --> 00:06:42,009 Those are the first things you do. 144 00:06:42,009 --> 00:06:45,201 It's easy, so eventually I learnt to cut my daughter's hair. 145 00:06:45,201 --> 00:06:47,847 I then went on that mountain bike extreme course 146 00:06:47,847 --> 00:06:50,600 that a friend of mine has been asking me to do for years, 147 00:06:50,600 --> 00:06:53,133 and I never went with him, so I did it. 148 00:06:53,133 --> 00:06:54,873 I finally did that half-marathon 149 00:06:54,873 --> 00:06:58,285 that I had been threatening to sign up to for years but I never had. 150 00:06:58,285 --> 00:06:59,625 So I just did it. 151 00:06:59,625 --> 00:07:01,786 Then I spent four weeks with a physiotherapist 152 00:07:01,786 --> 00:07:04,327 because it turns out that you can't do a half-marathon 153 00:07:04,327 --> 00:07:06,517 on 10 days' training, who knew? 154 00:07:06,517 --> 00:07:08,288 (Laughter) 155 00:07:08,579 --> 00:07:11,644 But I'd never been to a physiotherapist before. 156 00:07:11,644 --> 00:07:12,830 New experience! 157 00:07:12,830 --> 00:07:14,960 Herniated disk, new experience! 158 00:07:14,975 --> 00:07:15,985 (Laughter) 159 00:07:16,611 --> 00:07:18,240 So, the weekends are easy 160 00:07:18,240 --> 00:07:20,576 because the weekends you have the time already. 161 00:07:20,576 --> 00:07:23,994 So you go to the local reptile zoo, and you find your hand shooting up 162 00:07:23,994 --> 00:07:26,804 when they ask for someone to hold the tarantula. 163 00:07:27,276 --> 00:07:30,421 You go on a basket-weaving course to learn how to weave baskets. 164 00:07:30,421 --> 00:07:34,452 You let your children and their friends paint you green from top to bottom, 165 00:07:34,452 --> 00:07:39,354 and you take part, uninvited, in the local Saint Patrick's Day parade. 166 00:07:39,354 --> 00:07:40,794 (Music) (Laughter) 167 00:07:40,794 --> 00:07:43,658 You know? Why wouldn't you? Why would you need an invite? 168 00:07:43,658 --> 00:07:46,750 So, these are easy; these are big things and these are weekends, 169 00:07:46,750 --> 00:07:47,987 because you have the time. 170 00:07:47,997 --> 00:07:51,167 But the trick of the experiment is to do this in your normal life, 171 00:07:51,167 --> 00:07:53,660 your Monday to Friday, your home, your office. 172 00:07:53,660 --> 00:07:55,362 These are the days that are harder. 173 00:07:55,362 --> 00:07:58,487 You've got to look for things to do that you've never done before. 174 00:07:58,487 --> 00:08:01,626 So one day you're in a hotel, and they run out of pain au chocolat, 175 00:08:01,626 --> 00:08:04,532 so you decide, "OK, I'm going to make my own pain au chocolat 176 00:08:04,532 --> 00:08:08,746 with croissants and chocolate cereal from the breakfast table for the kids." 177 00:08:08,746 --> 00:08:10,014 Small things. 178 00:08:10,014 --> 00:08:13,208 You take the DVD that your wife has done all the time for aerobics. 179 00:08:13,208 --> 00:08:16,297 You've seen her do it hundreds of times, but you've never done it, 180 00:08:16,297 --> 00:08:18,611 so you do her aerobics DVD., 181 00:08:19,222 --> 00:08:21,692 You make shadow portraits from the 18th Century 182 00:08:21,692 --> 00:08:23,332 because you read it in a book. 183 00:08:23,339 --> 00:08:26,809 And this one, you watch your six-year-old daughter paint your toe nails, 184 00:08:26,809 --> 00:08:30,929 and you say, "How did I get to be 40 and never had my toe nails painted?" 185 00:08:30,961 --> 00:08:32,747 (Laughter) 186 00:08:32,977 --> 00:08:34,810 And this one, she painted my toenails 187 00:08:34,810 --> 00:08:37,663 and no joke - this is one of the best things I did all year! 188 00:08:37,667 --> 00:08:42,500 For two weeks I woke up every morning, swung my legs out of bed and laughed! 189 00:08:42,500 --> 00:08:43,920 (Laughter) 190 00:08:43,920 --> 00:08:45,949 It was like having M&Ms for toes! 191 00:08:45,949 --> 00:08:47,689 (Laughter) 192 00:08:47,689 --> 00:08:49,970 And I put my socks on and I... 193 00:08:49,970 --> 00:08:51,175 (Applause) 194 00:08:51,175 --> 00:08:52,620 Thank you. 195 00:08:52,620 --> 00:08:54,622 (Applause) 196 00:08:55,145 --> 00:08:56,169 It gets better. 197 00:08:56,214 --> 00:08:58,317 I put my socks on and of course you'd forget. 198 00:08:58,317 --> 00:08:59,580 Of course you'd forget. 199 00:08:59,580 --> 00:09:01,975 And you go about your business, you'd work all day, 200 00:09:01,975 --> 00:09:04,657 and at the end of the day you take your socks off and go, 201 00:09:04,657 --> 00:09:05,660 "Ha! M&Ms!" 202 00:09:05,660 --> 00:09:06,760 (Laughter) 203 00:09:06,760 --> 00:09:09,292 And for two weeks I smiled and I laughed twice a day, 204 00:09:09,292 --> 00:09:13,271 and I thought to myself, "You know what? This is it, this is what life is about!" 205 00:09:13,271 --> 00:09:15,660 We need to be reminded on a continuous basis 206 00:09:15,660 --> 00:09:19,383 to live a better life, to live a life that could be more full. 207 00:09:19,503 --> 00:09:23,050 And when you open a packet of biscuits you could just eat them, 208 00:09:23,050 --> 00:09:26,680 or you could build a Jenga Tower and play biscuit Jenga. 209 00:09:27,021 --> 00:09:29,616 How many people have played biscuit Jenga in your life? 210 00:09:29,616 --> 00:09:31,947 Probably never, and now you all will. 211 00:09:31,947 --> 00:09:33,258 These things are so simple, 212 00:09:33,258 --> 00:09:34,838 and what you learn about yourself 213 00:09:34,838 --> 00:09:39,380 is that you can live a life that's closed or you can live a life that is open, 214 00:09:39,635 --> 00:09:42,119 open to a world of possibilities around you. 215 00:09:42,150 --> 00:09:46,156 Now I would never walk past a notice board without stopping 216 00:09:46,156 --> 00:09:49,286 and reading what events are on in the community that I can go to. 217 00:09:49,286 --> 00:09:51,604 I was the only man in the Zumba class last week. 218 00:09:51,604 --> 00:09:52,704 (Laughter) 219 00:09:52,704 --> 00:09:55,256 What's on? What have I not done yet? What can I do? 220 00:09:55,256 --> 00:09:57,930 You'll be surprised how much there is to do in your life, 221 00:09:57,930 --> 00:10:00,423 in your own community, in your own home. 222 00:10:00,423 --> 00:10:03,153 You just need to open yourself to all these possibilities. 223 00:10:03,153 --> 00:10:05,550 So yes, I've walked on fire, I've done big things, 224 00:10:05,550 --> 00:10:08,763 I've eaten frogs' legs which I'd never done before, 225 00:10:08,763 --> 00:10:12,160 I helped deliver a new born lamb, which was beautiful. 226 00:10:12,460 --> 00:10:15,480 When the first winter snow fell the first thing I thought about 227 00:10:15,480 --> 00:10:18,700 was taking all my clothes off and rolling naked down the hill. 228 00:10:19,080 --> 00:10:21,750 And what you realise is that you feel so alive 229 00:10:21,750 --> 00:10:24,055 when you open up to all these experiences. 230 00:10:24,055 --> 00:10:27,369 When you start to look at the world as a new place to do things, 231 00:10:27,369 --> 00:10:29,616 you are amazed at what the world can offer you. 232 00:10:29,616 --> 00:10:31,104 And you become addicted. 233 00:10:31,104 --> 00:10:32,840 Every day I had my new experience. 234 00:10:32,840 --> 00:10:35,750 Many days three or four experiences, I became addicted to it. 235 00:10:35,750 --> 00:10:38,843 What was interesting is as I became addicted, so did others. 236 00:10:38,843 --> 00:10:41,985 People watching me on social media or having conversations with me 237 00:10:41,985 --> 00:10:43,499 got sucked in. 238 00:10:43,535 --> 00:10:44,866 Time Bending is infectious. 239 00:10:44,866 --> 00:10:46,848 It's like gravity; it'll pull you in. 240 00:10:46,848 --> 00:10:49,069 So when I sent a message to a friend 241 00:10:49,069 --> 00:10:51,598 saying I was going to the beach to do some beach art, 242 00:10:51,598 --> 00:10:54,316 suddenly we had five, 10, 15 people all coming with me. 243 00:10:54,598 --> 00:10:57,655 When I posted the video of the spray-cream challenge on my face, 244 00:10:57,655 --> 00:11:01,787 about six or seven people did the same that day up on Facebook. 245 00:11:01,933 --> 00:11:04,834 You know, I have signed up for a 5K mountain run, 246 00:11:04,834 --> 00:11:06,601 which, by the way, they call a sport. 247 00:11:06,601 --> 00:11:08,590 it is not a sport, it's torture. 248 00:11:08,590 --> 00:11:09,740 (Laughter) 249 00:11:09,740 --> 00:11:11,709 Three or four friends came with me. 250 00:11:11,830 --> 00:11:13,343 Haven't spoken to me since, 251 00:11:13,372 --> 00:11:14,483 (Laughter) 252 00:11:14,483 --> 00:11:16,236 but that's another story. 253 00:11:16,617 --> 00:11:19,480 When I went flyboarding, everyone who saw the video thought, 254 00:11:19,480 --> 00:11:22,525 "Where can I do that? I want to sign up for that, too!" 255 00:11:22,525 --> 00:11:25,017 So people got sucked in to this idea. 256 00:11:25,017 --> 00:11:28,497 And you'd be amazed how open other people are also. 257 00:11:28,647 --> 00:11:29,697 We had a dinner party 258 00:11:29,697 --> 00:11:33,240 where we asked all our friends to wear their wedding dresses one last time. 259 00:11:33,330 --> 00:11:34,881 (Laughter) 260 00:11:35,433 --> 00:11:37,358 How many women in the room, in the world 261 00:11:37,358 --> 00:11:40,978 have a wedding dress they have worn once and never again? 262 00:11:40,978 --> 00:11:44,774 And you give people an opportunity, and suddenly, no problem! Bring it on! 263 00:11:45,533 --> 00:11:48,361 And you'll, again, realise, during this experiment, 264 00:11:48,361 --> 00:11:50,532 just how often you say no. 265 00:11:50,532 --> 00:11:53,363 Do you know how often you all say no in life every day? 266 00:11:53,363 --> 00:11:56,003 People say, "Can you come to this" or "I'm doing that," 267 00:11:56,003 --> 00:11:59,883 and you say, "Yeah, I'd like to, but hmm, I don't know or I don't, hmm, know." 268 00:11:59,883 --> 00:12:00,967 You hesitate. 269 00:12:00,967 --> 00:12:03,309 When you are a Time-Bender, you have to say yes. 270 00:12:03,309 --> 00:12:06,985 Because this could be the day that passes, that nothing happens in your life, 271 00:12:06,985 --> 00:12:08,329 and you fail the experiment. 272 00:12:08,329 --> 00:12:11,332 So you say yes to everything, to anything that comes your way 273 00:12:11,332 --> 00:12:13,524 to make sure that this one day you don't fail. 274 00:12:13,524 --> 00:12:14,989 Now, this is dangerous, 275 00:12:14,989 --> 00:12:18,441 because your friends learn this, that you will do anything. 276 00:12:18,461 --> 00:12:19,461 (Laughter) 277 00:12:19,481 --> 00:12:21,627 And then on your suggestion wall on Facebook, 278 00:12:21,627 --> 00:12:23,204 they start making you do things. 279 00:12:23,204 --> 00:12:26,827 Like Shane, who suggested that I drink my own urine out of a champagne flute. 280 00:12:26,837 --> 00:12:28,157 (Laughter) 281 00:12:28,357 --> 00:12:30,111 Or I was made get a tattoo. 282 00:12:30,111 --> 00:12:32,974 I don't like tattoos; I have a tattoo. 283 00:12:33,004 --> 00:12:34,664 (Laughter) 284 00:12:35,354 --> 00:12:39,112 I was made wax a part of my body that has never even seen the sunlight. 285 00:12:39,760 --> 00:12:41,693 If you ever want to know, 286 00:12:41,693 --> 00:12:44,607 the face of a man getting the crack of his ass waxed, 287 00:12:44,627 --> 00:12:45,627 (Laughter) 288 00:12:45,647 --> 00:12:49,145 this is the face you make when you get your ass waxed. 289 00:12:49,145 --> 00:12:51,865 (Laughter) (Applause) 290 00:12:55,725 --> 00:12:58,455 The photographs at the other end are not available. 291 00:12:58,455 --> 00:13:00,291 (Laughter) 292 00:13:00,591 --> 00:13:03,130 And your eight-year-old son also learns this 293 00:13:03,130 --> 00:13:06,280 and tells you to go grocery shopping wearing nothing but a towel. 294 00:13:06,305 --> 00:13:07,365 (Laughter) 295 00:13:07,370 --> 00:13:09,360 I think I'm the only person in the world 296 00:13:09,360 --> 00:13:11,801 to be barred from Marks food and vegetable shop. 297 00:13:11,801 --> 00:13:14,080 The lesson I learnt is that it's not a good idea 298 00:13:14,080 --> 00:13:17,144 to leave your eight-year-old old son with your fate in his hands. 299 00:13:17,144 --> 00:13:19,874 But what you also learn by doing this experiment 300 00:13:19,874 --> 00:13:22,239 is that life is great fun. 301 00:13:22,658 --> 00:13:26,240 When you say yes to everything, play will find you. 302 00:13:26,240 --> 00:13:27,936 And I mean play in real play. 303 00:13:27,936 --> 00:13:30,290 Real play actually doesn't really have a purpose. 304 00:13:30,290 --> 00:13:32,337 Real play is just for play's sake. 305 00:13:32,337 --> 00:13:34,870 Kids know this automatically. They know it naturally. 306 00:13:34,870 --> 00:13:37,492 And somehow we unlearn it as adults. 307 00:13:37,492 --> 00:13:40,012 So you say yes to everything. Play will find you. 308 00:13:40,214 --> 00:13:42,362 And what's interesting about this experiment 309 00:13:42,362 --> 00:13:47,642 is I suddenly realised that this is how you permanently foster play in adults. 310 00:13:47,642 --> 00:13:49,929 We all know that play is really important. 311 00:13:49,929 --> 00:13:53,387 OK? We all know that Play leads to creativity, which leads to innovation. 312 00:13:53,387 --> 00:13:55,185 There's been lots of books, articles, 313 00:13:55,185 --> 00:13:57,555 some fantastic TED talks in the past on play 314 00:13:57,555 --> 00:14:00,470 and the importance of play leading to creativity. 315 00:14:00,470 --> 00:14:02,972 Small business know this; big corporations know this. 316 00:14:02,972 --> 00:14:06,412 And as I played on, I thought, do you know what? 317 00:14:06,984 --> 00:14:09,926 Everyone wants creativity; everyone wants innovation. 318 00:14:09,926 --> 00:14:11,828 They want this to lead them to success. 319 00:14:11,828 --> 00:14:14,678 But we need to understand how to foster that creativity, 320 00:14:14,678 --> 00:14:17,398 how can we foster an everyday sense of play? 321 00:14:17,398 --> 00:14:20,722 How can we make the people who work in our hospitals, in our schools, 322 00:14:20,726 --> 00:14:22,702 in our small businesses and corporations 323 00:14:22,702 --> 00:14:25,742 more playful every day so we can fuel this creativity? 324 00:14:25,742 --> 00:14:27,641 How to make them play at everyday level? 325 00:14:27,641 --> 00:14:31,492 The problem with most corporations and their attitude to creativity and play 326 00:14:31,492 --> 00:14:33,040 is that they fail at doing it 327 00:14:33,040 --> 00:14:35,660 because they try to enforce it on their employees. 328 00:14:35,660 --> 00:14:37,171 It's play on their terms. 329 00:14:37,171 --> 00:14:40,561 They send you off to the woods to shoot each other with paintball guns, 330 00:14:40,561 --> 00:14:44,970 or they put a snooker table in the canteen and call it, "Hey! Play!" 331 00:14:44,970 --> 00:14:47,070 But it doesn't really change things. 332 00:14:47,070 --> 00:14:49,537 And I think a corporation or an organization 333 00:14:49,537 --> 00:14:50,948 can't actually be responsible 334 00:14:50,948 --> 00:14:53,184 for your sense of creativity and play anyway. 335 00:14:53,184 --> 00:14:56,660 Just like they can't be responsible for your happiness or your health. 336 00:14:56,660 --> 00:14:59,019 I mean, they can encourage, they can facilitate, 337 00:14:59,019 --> 00:15:02,339 but the actual spark of who you are in terms of creativity and play, 338 00:15:02,339 --> 00:15:05,217 it has to come from you, inside yourself. 339 00:15:05,217 --> 00:15:08,217 So if we are going to solve problems in new ways in the world, 340 00:15:08,217 --> 00:15:11,654 if we are going to challenge norms and push boundaries, 341 00:15:11,654 --> 00:15:14,384 then it needs to start with you, the individual. 342 00:15:14,384 --> 00:15:16,977 You can't hope that a corporation will do it for you. 343 00:15:16,977 --> 00:15:18,094 It also has to last. 344 00:15:18,254 --> 00:15:21,082 This can't be just a book you read or a TED talk you watched 345 00:15:21,082 --> 00:15:22,753 or a one-day workshop you went to. 346 00:15:22,753 --> 00:15:25,551 If we want to be creative, it has to be a permanent thing. 347 00:15:25,551 --> 00:15:27,722 It has to become a philosophy for who you are, 348 00:15:27,722 --> 00:15:30,746 and permeate your every moment, your everyday life. 349 00:15:30,746 --> 00:15:32,526 This is what I became interested in. 350 00:15:32,526 --> 00:15:34,218 100 days into my experiment, 351 00:15:34,218 --> 00:15:37,313 I practically heard it click inside myself. 352 00:15:37,936 --> 00:15:41,197 I had a perspective shift on the world that will never go away now. 353 00:15:41,197 --> 00:15:42,359 It is now who I am. 354 00:15:42,359 --> 00:15:44,777 It has changed my personal life, I've laughed more, 355 00:15:44,777 --> 00:15:48,100 I've learnt more, I've had more fun, I take more risks. 356 00:15:48,490 --> 00:15:50,900 It fuels your relationships, your sex life, 357 00:15:50,900 --> 00:15:53,927 you take risks which then filter into business life, 358 00:15:53,927 --> 00:15:56,178 and in your business life you take more risks. 359 00:15:56,178 --> 00:15:59,279 You become open to opportunities, you solve problems in new ways. 360 00:15:59,279 --> 00:16:02,290 And risk, of course, is the heart of innovation and creativity. 361 00:16:02,290 --> 00:16:04,430 Nothing ever happens unless you take a risk. 362 00:16:04,430 --> 00:16:08,300 A year ago I wouldn't have expected that I would walk across broken glass 363 00:16:08,484 --> 00:16:11,524 or that I would go on Europe's tallest roller coaster. 364 00:16:11,534 --> 00:16:15,474 I hate roller coasters. But you just say yes. 365 00:16:15,690 --> 00:16:18,753 Who would have thought that I would have pierced a friend's ear? 366 00:16:18,753 --> 00:16:21,050 I had no idea of what I was doing. 367 00:16:21,050 --> 00:16:22,050 (Laughter) 368 00:16:22,050 --> 00:16:23,377 I still don't! 369 00:16:24,197 --> 00:16:25,220 But you just say yes. 370 00:16:25,220 --> 00:16:28,217 You go from being a guy who says, "Oh, maybe, I'm not too sure," 371 00:16:28,217 --> 00:16:29,889 you go to being a guy who says yes. 372 00:16:29,889 --> 00:16:31,189 You say yes to everything. 373 00:16:31,189 --> 00:16:34,713 And here I am on day 318 of my experiment. 374 00:16:34,713 --> 00:16:39,451 My new experience for today? Quite easy. My first TED talk. 375 00:16:39,580 --> 00:16:42,050 (Applause) 376 00:16:42,050 --> 00:16:43,129 Thank you. 377 00:16:47,430 --> 00:16:50,899 But you don't have to follow me on the 365-day version. 378 00:16:50,899 --> 00:16:54,320 100 days of your life, three months, 12 weeks 379 00:16:54,320 --> 00:16:57,234 is all it will take for this perspective shift. 380 00:16:57,234 --> 00:17:00,509 So I'm travelling the world now recruiting Time-Benders, 381 00:17:00,509 --> 00:17:03,235 [who] agree to live a life less ordinary. 382 00:17:03,235 --> 00:17:05,477 A life in colour instead of the black and white. 383 00:17:05,477 --> 00:17:08,019 So go home and write your list, 20 or 30 things. 384 00:17:08,019 --> 00:17:11,138 They can be small things and don't have to be jumping off planes. 385 00:17:11,138 --> 00:17:12,919 Small things that you're going to do. 386 00:17:12,919 --> 00:17:16,042 Ask your family and friends, they'll give you another 20-30 ideas. 387 00:17:16,042 --> 00:17:18,414 Ask the internet, you'll get 2,000 ideas. 388 00:17:18,414 --> 00:17:20,162 Keep a journal; it's a good way. 389 00:17:20,162 --> 00:17:22,220 Keep a journal every day, challenge yourself 390 00:17:22,220 --> 00:17:23,480 into, "What did I do?" 391 00:17:23,480 --> 00:17:26,293 "What did I do today that was different, that was unique?" 392 00:17:26,293 --> 00:17:29,410 How can we expect to solve problems in new ways 393 00:17:29,410 --> 00:17:32,797 if we do the same thing every day, if we take things for granted? 394 00:17:32,797 --> 00:17:35,313 I travel a lot. I spend a lot of time in hotel rooms. 395 00:17:35,313 --> 00:17:37,202 Hotel rooms can be quite boring places. 396 00:17:37,202 --> 00:17:40,040 This is what you get. This is not how I slept last night. 397 00:17:40,040 --> 00:17:42,217 How I slept last night was like this. 398 00:17:42,217 --> 00:17:43,772 (Laughter) 399 00:17:43,772 --> 00:17:47,780 Don't take what's given to you for granted. 400 00:17:47,780 --> 00:17:51,211 And again, this was a hotel two weeks ago around Halloween. 401 00:17:51,321 --> 00:17:54,162 This is how I arrived. This is how I left the hotel room. 402 00:17:54,162 --> 00:17:55,162 (Laughter) 403 00:17:55,162 --> 00:17:58,788 What rule? Is there a rule that says you can't decorate your own hotel room? 404 00:17:58,788 --> 00:17:59,798 (Laughter) 405 00:17:59,798 --> 00:18:01,988 I'd love to have seen the face of housekeeping 406 00:18:01,988 --> 00:18:03,558 when they opened the door. 407 00:18:03,578 --> 00:18:04,798 "What the heck?!" 408 00:18:05,439 --> 00:18:06,845 So I'm curious. 409 00:18:06,845 --> 00:18:09,049 You have to change things all the time. 410 00:18:09,049 --> 00:18:11,936 Look at the work spaces that we work in, your own work space. 411 00:18:11,936 --> 00:18:13,477 Think about your own work space. 412 00:18:13,477 --> 00:18:14,518 Why would you think 413 00:18:14,518 --> 00:18:16,768 you're going to be suddenly be creative one day 414 00:18:16,768 --> 00:18:19,527 if you sit in the same chair, same desk in the same corner, 415 00:18:19,527 --> 00:18:21,267 in the same office every single day. 416 00:18:21,267 --> 00:18:23,529 Change your work space every two or three weeks. 417 00:18:23,529 --> 00:18:26,104 Change the art, change the decor, change the building. 418 00:18:26,104 --> 00:18:27,214 Change where you work. 419 00:18:27,214 --> 00:18:30,110 How are you going to be creative if you keep things the same? 420 00:18:30,110 --> 00:18:32,678 Once you open up, once you start this experiment, 421 00:18:32,678 --> 00:18:34,740 what you learn is that it becomes a habit. 422 00:18:34,740 --> 00:18:36,998 You actually don't need the journal anymore. 423 00:18:36,998 --> 00:18:40,325 You don't need the challenge of having to do something every day 424 00:18:40,325 --> 00:18:44,073 because you will do two or three or four things every single day regardless. 425 00:18:44,073 --> 00:18:46,980 Who would have thought that if you went into your dentist 426 00:18:46,980 --> 00:18:49,630 and asked him, instead of him cleaning your teeth, 427 00:18:49,630 --> 00:18:51,245 that you were going to clean his, 428 00:18:51,245 --> 00:18:52,249 (Laughter) 429 00:18:52,249 --> 00:18:53,740 that he would say yes? 430 00:18:54,054 --> 00:18:56,384 The world will say yes to you. 431 00:18:56,707 --> 00:18:57,820 Time Bending. 432 00:18:57,820 --> 00:18:59,267 The world is a playground. 433 00:18:59,267 --> 00:19:02,267 All you need to do is step up and play. 434 00:19:02,507 --> 00:19:04,090 Thank you. 435 00:19:04,090 --> 00:19:07,300 (Applause)