Brainchild (2018) s01e07 Episode Script
Motivation
[football whistle]
The Rovers are headed
to the locker room down at the half.
You gotta wonder
what Coach Shandler's gonna say
to motivate his team
to a big second-half comeback.
All right, fellas. Bring it in.
Come on.
Let's go!
All right, let's face it.
We're done.
They're killing us out there.
It'd be different if we were down
by seven or ten, even fourteen
but 46?!
Not gonna happen, guys.
If you guys wanna
hit the showers, it's fine with me
Forfeit on three.
-One, two
-Wait!
That's your big motivational speech?
What can I say?
We played like wet
garbage. My coaching staff stinks.
Even the mascot is terrible.
Hey, no shame in quitting, boys!
Or you can motivate your team
to get back out there and fight!
-All right.
-Come on, Coach. You got this.
Let's do this.
All right. Listen up, losers!
That was absolutely pathetic!
All right. Let's go!
Arrrrrrrrrrrrgggggghh!
I tried.
Wow! You got a lot to learn
about motivation.
Like, where does motivation come from?
How d'you motivate yourself
to do stuff that
you don't want to do? And most of all,
how d'a keep going
when the going gets tough?
Good question. Beats me.
Watch and learn on Brainchild.
[crowd cheers]
[alarm clock peeps]
Some days you just feel like
hitting the snooze button on life,
but you can't stay in all day.
-What's your deal?
-Sorry, lazy boy,
but it's time to learn about motivation.
I'm hungry.
-Can you make me some pancakes?
-No!
But I can help increase your drive
to get outta bed,
make your own breakfast
and get through your to-do list.
-Ugh! Pass!
-Oh, no you don't.
The first step to hacking motivation
is figuring out what gets you
so motivated in the first place,
and to do that,
we're gonna play a little game.
A game?
I'm listening.
It's time for you to play
during the halftime show.
Step up to the drum line.
Pay attention as the drummers
play a short beat,
then try to repeat it exactly the same.
You can clap your hands or
tap out the beat on a table or your body.
[basic drum beat]
Okay. Your turn. Repeat the beat.
[silence]
Not super easy,
but you were probably close.
Okay, drum pros, here's a new one.
[more complex drum beat]
Now, it's your turn.
[silence]
Okay. Now that was a challenge, right?
Chances are you'd need a little
more practice before you nailed it.
[football whistle]
So, here's the question,
how many of you will be motivated
to rewind the show and keep trying
until you get it?
A few might,
but most of you're probably like
-Pass.
-After all,
what's the point
of clapping out this beat?
But what if I said,
"If you record a video of yourself
perfectly clapping or tapping
this exact beat,
and text it to the number on the screen,
you'll get a chance to win $1,000"?
So, are you thinking about going back
and practicing now?
Well, maybe not all of you,
but a lot more than before.
So, what changed?
Well, duh, we offered you
a chance to win money.
Otherwise known as "an incentive."
And incentives play a big part
in motivation.
To explain, here's Alie.
When it comes to getting motivated
most experts agree
on the drive theory of motivation.
So in other words,
you're driven by your needs.
I mean, after all, why would prehistoric
humans leave the safety of their caves
unless they were motivated
by basic survival needs
like food, water and clothing?
Today, you're motivated by things
like money,
maybe getting a good grade in class,
acceptance by your peers,
or even winning the big game.
Basically, anything that drives you
to do something
can be seen by your brain
as a motivating factor.
In other words, we use the old
carrot-on-a-stick trick.
Hee-haw! Carrot.
Of course, most kids wouldn't
do much for an actual carrot.
It would probably look more like this.
Phone!
Phone!
But here's the best part. Your brain
will release pleasure chemicals
like dopamine, just for trying.
You don't even have to be fully successful
in order to feel good.
Which is why you feel
a sense of satisfaction
whenever you've given something
your very best effort.
Kinda like
the ultimate participation trophy.
[Sahana] Ok. You're probably onto us.
We're not really holding a drum beat
clapping sweepstakes,
but, just the possibility
of winning a prize
can motivate you to not give up and keep
trying something.
Sounds simple enough, right?
Then how come it's so easy
to get demotivated?
Let's find out in this next experiment.
Stop the music ♪
Stop.
We've brought in some young volunteers
who think they're here
to try out a new dance video game
called "Stop The Music."
-What is that?
-It looks so awesome.
But what they're really here for
is to test our theory on demotivation.
Unlike other dance games where you have to
move to the beat, the goal here
is to find the right combination
of dance moves to turn the music off.
Why would you wanna
stop the music?
Because it sounds like this:
-[fast, bleepy, dance music]
-[cat miaows]
[klaxon blows]
[fast, loud, dance music]
Arrrgh! Okay! Turn it off!
-[music stops]
The music is very annoying.
Well, all they have to do
to stop the annoying music
is guess the secret dance pattern
using the arrows below.
Let's see if our first player
can crack the code.
-[sped-up dance music]
-It's a kiddies' song.
[kid] That's cool.
[kid 2] This is so annoying.
[kid 3] So bad!
I did it!
Not bad. Do you think
our other players can figure it out, too?
[music plays]
[kid] It's the same stupid song again!
[music gets higher]
[kid] Make it stop!
Uh oh. He can't seem to get it.
-[kid] Nice knowing you!
-And he's not the only one.
[music plays]
[kid] Time's almost up!
You lost.
[music plays]
-She got it.
-Yeahhhh!
But she didn't.
So, are some kids just better
at figuring out secret dance moves
while others fail miserably?
Or, is there something else going on?
This is rigged!
Whoa! That's a serious accusation,
but he's right.
There's no code to crack.
We're backstage stopping the music
and picking who wins
and who loses.
Make it stop!
Why are we doing this?
To demonstrate the destructive power
of demotivation.
It's so disappointing.
But before we show you what's in store
for these kids,
here's a game
to keep you on your toes at home.
Word Find.
We're going to give you 15 seconds
to make as many words as you can
from the letters in this grid.
For example,
you could make the word "stoked."
Okay. Are you stoked to try this game?
Fifteen seconds on the clock.
Go!
Time's up!
If you made eight or more words,
that's amazing,
but what does a word game have to
do with dancing or these kids?
Good question.
All of these kids were equally motivated
to win our dance game,
but now that some have succeeded
and others have failed
I don't have much confidence.
we're bringing our tiny dancers
to the classroom, and giving them
five minutes to play
the same word-find game you just played.
Ready? Go.
Looks like some of these kids
are at no loss for words,
while others are
quick to give up.
Okay. Pencils down.
Would you believe there are a total
of 3,834 possible words
hidden in this jumble?
What does this have to do with
our dance challenge?
It turns out, the kids who won
our dancing competition
were on average
able to find three times
as many words as the kids who lost,
and a few of our struggling dancers
actually gave up with time still on
the clock.
But why?
You're witnessing a phenomenon
known as learned helplessness.
When you feel your actions have no effect,
it can make you feel powerless and lower
your motivation levels across the board.
So, the frustration these kids
felt at not being able to win
the dance game,
despite trying
everything, spilled over
and caused them to come up short again.
And once again, it has to do with that
chemical in your brain called "dopamine."
I'm real bad at it.
Fortunately, the opposite is also true.
So, if you're successful
at a task, it can
boost your dopamine levels,
and that happy brain feeling
will carry over into other tasks,
sustaining your motivation.
Life hack alert!
If you're struggling
to finish a difficult task,
like winning a dance competition
or finding the right words,
don't give up! Instead,
take a short break to do something
you're really good at,
like a game you've mastered,
a musical instrument,
or a sport.
Then, get back to what you were doing
with boosted confidence,
a positive attitude,
and a lot more motivation
to reach your goals.
But what do you do
when your goal is terrifying,
like cleaning a room that looks like this?
Arrrghhhhh!
Yikes! Where would you even start?
Might as well give up
and start a new life under the covers,
but that's probably not going to fly.
So, how do you motivate yourself
to do things you don't want to do?
The next time you have a big task,
break it down with science,
and a checklist.
Writing out each step is a proven way
to make overwhelming tasks
appear much more achievable.
This way
you can level up without giving up.
I just made that up.
Tadarr!
But there's a big part of motivation
that we haven't touched on yet.
It's why it's so hard to do things
like your homework
and so easy to do things
like play video games,
hang out with your friends,
or make an ice-cream sundae.
Yummy!
'Cause it's fun!
So, just how powerful is fun
when it comes to motivation?
You're about to find out.
Dancing with the stairs.
Here's a choice people often face:
escalator
or stairs? If you're
like most people,
it's the escalators all the way.
Why waste time and energy
climbing stairs
you don't have to, right?
But can you think of a way that
we could motivate people to choose
stairs over the escalator?
Well, what if instead of
a boring old staircase,
we turned it into
musical stairs?
So, do you think
our magical musical staircase
will motivate people to take the stairs
instead of the escalators?
Let's find out!
[musical scales gradually get higher]
Wahoo!
Right off the bat,
we have our first potential stair master!
Come on!
[distorted electric guitar notes]
[piano notes]
Look at that!
The stairs are
suddenly all the rage.
Not only are more people using the stairs,
they're happily running up them.
[tinkling piano notes]
So, why did adding lights and
music to the stairs
suddenly motivate all these people
to take the climb?
A great way to motivate people to do
something they might not ordinarily do
is by turning it into a game.
We call that gamification.
It's often used by companies,
governments and teachers
to encourage people
to do things like exercise,
drive safely or even
take the stairs.
Next time you have a monster to-do list
of stuff you don't wanna do, like
walking the dog or doing the dishes,
try thinking of ways to gamify it.
You could turn it into an epic quest
where each task
is a foe you have to vanquish.
Arrrrrrrggggghhhhhhhaaaaa!
If after all that
you're still not feeling motivated,
I got nuttin' left for you.
Well
there is one thing.
Nah. It's too crazy.
You wouldn't believe me.
Please.
Okay.
Sorcery!
You're getting sleepy!
Meet Spidey.
Now he's not a sorcerer.
He's a mentalist who is about to use
a mysterious method
to motivate our volunteers.
Today, I'm going to show you
just how powerful your own mind can be,
given the right motivation. In this case,
the motivation will be hypnosis.
Would it work on you?
I'm kind of skeptical.
You're skeptical.
Would it work on you?
I'm pretty strong in my convictions.
I don't think hypnotism
is gonna really do much.
Well, let's find out.
I'm gonna ask you to start
by shaking your head like this.
Then drop it forward
and close your eyes.
As you listen to the sound of my voice,
you give in deeper and deeper
to that state of relaxation.
When you hear the word "sleep,"
your entire body is going to collapse.
One, two, three,
and sleep. All the way down.
So, do you think these people
are really hypnotized?
When I count 3, sit up.
Your eyes are going to pop open.
You are stuck to your chair,
and can't get up.
One, two, three, eyes open.
Your strongest motivation
is the one I gave you.
You are stuck to your chair.
Try everything you got.
200 bucks.
All you have to do is get up.
Come on!
Try as hard as you can.
I can't move. I'm stuck.
Yeah. It looks like they are.
And sleep. All the way down.
All the way.
But can Spidey motivate
our sleepy volunteers
to do something they would never do?
One of the hardest things to get
yourself to do is to eat veggies.
I'm going to show you, you don't really
hate vegetables.
You just think you hate vegetables.
To do this, I'm going to use
one of the strongest,
disgusting vegetables, ever.
Ladies and gentlemen,
the onion.
[onion man] Yummy!
The two I'm touching now
and now,
sit up. Eyes open.
-Your favorite fruit?
-Apples.
-Oh, apples, too.
-You too?
That's crazy 'cause we got you
a bunch of the best ones we could find.
When you eat it,
you will taste
only your favorite fruit.
Grab one. Take one. Yeah.
Go ahead. Take nice, big bites.
I want you to really savor it.
It's nice and crunchy, huh?
These are really good.
-Is that the best apple, ever?
-This is so good. My god!
Those are definitely not apples.
Take another big bite.
Chew it.
Really get that flavor in.
You'll like it.
When I snap my fingers, you'll taste it
for what it actually is.
One, two,
three. That's an onion.
Eww!
Quick question. Why?
I don't know. D'you like onions?
Absolutely not. They're
-Why'd you make me eat an onion?
-I didn't make you.
Spidey didn't make them eat it.
He just used an extreme form of
motivation to convince both girls
they enjoy a vegetable they dislike.
Please take this away.
I want you to see what you did to this.
-Do you want some?
-Nope.
My eyes are actually watering.
Her eyes are watering, just now.
They weren't before but they are now.
But now it's time
for our ultimate motivation challenge.
Both of you, sleep.
Just how far can hypnosis
push our volunteers
to do things they wouldn't normally do?
In this day and age, lots of people
are addicted to phones.
That's why, all you need is a hypnotist.
See, hypnotists
are very good at giving you the motivation
to get off your phone.
Would you say
mom's phone is important to her?
She's always on it, like
Do you sometimes wish
you could just take that phone away?
-Yes.
-Okay.
-She would kill me.
-Yeah?
No, I would kill her.
At the count of three,
eyes open. One, two, three.
Eyes open.
Sarah, come on up right over here.
Hold this in one hand.
Michelle, do you have your phone?
-Yeah.
-Could I borrow it?
Sarah, this is your mom's phone.
Now is this very important to you?
-Of course.
-Yeah?
If anything happened to it,
you wouldn't be happy?
You wouldn't want me to drop it.
Sarah, I'm going to hold this right here.
I want you to hold it
with two fingers
That's not even funny.
Put it down.
Here's the thing.
When I snap my fingers
-[Michelle] Put it down.
-it'll drop
-into the water.
-No, it's not.
If mom can get you to put it down
we're not gonna do it.
Excuse me. Oh, Jesus!
Give me that, please!
I can't get out of the chair.
Oh, right. She's still stuck to the chair.
You got 20 seconds to convince her.
I'm not even joking. Sarah Frances,
I'm warning you right now.
I'll rip up your Hamilton stuff.
I swear, if you drop that in there,
you're dead meat.
-I snap my fingers, drop.
-She'll go live with
-her father.
-Three.
-If you drop that
-Two.
so help me God! Sarah Frances!
That's in there.
Did you do that on purpose?
-Did you wanna do that?
-Done.
Look at me, when I snap my fingers,
you'll realize you just dropped
your mom's phone
-You're dead.
-in the water.
One, two, three.
-Oh, my god. I'm sorry.
-I don't care.
-I didn't even
-You're so lucky my legs don't work.
-Can you look here?
-No, I can't.
-I'm angry.
-It's just one word.
Sleep.
All the way down. Eyes closed, nice
and relaxed. Go have a seat.
Well that's one way to help your parents
beat cell-phone addiction.
Phone!
But don't try this one at home, kids,
unless being grounded for life
sounds like fun.
Luckily for Sarah,
Spidey secretly swapped out
her mom's real phone
with a lookalike at the start,
so no phones were harmed during
the filming of this experiment
except for this one.
And don't worry, Spidey didn't leave
our volunteers hypnotized.
Full of life and energy.
Eyes open.
You come back feeling great.
But what did this show you about
the motivating power of your own mind?
Sometimes we have a hard time
finding the motivation
to do things we should be doing,
but those limits are just there
because you think they're there.
Given the right motivation
or the right push,
you can easily overcome
all of those limitations.
Thank you, everyone, for being here.
Thank you.
So, has our coach learned anything
about motivation?
All right, Coach.
You guys are down by a lot.
It's okay. I've got this.
All right, boys. We've got 30 minutes
of football left to play,
and I need you to take it
one play at a time.
Fight, for every yard.
Can you do that for me?
Yeah!
Now, you go out there
and give it your best effort,
and no matter what happens,
you'll feel like a champion
because you gave it everything
and made everybody proud.
Especially me.
So, let's get out there, with some
fire in our eyes!
And get ourselves a W!
Rovers on three!
One, two, three!
Rovers!
Arrrrrrgggggghhhhh!
Wait!
Ow!
All right. Listen up, you losers!
[team laughs]
-[director] Cut.
-All right. That's cut.
[laughter]
You can go now.
The Rovers are headed
to the locker room down at the half.
You gotta wonder
what Coach Shandler's gonna say
to motivate his team
to a big second-half comeback.
All right, fellas. Bring it in.
Come on.
Let's go!
All right, let's face it.
We're done.
They're killing us out there.
It'd be different if we were down
by seven or ten, even fourteen
but 46?!
Not gonna happen, guys.
If you guys wanna
hit the showers, it's fine with me
Forfeit on three.
-One, two
-Wait!
That's your big motivational speech?
What can I say?
We played like wet
garbage. My coaching staff stinks.
Even the mascot is terrible.
Hey, no shame in quitting, boys!
Or you can motivate your team
to get back out there and fight!
-All right.
-Come on, Coach. You got this.
Let's do this.
All right. Listen up, losers!
That was absolutely pathetic!
All right. Let's go!
Arrrrrrrrrrrrgggggghh!
I tried.
Wow! You got a lot to learn
about motivation.
Like, where does motivation come from?
How d'you motivate yourself
to do stuff that
you don't want to do? And most of all,
how d'a keep going
when the going gets tough?
Good question. Beats me.
Watch and learn on Brainchild.
[crowd cheers]
[alarm clock peeps]
Some days you just feel like
hitting the snooze button on life,
but you can't stay in all day.
-What's your deal?
-Sorry, lazy boy,
but it's time to learn about motivation.
I'm hungry.
-Can you make me some pancakes?
-No!
But I can help increase your drive
to get outta bed,
make your own breakfast
and get through your to-do list.
-Ugh! Pass!
-Oh, no you don't.
The first step to hacking motivation
is figuring out what gets you
so motivated in the first place,
and to do that,
we're gonna play a little game.
A game?
I'm listening.
It's time for you to play
during the halftime show.
Step up to the drum line.
Pay attention as the drummers
play a short beat,
then try to repeat it exactly the same.
You can clap your hands or
tap out the beat on a table or your body.
[basic drum beat]
Okay. Your turn. Repeat the beat.
[silence]
Not super easy,
but you were probably close.
Okay, drum pros, here's a new one.
[more complex drum beat]
Now, it's your turn.
[silence]
Okay. Now that was a challenge, right?
Chances are you'd need a little
more practice before you nailed it.
[football whistle]
So, here's the question,
how many of you will be motivated
to rewind the show and keep trying
until you get it?
A few might,
but most of you're probably like
-Pass.
-After all,
what's the point
of clapping out this beat?
But what if I said,
"If you record a video of yourself
perfectly clapping or tapping
this exact beat,
and text it to the number on the screen,
you'll get a chance to win $1,000"?
So, are you thinking about going back
and practicing now?
Well, maybe not all of you,
but a lot more than before.
So, what changed?
Well, duh, we offered you
a chance to win money.
Otherwise known as "an incentive."
And incentives play a big part
in motivation.
To explain, here's Alie.
When it comes to getting motivated
most experts agree
on the drive theory of motivation.
So in other words,
you're driven by your needs.
I mean, after all, why would prehistoric
humans leave the safety of their caves
unless they were motivated
by basic survival needs
like food, water and clothing?
Today, you're motivated by things
like money,
maybe getting a good grade in class,
acceptance by your peers,
or even winning the big game.
Basically, anything that drives you
to do something
can be seen by your brain
as a motivating factor.
In other words, we use the old
carrot-on-a-stick trick.
Hee-haw! Carrot.
Of course, most kids wouldn't
do much for an actual carrot.
It would probably look more like this.
Phone!
Phone!
But here's the best part. Your brain
will release pleasure chemicals
like dopamine, just for trying.
You don't even have to be fully successful
in order to feel good.
Which is why you feel
a sense of satisfaction
whenever you've given something
your very best effort.
Kinda like
the ultimate participation trophy.
[Sahana] Ok. You're probably onto us.
We're not really holding a drum beat
clapping sweepstakes,
but, just the possibility
of winning a prize
can motivate you to not give up and keep
trying something.
Sounds simple enough, right?
Then how come it's so easy
to get demotivated?
Let's find out in this next experiment.
Stop the music ♪
Stop.
We've brought in some young volunteers
who think they're here
to try out a new dance video game
called "Stop The Music."
-What is that?
-It looks so awesome.
But what they're really here for
is to test our theory on demotivation.
Unlike other dance games where you have to
move to the beat, the goal here
is to find the right combination
of dance moves to turn the music off.
Why would you wanna
stop the music?
Because it sounds like this:
-[fast, bleepy, dance music]
-[cat miaows]
[klaxon blows]
[fast, loud, dance music]
Arrrgh! Okay! Turn it off!
-[music stops]
The music is very annoying.
Well, all they have to do
to stop the annoying music
is guess the secret dance pattern
using the arrows below.
Let's see if our first player
can crack the code.
-[sped-up dance music]
-It's a kiddies' song.
[kid] That's cool.
[kid 2] This is so annoying.
[kid 3] So bad!
I did it!
Not bad. Do you think
our other players can figure it out, too?
[music plays]
[kid] It's the same stupid song again!
[music gets higher]
[kid] Make it stop!
Uh oh. He can't seem to get it.
-[kid] Nice knowing you!
-And he's not the only one.
[music plays]
[kid] Time's almost up!
You lost.
[music plays]
-She got it.
-Yeahhhh!
But she didn't.
So, are some kids just better
at figuring out secret dance moves
while others fail miserably?
Or, is there something else going on?
This is rigged!
Whoa! That's a serious accusation,
but he's right.
There's no code to crack.
We're backstage stopping the music
and picking who wins
and who loses.
Make it stop!
Why are we doing this?
To demonstrate the destructive power
of demotivation.
It's so disappointing.
But before we show you what's in store
for these kids,
here's a game
to keep you on your toes at home.
Word Find.
We're going to give you 15 seconds
to make as many words as you can
from the letters in this grid.
For example,
you could make the word "stoked."
Okay. Are you stoked to try this game?
Fifteen seconds on the clock.
Go!
Time's up!
If you made eight or more words,
that's amazing,
but what does a word game have to
do with dancing or these kids?
Good question.
All of these kids were equally motivated
to win our dance game,
but now that some have succeeded
and others have failed
I don't have much confidence.
we're bringing our tiny dancers
to the classroom, and giving them
five minutes to play
the same word-find game you just played.
Ready? Go.
Looks like some of these kids
are at no loss for words,
while others are
quick to give up.
Okay. Pencils down.
Would you believe there are a total
of 3,834 possible words
hidden in this jumble?
What does this have to do with
our dance challenge?
It turns out, the kids who won
our dancing competition
were on average
able to find three times
as many words as the kids who lost,
and a few of our struggling dancers
actually gave up with time still on
the clock.
But why?
You're witnessing a phenomenon
known as learned helplessness.
When you feel your actions have no effect,
it can make you feel powerless and lower
your motivation levels across the board.
So, the frustration these kids
felt at not being able to win
the dance game,
despite trying
everything, spilled over
and caused them to come up short again.
And once again, it has to do with that
chemical in your brain called "dopamine."
I'm real bad at it.
Fortunately, the opposite is also true.
So, if you're successful
at a task, it can
boost your dopamine levels,
and that happy brain feeling
will carry over into other tasks,
sustaining your motivation.
Life hack alert!
If you're struggling
to finish a difficult task,
like winning a dance competition
or finding the right words,
don't give up! Instead,
take a short break to do something
you're really good at,
like a game you've mastered,
a musical instrument,
or a sport.
Then, get back to what you were doing
with boosted confidence,
a positive attitude,
and a lot more motivation
to reach your goals.
But what do you do
when your goal is terrifying,
like cleaning a room that looks like this?
Arrrghhhhh!
Yikes! Where would you even start?
Might as well give up
and start a new life under the covers,
but that's probably not going to fly.
So, how do you motivate yourself
to do things you don't want to do?
The next time you have a big task,
break it down with science,
and a checklist.
Writing out each step is a proven way
to make overwhelming tasks
appear much more achievable.
This way
you can level up without giving up.
I just made that up.
Tadarr!
But there's a big part of motivation
that we haven't touched on yet.
It's why it's so hard to do things
like your homework
and so easy to do things
like play video games,
hang out with your friends,
or make an ice-cream sundae.
Yummy!
'Cause it's fun!
So, just how powerful is fun
when it comes to motivation?
You're about to find out.
Dancing with the stairs.
Here's a choice people often face:
escalator
or stairs? If you're
like most people,
it's the escalators all the way.
Why waste time and energy
climbing stairs
you don't have to, right?
But can you think of a way that
we could motivate people to choose
stairs over the escalator?
Well, what if instead of
a boring old staircase,
we turned it into
musical stairs?
So, do you think
our magical musical staircase
will motivate people to take the stairs
instead of the escalators?
Let's find out!
[musical scales gradually get higher]
Wahoo!
Right off the bat,
we have our first potential stair master!
Come on!
[distorted electric guitar notes]
[piano notes]
Look at that!
The stairs are
suddenly all the rage.
Not only are more people using the stairs,
they're happily running up them.
[tinkling piano notes]
So, why did adding lights and
music to the stairs
suddenly motivate all these people
to take the climb?
A great way to motivate people to do
something they might not ordinarily do
is by turning it into a game.
We call that gamification.
It's often used by companies,
governments and teachers
to encourage people
to do things like exercise,
drive safely or even
take the stairs.
Next time you have a monster to-do list
of stuff you don't wanna do, like
walking the dog or doing the dishes,
try thinking of ways to gamify it.
You could turn it into an epic quest
where each task
is a foe you have to vanquish.
Arrrrrrrggggghhhhhhhaaaaa!
If after all that
you're still not feeling motivated,
I got nuttin' left for you.
Well
there is one thing.
Nah. It's too crazy.
You wouldn't believe me.
Please.
Okay.
Sorcery!
You're getting sleepy!
Meet Spidey.
Now he's not a sorcerer.
He's a mentalist who is about to use
a mysterious method
to motivate our volunteers.
Today, I'm going to show you
just how powerful your own mind can be,
given the right motivation. In this case,
the motivation will be hypnosis.
Would it work on you?
I'm kind of skeptical.
You're skeptical.
Would it work on you?
I'm pretty strong in my convictions.
I don't think hypnotism
is gonna really do much.
Well, let's find out.
I'm gonna ask you to start
by shaking your head like this.
Then drop it forward
and close your eyes.
As you listen to the sound of my voice,
you give in deeper and deeper
to that state of relaxation.
When you hear the word "sleep,"
your entire body is going to collapse.
One, two, three,
and sleep. All the way down.
So, do you think these people
are really hypnotized?
When I count 3, sit up.
Your eyes are going to pop open.
You are stuck to your chair,
and can't get up.
One, two, three, eyes open.
Your strongest motivation
is the one I gave you.
You are stuck to your chair.
Try everything you got.
200 bucks.
All you have to do is get up.
Come on!
Try as hard as you can.
I can't move. I'm stuck.
Yeah. It looks like they are.
And sleep. All the way down.
All the way.
But can Spidey motivate
our sleepy volunteers
to do something they would never do?
One of the hardest things to get
yourself to do is to eat veggies.
I'm going to show you, you don't really
hate vegetables.
You just think you hate vegetables.
To do this, I'm going to use
one of the strongest,
disgusting vegetables, ever.
Ladies and gentlemen,
the onion.
[onion man] Yummy!
The two I'm touching now
and now,
sit up. Eyes open.
-Your favorite fruit?
-Apples.
-Oh, apples, too.
-You too?
That's crazy 'cause we got you
a bunch of the best ones we could find.
When you eat it,
you will taste
only your favorite fruit.
Grab one. Take one. Yeah.
Go ahead. Take nice, big bites.
I want you to really savor it.
It's nice and crunchy, huh?
These are really good.
-Is that the best apple, ever?
-This is so good. My god!
Those are definitely not apples.
Take another big bite.
Chew it.
Really get that flavor in.
You'll like it.
When I snap my fingers, you'll taste it
for what it actually is.
One, two,
three. That's an onion.
Eww!
Quick question. Why?
I don't know. D'you like onions?
Absolutely not. They're
-Why'd you make me eat an onion?
-I didn't make you.
Spidey didn't make them eat it.
He just used an extreme form of
motivation to convince both girls
they enjoy a vegetable they dislike.
Please take this away.
I want you to see what you did to this.
-Do you want some?
-Nope.
My eyes are actually watering.
Her eyes are watering, just now.
They weren't before but they are now.
But now it's time
for our ultimate motivation challenge.
Both of you, sleep.
Just how far can hypnosis
push our volunteers
to do things they wouldn't normally do?
In this day and age, lots of people
are addicted to phones.
That's why, all you need is a hypnotist.
See, hypnotists
are very good at giving you the motivation
to get off your phone.
Would you say
mom's phone is important to her?
She's always on it, like
Do you sometimes wish
you could just take that phone away?
-Yes.
-Okay.
-She would kill me.
-Yeah?
No, I would kill her.
At the count of three,
eyes open. One, two, three.
Eyes open.
Sarah, come on up right over here.
Hold this in one hand.
Michelle, do you have your phone?
-Yeah.
-Could I borrow it?
Sarah, this is your mom's phone.
Now is this very important to you?
-Of course.
-Yeah?
If anything happened to it,
you wouldn't be happy?
You wouldn't want me to drop it.
Sarah, I'm going to hold this right here.
I want you to hold it
with two fingers
That's not even funny.
Put it down.
Here's the thing.
When I snap my fingers
-[Michelle] Put it down.
-it'll drop
-into the water.
-No, it's not.
If mom can get you to put it down
we're not gonna do it.
Excuse me. Oh, Jesus!
Give me that, please!
I can't get out of the chair.
Oh, right. She's still stuck to the chair.
You got 20 seconds to convince her.
I'm not even joking. Sarah Frances,
I'm warning you right now.
I'll rip up your Hamilton stuff.
I swear, if you drop that in there,
you're dead meat.
-I snap my fingers, drop.
-She'll go live with
-her father.
-Three.
-If you drop that
-Two.
so help me God! Sarah Frances!
That's in there.
Did you do that on purpose?
-Did you wanna do that?
-Done.
Look at me, when I snap my fingers,
you'll realize you just dropped
your mom's phone
-You're dead.
-in the water.
One, two, three.
-Oh, my god. I'm sorry.
-I don't care.
-I didn't even
-You're so lucky my legs don't work.
-Can you look here?
-No, I can't.
-I'm angry.
-It's just one word.
Sleep.
All the way down. Eyes closed, nice
and relaxed. Go have a seat.
Well that's one way to help your parents
beat cell-phone addiction.
Phone!
But don't try this one at home, kids,
unless being grounded for life
sounds like fun.
Luckily for Sarah,
Spidey secretly swapped out
her mom's real phone
with a lookalike at the start,
so no phones were harmed during
the filming of this experiment
except for this one.
And don't worry, Spidey didn't leave
our volunteers hypnotized.
Full of life and energy.
Eyes open.
You come back feeling great.
But what did this show you about
the motivating power of your own mind?
Sometimes we have a hard time
finding the motivation
to do things we should be doing,
but those limits are just there
because you think they're there.
Given the right motivation
or the right push,
you can easily overcome
all of those limitations.
Thank you, everyone, for being here.
Thank you.
So, has our coach learned anything
about motivation?
All right, Coach.
You guys are down by a lot.
It's okay. I've got this.
All right, boys. We've got 30 minutes
of football left to play,
and I need you to take it
one play at a time.
Fight, for every yard.
Can you do that for me?
Yeah!
Now, you go out there
and give it your best effort,
and no matter what happens,
you'll feel like a champion
because you gave it everything
and made everybody proud.
Especially me.
So, let's get out there, with some
fire in our eyes!
And get ourselves a W!
Rovers on three!
One, two, three!
Rovers!
Arrrrrrgggggghhhhh!
Wait!
Ow!
All right. Listen up, you losers!
[team laughs]
-[director] Cut.
-All right. That's cut.
[laughter]
You can go now.