Control pattern recognition like a Tetris master

[Music]

so i’m in this relationship

and a few months ago my girlfriend and i

were fighting a lot

we just couldn’t seem to find any ways

to agree with each other

on many things and after each fight just

like any responsible boyfriend

i chose to play video games to forget

about everything

but surprisingly enough

uh but surprisingly enough a puzzle game

called tetris

actually had the answer for our

relationship playing the game

i realized that i was thinking was just

following a very destructive pattern for

us

as a couple and we had to do something

about it

so today i would like to share about how

teachers can save a relationship

and

and our teachers can help us improve

pattern recognition control

in life so what is tetris

the rule is very simple there are seven

random pieces that are just like my

academic scores

falling constantly from the top to the

other

anyway you can move you can rotate to

fit these pieces together and when you

complete a straight line

that light disappears so since it first

came out not only has tetris became the

best-selling game but also one of the

most researched

video games of all time many scientific

words have shown the positive effects

that tetris may have on the brain

for example 1994 study by okabegi in

french

and 2009 research published on bmc

research notes

found that blank touches may lead to

higher brain efficiency

and better cognitive flexibility

for me personally the benefit i got from

the game was a better

mental health back in high school i was

having trouble

sleeping stress and worries always

followed me to bed bringing with them

the nasty insomnia

and time at the time lying in bed with

eyes wide open

i decided to screw it and play tetris

all night instead

but i failed that mission because just

after 15 minutes of playing

i started to dose up to forget about my

life problem

and started to dream about tetris

so so turned out the game was like the

ocd version of carting ships

that i need and i was able to sleep

again

anyway i got very interested in this

dreaming phenomenon

and wanted to know why it happened that

was when i stumbled upon a

research 1999 research conducted by

professor robert stigle

in harvard medical school participants

were asked

to play touches for three days and after

that just like me

they reported dreaming about falling

shapes that were similar to tetris

pieces

this phenomenon was called the tetris

effect and this happened

because the brain still retains the

upper image of tetris during sleep

to continue forming new neuron pathways

and

new patterns to improve at the game you

can experience the same effect when

playing sport

or solving rubik’s cube for long enough

time

and when you started to form new muscle

memory

but not just limited to sleep status

syndrome can also happen when we are

awake

people who play tattoos for long hours

may involuntarily try to

reorganize real life items geometrically

i know this first hand because during my

first month of intensive playing

my ocd got the better of me and i

started to reorganize

socks clothes and books in my room and

that was also for the first time in my

life

my mother liked the idea of me playing a

video game

so just like how it can help us improve

attention

or cleaning up the room saturation

syndrome can also be applied to

improve button recognition in other

situations

as well why does this matter because

pattern recognition matters

when there’s too much information for us

to process what our brains usually do is

they

filter information in patterns and in

many cases we couldn’t decide for

ourselves

what information to keep and what to

filter out because

the patent recognition process can

happen unconsciously

but we can still give good patents the

best

chance to shine by consciously

replicating the tattoo syndrome

let’s take a look at the tetras game for

better visualization

so uh because seven pieces appear

randomly and are constantly falling

we need to consciously try our best to

build an environment a playfield

that are accommoda accommodable for all

seven pieces

similarly in real life so for the

pattern recognition process to be

effective

we need suitable stimuli so what we can

do is we can consciously

construct an environment that promotes

and accommodates

this suitable stimuli let’s take a look

at a real life example

artists travel to beautiful landscapes

to find new inspirations

what they’re actually doing is they

consciously

construct an environment that promotes

creativity

and artistic patterns for them so on

another key takeaway here is we are

consciously

doing something with consciously

creating an environment

to influence the unconscious process of

pattern recognition

so let’s get back to my relationship

problem it’s

obvious what needed to be done here

whenever talking with my partner

i needed to create an atmosphere that

promotes positivity

and good conversations right

well turned out it was not that simple

if our conversations

was like a tertiary scheme it could look

something like this

we couldn’t agree on many things just

like how these pieces don’t really fit

together

and wrong pieces kept on piling up

preventing necessary and right pieces

to fit into holes and gaps beneath them

so

just like how people can unintentionally

become good

at tetris what my girlfriend and i

were doing for those past few weeks was

that

we are playing an emotionally negative

tetris game for so long

that our brains unintentionally become

so good

at recognizing negative patterns so oops

because there are finite things we can

think

at once there’s just simply no room for

positivity anymore

and i need to dig up this hose first to

find room for positivity

so to solve this problem we first need

to understand

about the characteristic of good and bad

patterns

it’s not the button itself but actually

the context

that decides whether a pattern is good

or not

for example a pessimistic thinking

pattern is definitely

bad for people who suffer from

depression

but it’s sometimes good for a business

owner when managing business risk

similarly in our relationship negativity

is

bad because it’s cost fighting but it’s

sometimes good

because it’s helped detect problems and

improve the relationship

so on another bigger problem here is not

the pattern

but the lack of control the lack of

flexibility in the pattern recognition

process

so uh now we know that we need to

be able to change button when the

context requires to do so

here is also where we can learn another

things from tetris

after playing the game for some time

what the game actually do is the game

will level up and speed up

by that time if you use the same

patterns and the same strategy

pieces will pine up very quickly and

boom game over

so but luckily for us right after

leveling up

tetris will keep zero q by changing its

color

and playing a short tune so maybe that

is what we

need in real life because changing from

changing to patterns that has the

complete opposite effect of what your

brain

is currently stuck on is very difficult

we need to take a little detour first

basically we need a cognitive

instruction

a destruction can be anything a shower

after work

a good meal a good book but the more

rewarding the better because the more

rewarding

the more dopamine you get and the more

dopamine you get

the more attention you pay on the task

and eventually

you should be able to distract yourself

from the old audited pattern

and started to build new patterns again

using the conscious environment strategy

as previously stated

so i have of the pieces now it’s time to

form a strategy whenever we are stuck

on a pattern we should distract

ourselves with something more rewarding

and when bad patterns wear off we can

then

build an environment to promote new

better good

patterns so i shared this strategy with

my girlfriend

at first it was awkward like we are

about to give a ted talk presentation

and it was like a

ted speech guy but luckily for me my

girlfriend was very understanding and we

decided to give this a try here’s how we

implemented it

whenever we were fighting or were about

to start a fight

we would stop talking and then do

something else

more rewarding and less stressful like

thinking of happy things that

happened during the day or listening to

some good music

and when the hit between us had gone

down

we will start talking again and this

time we will try to

remind ourselves of good characteristics

in each other

and remind ourselves of the reason why

we fall in love in the first place

and

[Applause]

and this strategy was surprisingly

effective

turn out our brains refer love and

positivity to

negativity and fighting so

i’m happy to say that we are still going

strong to this day

[Music]

so after this speech i would like to

invite you to try a game of tetris

you may not find a way to control the

pattern of life right away

but i think it will still be a 15 minute

sessions

of very simple and entertaining blocks

stacking

maybe live pattern recognition and

textures

are not so different after all thank you

for listening