Richard Osterlind
"
Richard Osterlind
©2002 by Richard Osterlind
All rights reserved. Reproduction or utilization of this work in any form
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mission from the publisher.
First Print Edition
March 2002
First E-Book Edition
July 2003
E-Book Layout & Design - Jim Sisti
For Lisa
Not just my new wife, but my new life.
FOREWORD
love the art of magic. More than just a profession, it is a way of life
I with me. It gives me joy, gets me through hard times and shows me
the potential of the human mind. Doing magic is not doing the impos-
sible, but finding out the extent of what is possible. It is breaking down
barriers that hold others back and finding wonderful, new worlds
around every corner.
Magic can make you young and healthy. It can give you confi-
dence when others give up. It can give you a marvelous new outlook
on life. It can solve problems when there appears to be no solution. It
can show you the truth of one of my favorite sayings, There are
always options!
I
THE MAGIC STATE OF MIND
ne can only observe the world from within oneself and hope
Othose feelings, which make up one s entire being, are universal.
I can only have something to say to you if my ideas of happiness,
sorrow, love, hate, joy, disappointment and other emotions mean ba-
sically the same to you as to me. This is vital to my theory of the
Magic State of Mind.
I constantly try to relive my feelings as a young boy when I first
discovered magic. What a world that was! I try to remember my joy
upon learning how a trick worked and how I felt about being able to
perform it. I try to remember my excitement upon getting a new book
or prop and the anticipation of the powers it would give me. I try to
remember what I expected life to be like once I became an accom-
plished miracle maker.
How absurd is it to discover it takes the maturity of life to teach us
the magic of innocence and yet destroys it at the same time! It is our
job as magicians to reclaim it.
God bless you if you still harbor even some of those same magic
feelings. God bless you if you still feel not just the excitement, but the
wonder you had when you first learned magic. At the very least, God
bless you for wanting to feel that way again.
II
IF YOU BELIEVE IN YOUR MAGIC,
SO WILL OTHERS
am not referring to being confident your secret is so well hidden it
I will defy detection or your sleight of hand is so flawless that no one
will catch on to the moves. I am not referring to the box you paid so
much for and is so well made you can pass it out for inspection. I am
referring to really believing you are doing magic! That does not mean
just putting the tricky part out of your head, but putting the effect
created and the supposed magical reason for its happening into your
head.. If you can truly believe what you are pretending to do is really
happening, then your audience will believe it, too.
As a child, I had a wonderful plastic set of Chinese Rice Bowls. I
was certainly smart enough to know the reason the rice doubled and
changed to water was because of the plastic gimmick, but that didn t
stop me from thinking those golden bowls were really magic. Like-
wise, my red magic vase hung suspended from the rope because of
magic, not the little cork ball inside. It had something to do with those
painted Chinese characters on the side, not the instructions that came
with it in the box from Adams. My magic wand rose in my hand
because I willed it and not because of the two buttons connected
inside it with black elastic cord.
How could I know the secret and still believe in magic? Back
then, it was no problem. It was as easy as believing there were real
bad guys I was shooting with my six-gun. It was as easy as how I could
fly when I had my Superman cape on. Who ever said that you couldn t
believe two things at once? Hypnotism can take us back into a child-
like innocence. In his wonderful book, The Hypnotic World of Paul
McKenna, Paul relates a story of a hypnotized man being told to walk
across an empty room. A chair was placed in front of him. The man
got up and walked around the chair. When asked why he did that,
the man said, To avoid hitting the chair. When he was asked why
he saw the chair when the room was empty, he replied, What chair?
You don t have to be hypnotized to think that way. If you take the right
approach it is easy to train your mind to be in the Magic State.
Ideo-motor reflex is the mental phenomenon that results in un-
conscious movements of your body by holding a strong thought in
your mind. These movements happen automatically and appear to be
out of your physical control. They will cause a pendulum held in your
hand to swing back and forth for Yes or in circles for No to an-
swer questions you ask it. It will cause the pointer on a Ouija Board to
slide around and appear to be guided by spirits. It can even move
tables in a séance if the participants are in the right frame of mind.
Some magical effects can be greatly enhanced if you purposely apply
ideo-motor reflex to them. The Haunted Key is a perfect example.
This trick has been around for years. A skeleton key is placed in
your palm. You make passes over it with the other hand and the key
suddenly turns over. The modus operandi is simply that a slight change
in balance will make the key turn. Many magicians believe the proper
method to achieve this is to slightly tilt their hand forward, causing the
key to revolve. This is totally wrong. I have seen the effect ruined by
doing it that way. The method is too obvious and it becomes nothing
more than a throwaway or gag effect.
The real secret is to place the key on the palm, balanced just at the
point where it is ready to turn. Then, if you slightly contract the muscles
of your palm, you can cause the key to slowly turn over. The hand
doesn t move and you can hide the muscle movements by keeping
that part of your hand turned away from the spectators. This is the
recommended method and it works well. We can, however, take the
trick one step further.
Instead of consciously using the muscles in your hand to make the
key move, just think for it to move. That s right, just think! If you
think hard enough, your ideo-motor reflex will take over and the key
will start to turn! At first you may need to help it by deliberately mov-
ing those muscles, but after awhile, the key will just move according
to your willpower. Once you get the knack of it, you can cause the key
to stop midway, start up again or even reverse directions. Using the
other hand over the top of the key adds to the effect. It will look so
eerie that people will be convinced you are either really using your
mind or else relying on magnets or threads. Even those who know the
old method will find themselves wondering.
Let me clearly restate the goal of this exercise. The objective is not
to put the thought that you are using your muscles to move the key out
of your mind. The objective is to put the thought that you are using
your willpower to move the key into your mind!
When you can do that, two things will happen. First, the muscle
movements in your hand will become so slight they will be virtually
invisible even to the closest observer. You won t have to worry about
angles. Second, if you can become so convinced that you are really
using just your mind to move to move the key, the idea of trickery will
simply cease to exit! You will really be doing it by magic! When you
get that far, you are on the threshold of miracles.
If you are laughing at this now, you may as well put this book
away and go no further. You are missing the point altogether. If you
think it is silly to pretend you are doing real magic, you must think it
silly for an actor to cry real tears because he is living the part. You must
think it silly that an author can become depressed for weeks by the
sadness his pen created in his latest novel. You must think it silly that
an artist feels that part of his very soul is in his painting.
If you can, however, get into this Magic State of Mind, you are
about to enter into a world that you hadn t felt since childhood. It is a
feeling that probably first pulled you into the art. It is a world where
real magic happens! Just like Harry Potter discovering he is a wizard,
you will discover the same. If you are truly into the Magic State of
Mind, you will even become nonplussed or shocked if someone
should suggest it is just a trick. Most of the time, however, that will not
even happen. Trust me. Your audience will sit back and experience
the wonder with you. It is not a question of you suspending reality for
the audience; it is a question of you creating a new reality.
Remember what I said in the beginning of this chapter? If your
feelings and emotions are the same as mine, then when I create real
magic for myself, I create it for you, too! Likewise, if you create real
magic for yourself, it will be real for your audience.
There are other effects where you can utilize the same principle
of using ideo-motor reflex to create this Magic State. In The Close-
Magic of Frank Garcia - Volume One, there is an effect called Un-
canny. In this effect, an indifferent card flips over by its own volition
and turns into the selected card. Instead of having the card flip over
quickly as a simple revelation, practice having it turn over slowly and
mysteriously, apparently using the power of your mind. If you do it
right, the effect looks incredible. This quickie becomes a feature ef-
fect that people will talk about long after you leave.
One other effect to consider, although there are countless others,
is the new trick going around where a borrowed finger ring placed on
a rubber band slides across it uphill. This is another of those effects
that works on a principle that can be controlled with your mind. If you
just think it to happen and present it in the Magic State you will
have a miracle.
Moving an object with your mind is one of the strongest magical
feats you can perform. If you can do it without elaborate props, threads,
magnets or any other gimmick at any time, any place and completely
surrounded, you have something to treasure. Here you have three
and the potential to find many more.
III
THE MENTAL STATE OF MIND
have been a mentalist for most of my professional career. There is
I a reason for this and a lesson to be learned. I love all forms of magic
and have performed most of them. During the 70 s, I even built and
performed illusions when I played with a band called Merlin. There
are times when I dearly miss doing billiard ball and card manipula-
tions. I love the Linking Rings and the Cups and Balls. Contrary to
what many mentalists have written, I love elaborately decorated boxes
and shiny apparatus. I think they exude mystery.
When I was performing in China, I had the opportunity to visit
many ancient landmarks such as the Forbidden City and the Summer
Palace and most were filled with items that resembled magic props!
The reason this look is not used much in mentalism is simply because
it doesn t fit. Items that appear as if they came from a stationary store
are more appropriate. In like manner, I discovered years ago that I do
not have the flamboyancy of a David Copperfield to pull off that type
of act. I do not have the natural comic ability of a Johnny Thompson
to be a great comedy magician. My personality is more appropriate for
mental magic and hypnotism. We should all strive to take advantage
of our natural, God-given abilities.
In my early days, I was mostly concerned with pulling off the ef-
fects and fooling everyone. My worse nightmare was being found out
and discredited. As the years went on, I found myself less concerned
with these matters and more concerned with doing an entertaining
show. Also, like so many other mentalists, I started half-believing I
could really read minds. I found myself standing on stage with the
attitude I could just look at someone and peer into his or her inner-
most thoughts. This demeanor comes from the absolute necessity of
having to play the part to be successful. I always use a disclaimer
stating I do not possess supernatural powers, but then perform as if I
do! Some magicians criticize mentalists for working this strong, but I
think that attitude is unfair. Top magicians do the same thing. They
may call their effects illusions, but then go on to state there are no
camera tricks, no wires, no mirrors, no trap doors, in short, nothing
that is tricked - even though there is! It s back to the previous chapter
about believing two things at once! That principle will be used through-
out this book and is invaluable.
In the first chapter, you learned how to apply the Magic State of
Mind to effects using ideo-motor reflex. I have no intention of trying
to make you a mentalist, but I want you to understand the Mental
State of Mind so we can move on. It is a technique I developed years
ago and try to apply whenever possible. It is designed to not only give
the perfect illusion of mindreading, but to also to make you feel as if
you are doing exactly what you are claiming. In so doing, you will
enter into the Magic State when performing mental effects. This
technique can be applied to most examples of pseudo-telepathy and
we will use it here with a simple card effect.
To begin, you must have a stacked deck. Any stack that allows you
to know the rotation of the cards so you can determine a selected card
by glimpsing the previous card in the stack (such as the 8 Kings or Si
Stebbins) can be used. False shuffle the deck and hand the cards to a
spectator. Have the person cut the cards once or twice to make sure
he knows how to do this. It is important he only gives the deck com-
plete cuts. Now turn your back on the spectator and have him cut the
deck once or twice more. Have him place either the top or bottom
card into one of his pockets without looking at it. As you take back the
deck, you casually glance at the bottom of the deck and spot the face
card. Now here is the important part. As soon as you spot the card
forget it! That s right, forget it.
Have the spectator walk to the other side of the room while you
place the deck aside and pick up a pad and magic marker. When it is
obvious you cannot possibly see his card or be able to read a marked
card from that far away, have the spectator remove it and stare at its
face. If you like, you can have him shield the back of the card for extra
effect. Only now when he is looking at the card do you start to con-
centrate and remember the card you spotted earlier. After you recall
the card, do the math to determine his card and then draw a picture
of the card on the pad to the best of your ability. Have him show
everyone his card and you turn the pad around to end.
First, this is a very strong presentation for a simple card effect.
The idea of drawing a picture of the card is Annemann s and it is a
stroke of genius. It gives ten times the impact of simply naming the
card. What I really want to emphasize, however, is the mental state
of mind you put yourself in when you do it this way.
Most magicians would look at the bottom card, compute the cho-
sen card right away and then do the effect. This is wrong for two
reasons. First, you have to mentally calculate the card at a time when
you shouldn t be concerned as to what it is. Although this might be a
simple enough mental process, it still may show. All you should be
concerned about at this point is setting up the test conditions of the
effect. Second, if you already know the card they have, you have to
act when you are supposedly reading his mind. Even though you
may be a great actor, it will never look as convincing as if you really
have to dig into your brain to figure out what it is.
By waiting until the moment you are supposedly reading his mind,
you don t have to act at all. The process of remembering and comput-
ing the card looks identical to the process of telepathically receiving
the thought. More importantly, it is just a small step in the believing
two things at once mental process to convince yourself you are really
reading his mind. You tell him to look at the card and concentrate; you
stare at him and try to see into his mind. Part of your own mind will
compute the card for you while another part is trying to read his.
The name of his card will sort of drift into your consciousness and
it will feel to you as if you received his thought. The end result will be
a demonstration of telepathy that looks totally authentic.
Again, for those of you who may be thinking nonsense, let me
talk about method acting. There are a number of actors who, when
making a movie, will not respond to their real name, but only the
name of their character. They get so caught up in the role that it be-
comes their reality. If a good actor can stay in that frame of mind for
weeks, we can certainly sustain it for the duration of our performance.
There are many mental effects where you can use this technique.
Let me give you one more. John Cornelius has a wonderful effect
called Thought Transmitter. It is a leatherette case that a spectator
can write on with a marker and close to conceal the writing. A secret
gimmick allows you to spot the word or design in a split second and
then have it invisible again. Using my Mental State of Mind, you
would have the spectator write a name on the case and close it. Tak-
ing it back, you would get the glimpse and then instantly forget it!
After a bit of by-play, you stare at the spectator, read his mind (re-
member), and write down the name.
You may be wondering, What if I really forget the information?
If you do wonderful! Then you will really have to concentrate and
sweat a little! Isn t that perfect? Rest assured the information will even-
tually come back to you. You also know you can get it again if you
really have to. But, if you do have to strain and worry about getting it,
you will look just like you would if you were really doing it. More
importantly, your mental condition will be exactly the same as if you
were truly presenting a test of telepathy.
I have to address one more issue here that was recently brought to
my attention by a very good friend in magic. There are a lot of magi-
cians who have a problem separating acting from lying! There are a
lot of magicians who get very uncomfortable when they affect the
audience so strongly that they achieve real amazement. They some-
how feel as if they have gone too far with their abilities. That atti-
tude only destroys the very essence of magic. I see the trend mani-
fested in a number of ways.
First, there s the need of some magicians to constantly use com-
edy as if to minimize the amazement factor of their magic. Could it be
they feel guilty that such simple secrets can cause such astonishment?
I can almost hear their thoughts saying, Gosh, look! It s only a trick!
Secondly, there s the need of some magicians to do only difficult
sleight-of-hand. I believe this group needs to satisfy their ego by know-
ing their magic requires skill. That attitude is about as pointless as a
musician that thinks good music means playing a lot of difficult notes.
Thirdly, there s the need of a large number of magicians to put
down any performer who really affects his audience. They call David
Copperfield corny for trying to achieve true audience emotion. They
put down David Blaine for using standard magic in such a way as to
completely dazzle ordinary people on the street. In Japan, local magi-
cians tried to destroy the career of Mr. Maric because he had such a
profound effect on his audiences.
Artists do not create meaningless paintings so you won t feel any
real emotion! Writers do not do their best to stop you from getting
caught up in the reality of their fiction! Actors do not stop in the middle
of a line to remind you they are only playing a part!
Contrary to what anyone has written, magic is not the art of de-
ception! It is an art of creation, just like all the rest! It is an art that
creates a magic world! It creates a reality where the impossible can
happen and we can all experience...wonder !
IV
TAKING ADVANTAGE OF REAL MAGIC
s we move along developing the Magic State, I want to point
A out there is plenty of real magic out there that automatically
puts you in the Magic State. There is no worry about covering up a
trick because there is no trick! You don t have to worry about believ-
ing in what you are doing, because you really are doing what you say.
Many magicians never seem to use or understand the value of this
material.
The first effect that comes to mind is the Amazing Memory Test
as outlined in Step 3 of Corinda s Thirteen Steps T
o Mentalism. (You
can also find this in a slew of other books.) This demonstration of
mnemonics is a killer effect that can be an entertaining routine lasting
for more than fifteen minutes. I have used this as an opener for corpo-
rate shows with great results. Even with all the memory courses avail-
able, very few people bother studying them or know how to use them.
Another great effect is Harry Lorayne s Instant Magic Square. I
saw Harry perform this exactly the way he describes it in his The
Magic Book and knock out a hall full of magicians!
If you bother to read and learn the effects in John Fisher s book,
Body Magic, you will have an enormous amount of material at your
disposal for any occasion. Nowhere will you need any props, hidden
gimmicks nor have to execute any sleights.
One of my most favorite magic books is Martin Gardner s Ency-
clopedia of Impromptu Magic. This wonderful tome is just filled with
magic you can do with everyday articles. Although some of the magic
does require preparation or sleight of hand, there is a ton of material
that just relies on you knowing how.
Likewise, Miracle Math by Harry Lorayne can give you great
material and Games You Can t Lose by Harry Anderson has wonder-
ful stuff a magician can use.
I can go on and on with titles of books that fall into this category.
My goal is to make you feel like a real magician. Magicians are sup-
posed to know things - cool things! Performing magic whose secret
lies in what you know as opposed to what you do can be a tre-
mendous asset in acquiring the Magic State. You don t have to think
past secrets and misdirection. The magic is already real, so take ad-
vantage of it!
V
EXPANDING THE MAGIC STATE OF MIND
earning the material in the Magic State of Mind and the Men-
L tal State of Mind is both very simple and very difficult at the same
time. Certainly there are no elaborate sleights or artifices to contend
with, but learning to really believe in your magic may be harder than
you imagined. You cannot pretend you believe; you must really be-
lieve! For some, that is quite difficult.
The process reminds me of looking at a Magic Eye picture. I
love those pictures! When you look at one of them, you first see an
overall design or pattern. If you stare at the picture the right way, an
incredible 3-D image suddenly appears. It feels as though the paper it
is printed on has become a window allowing you to look deep, down
into it. You are truly transported into a different dimension. Some people
can see the image almost immediately; others must work at it for some
time. Some people cannot readjust their vision at all and can never
experience the sensation. Seeing your magic become real for the first
time is as startling as seeing that 3-D image suddenly jump out of the
paper at you. It is wonderful.
The real significance of achieving the Magic State of Mind will
become far more dramatic as we move along in its study. Getting past
the hurdle of gaining the Magic State will open doors to places you
never imagined existed. Not only will you feel like a real magician to
yourself and your audience, but also you will approach all magic in a
different way. The chore of learning new sleights and misdirection
will take on a new dimension! The elusiveness of trying to make your
magic look natural will simply vanish.
Magicians have been studying from each other with both good
and bad results for centuries. Outside of creating totally new magic,
this is the only way we can learn our craft. Whether we are studying
a book that only teaches basic concepts, or one that teaches the most
sophisticated secrets of an accomplished magician, we have to apply
those ideas to ourselves. Since we are all unique, this can be a daunt-
ing task. What is very natural to one magician may be totally artificial
to another. One of my goals is to try to make that process easier.
In my professional performances, I often talk about how the hu-
man mind is the most advanced computer in the world. Yes, it makes
the audience feel good, but it is also true! The information our brains
process every second of the day is staggering. We are unaware of
most of it. The human mind is more complex than anything man can
make. This is why with all the modern advancements in technology,
modern science can only hope to clone life and not create it.
I remember when I first obtained the first volume of the Tarbell
Course in Magic, I was working for the New Haven Meals on Wheels
program. I spent six months walking around all day with a half-dollar
classic palmed while I delivered food to the elderly. That experience
taught me a lot about looking natural. Most of the time, I wasn t even
aware I had the coin. The amazing part was I never flashed the coin!
This is where believing two things at once comes into play. Even
though I wasn t aware of the coin in my hand, a part of my mind
knew no one else was supposed to see it. That part of my mind knew
the angles automatically and adjusted for the line of sight of the people
around me. I even found myself closing my hand more when I was in
a crowd. It happened automatically without any conscious effort on
my part! That is what the mind can do. Your brain can control your
breathing, your heartbeat and all the rest of your body s actions with-
out your awareness. It can also be programmed to control magical
actions as well.
We will now expand the Magic State of Mind to a more ad-
vanced state. For our example, we will use the simple vanish of a half-
dollar. The method will be nothing more than a false transfer. Most
magic books (including my own beloved Tarbell) teach the following
sequence. First, really transfer the coin from one hand to the other
and study the movements. Second, attempt to duplicate those actions
as closely as possible when doing the false transfer. Third, hold the
one hand as if it really had the coin and the other as if it were really
empty. Finally, show the coin has vanished by opening the hand.
This is all sound advice. The problem comes when you step in
front of a mirror and begin to work on these actions. In addition to
trying to make the movements of both hands look natural, you have to
be concerned with angles of visibility and the timing and the acting
necessary to pull it off. If you separate each of the separate actions
and analyze them, there are many vital points to be concerned with.
Even this most simple magic maneuver can become a forbidding task.
(If you think I am exaggerating the difficulty of the move, let me ask
you if you have you ever tried to teach this simple vanish to a novice?
Did you find yourself frustrated because he or she couldn t coordinate
their movements or hold their hands naturally? Even some advanced
performers telegraph this most basic sleight.)
Let s try to make this whole process easier. We will use a basic
finger-palm false transfer. The coin is held at the base of the right-
hand fingers and is supposedly dropped into the left hand. In reality,
the coin remains in the right hand and the left hand pretends to accept
it and close. You should study these moves in front of a mirror in the
traditional way. You have to make the transfer in the correct manner.
As mentioned before, there are countless books on magic to teach you
this and numerous other moves. That is one thing we have no short-
age of.
Now is when the Magic State of Mind comes into play. You
must believe the coin is really dropped in the left hand! Really, really,
really believe! You must feel it. Feel the coldness. Feel the hardness.
Feel the shape and the weight. It has to be so real for you that there is
absolutely no doubt in your mind the coin is in your hand! You have to
be so sure the coin is there that for anyone to suggest otherwise would
be as ridiculous as him or her suggesting that the sky is not blue.
If you can really feel the coin in your hand, you will automatically
hold it the right way. You will feel your fingers sliding over the smooth
surface of the coin. You will feel your fingers squeezing it to avoid
dropping it. Your hand won t be too flat or too open; it will be just
right. You won t have to copy some illustration in a book or try to look
like a performer on video tape. You will hold the coin just like you
have always held objects your entire life. Nothing can look as natural
for you as that.
In addition, you won t have to worry about your other hand (with
the palmed coin). Your fingers will curl as perfectly as when they are
really empty and your hand and arm will fall to your side and swing
normally. Your hand will automatically turn to hide the coin from the
line-of-sight angle of your audience without any conscious effort on
your part. Your total concentration will be on the coin in your other
hand. It will all just happen!
You have to decide now just how the coin will vanish. This is the
fun part! How would you do it if you really could? What would the
coin do? You can do whatever magic you want to! You can imagine it
dissolving into little silvery pieces that flutter to the floor. Or you might
prefer imagining the coin dissolving into a puff of smoke. See the smoke
begin to slip through your fingers and as you open your hand, see the
smoke drifting upwards into nothingness! Perhaps you want it to shrink
down smaller and smaller until it is gone. Whatever way you decide,
you must see and feel it happening! If you have been able to feel the
coin in your hand the way I suggested, this should be no problem. It
will be a continuation of the reality you have created for yourself. It
will look and feel to you about as magical as is humanly possible. You
will really be magic!
Don t be surprised if your audience sees the coin vanishing the
same way! I don t want to lecture about the possibility of telepathy,
but when your belief system is really strong it can transfer itself to your
audience to a point that seems uncanny. Perhaps it is the mannerisms
and movements that telegraph what they perceive. Either way, if they
see the magic, the goal is accomplished.
VI
KNOWING WHAT THE MAGIC IS
n order to apply the Magic State of Mind to your magic, you have
Ito know what the effect is you are performing. This may seem el-
ementary on the first reading, but it is far from that. Let s take a simple
card effect as an example. A spectator takes a card, looks at it and
returns it to the deck. You shuffle the pack and show a card. It is not
the right one. You place it aside and a moment later, when you turn it
over, it is the selected card. That s a simple straightforward effect that,
at first thought, doesn t seem to need further explanation. There are,
however, a number of magical rationalizations as to how this could
have taken place.
The first, and simplest, is the indifferent card either magically
changed into the selected card or changed places with it. The second
explanation is the performer is a great card handler and somehow
was able to change the card through his card sharking capabilities.
The third and last is that the spectator s perception was somehow
altered so that he thought he saw another card when, in fact, it was
his card all along. These are all possible magical solutions to the effect
achieved. With some thought, you might be able to think of more.
You can, of course, just do the trick and let the spectators wonder.
I certainly wouldn t criticize you for doing so, but I do think the effect
can be enhanced if you do decide what effect you are going for. The
decision will have to be made on your style of working and how you
present the trick.
If you elect to present the trick as straight magic, you might con-
sider passing your hands over the card or snapping your fingers to
make it change. Think about it. If you really were doing it by real
magic, wouldn t you need to do something? Perhaps wave a wand,
say a spell or whatever. Think about the Harry Potter books. What
did they do in those books to make magic? I am not suggesting that you
act hokey or say silly spells, but I do think it does deserve some thought.
More importantly for us, if we are trying to get into the Magic State,
we have to know what we are believing in.
The second option would be great if you were doing poker dem-
onstrations and fancy flourishes in order to show your expertise with
cards. In that case, after the indifferent card is placed on the table,
you might consider doing a couple of fancy cuts with the deck near
the card or perhaps pick up the card and drop it back down before
showing it to be the selected card. This would lead the audience to
think that through your incredible ability, you somehow switched the
card even though they were watching so carefully. I like to use this
type of approach when doing The Lorayne Poker Deal from Close-
up Card Magic. Again, using the Magic State, I envision my hands
moving at lightning and invisible speed while dealing to give myself
the Royal Flush.
The third option, although it may seem a bit far-fetched, is one I
actually use when performing the Uncanny effect I mentioned ear-
lier. The eerie effect of the card turning over just lends itself to the
idea that it was the chosen one all along and that perhaps the specta-
tor was sort of hypnotized into believing it was different. It is an easy
matter to apply the Magic State to this effect. As the card turns over,
I tell the spectator that in addition to using my mind to move the card,
I also previously used my thoughts to make him see the wrong card.
As a performing hypnotist, it is an easy matter for me to believe this
scenario in my mind since I can really do it!
Even if you don t come right out and make a claim as to what you
are doing, you should be thinking of what you are supposed to be
doing. It s amazing how often the audience will pick up on what is
going on in your head. If you are thinking of the modus operandi, you
may be in for an unpleasant surprise. If, on the other hand, you are
thinking of the magical effect, you will be on safe ground.
I am trying to present these ideas on a very elementary level to
make my point as clear as possible. It is important to think through the
magic you are doing. A good way to approach the question of effect is
to ask yourself what would the audience believe happened if real
magic were possible? Then just go ahead and make that magic!
VII
A FINAL WORD
have often stated that I get my magical inspiration from many differ-
I ent sources. Certainly the recent Harry Potter books have been
enlightening in reminding me how one would feel to really study magic.
The chapter with him going to Diagon Alley to buy the right wand,
cauldron, etc. reminded me so much of walking into the local magic
shop when I was a kid! I can think back to my childhood and remem-
ber how affected I was to see the Walt Disney cartoon, The Sorcerer s
Apprentice. What a great job the animators did in showing what real
magic would look like. The Lord of the Rings has become a popular
movie just recently, but I discovered Tolkien s wonderful trilogy over
thirty years ago. If you want to know how sleight-of-hand magic should
really look, then find the chapter where Tom Bombadil takes Frodo s
magic ring and makes it disappear!
The recent 2002 Olympics games were once again a source for
motivation. How can not watching the top athletes in the world do
the incredible things they do not inspire all forms of human endeavor?
I like to often compare the study of magic to studying an instru-
ment. For awhile, I was a music education major in college. A music
teacher must be required to be able to play just about every major
band instrument with some degree of proficiency. I can tell you from
personal experience, the effort necessary to master a good Pass or
Second Deal in no way surpasses even rudimentary skills in playing
most instruments. In addition, the expertise it is necessary to attain
with an instrument before playing in public is far greater than it is with
magic. In short, there should be no such thing as giving up on some
magic sleight or routine because it is too hard.
Two of my favorite effects are the Cups and Balls and the Linking
Rings. Like so many others, I prefer the Dai Vernon treatments of both
of these classics. Dai evolved these two routines from the ideas of
some of the greatest minds in magic. They both represent the highest
standards in our art. To me, practicing them is like practicing the scales
of magic. Taking the basic segments of each and applying the Magic
State to every move is the best way I have found to apply these prin-
ciples in a practical way. When you are through, you will have two of
the finest routines in magic.
In conclusion, I hope I have inspired you to at least think about
approaching your magic in the Magic State. I have long ago learned
that almost anything I am so sure about may be totally wrong for some-
one else. I hope, however, in this case, I am not.
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