"I'm no good at that"

Following on from my last post about magic I feel I should talk a little bit about incompetence.

I am reminded of a comment I once heard one of my favourite songwriters come out with many years ago now. Sharon Corr, who is a solo artist these days but was best known as the violinist from The Corrs, was talking about the business of writing music for the band to play. Whilst I forget the exact wording the pearl of wisdom she conveyed was that the thing about song writing is that when you start writing the songs you write aren't very good, but if you keep writing they do get better over time.

It may sound like the most obvious statement in the world, and yet I think that there is a truism about the human experience here that so many people completely miss throughout their entire lives.

I'm thinking, as an example now, of what most people say when I suggest they try dancing.

"Oh no," the usual response goes, "I'm no good at dancing, I have two left feet."

Well really? You've not danced much or at all before and you are stating the fact that you don't think you're any good at it as a reason not to have a go.

How, if I may ask, would you be any good at dancing if you've never done it?! Really?

As with most things, the people who are good at dancing are the people who have danced, and have danced a lot. At some point in the past they were not very good at dancing, just like you. What makes them different? Well, they stuck with it long enough to become good.

Here's the lesson:

If you want to be good at something be prepared to be very bad at it.

I think it's important to get away from this attitude toward "talent" that seems to be all pervasive in our society. This notion that exceptional ability is a gift that's given indiscriminately to a lucky few, as opposed to a competence that is earned through persistence.

The bad news is that being exceptional doesn't drop out of the sky and into your lap. The good news is that being exceptional doesn't drop out of the sky and into anybody else's lap either. Yes some people may start slightly ahead and have an easier ride due to circumstances and more resources at their disposal, but long term the one thing that will make all the difference is your attitude. With the right attitude you will always have the advantage.

Afraid you won't be a good hypnotist when you try with your first subject? Guess what, you won't be! Keep at it though and soon enough you will.

I am at present enjoying developing my fledgling skills as a magician. I am not a brilliant magician. I have come to accept that every so often my "is this your card?" will be met with a blank look and a shaking of the head. Heck, I had a day a couple of weeks ago where I did four tricks in a row and none of them worked! The one thing I can tell you for certain is that it will happen again, I will fail, and not least because as I improve my skills I will constantly be trying to execute more difficult tricks.

Push your boundaries or they will never move and you won't grow as a person. Don't just do the things you can do; do the things you can't.

"Dancing? I've never done anything like that before and it really wouldn't have occurred to me to try... Sounds like fun! Let's go!"

If you need any more inspiration, take a look at this:
Step outside your comfort zone and study yourself failing

First Timers I ½ - Magical!

Earlier this year I wrote a blog post intended to give advice to all those wannabe hypnotists out there who have yet to take the plunge and hypnotise a subject.

I made a start at the second post, plunging into details for a routine that these hypnotists could try but every time I started writing there was always something that kept nagging at me. Something was missing from the first post, I knew that. What was worse was that I knew exactly what was missing and the reason I hadn't brought it up, which was that I didn't have the answer.

What is the biggest problem for most of us when it comes to starting out in hypnosis?

I don't know about you, but for me the problem is scarcity. It feels as though willing subjects to try this out on are few and far between. What this inevitably means is that we end up subcommunicating neediness whenever we approach a potential subject. They feel as though you want something from them and can get defensive. Some may be curious enough to get past this and give it a go, but the next pitfall comes from being worried about failure because who knows when the next opportunity will be.

This is a biggie. It's THE biggie as far as I'm concerned.

What we really need is a different frame to the situation, and I did hint at this in my last post. Your potential subject should be the one asking, begging, you to hypnotise them.

Indeed, some of the best impromptu subjects I've had in the past have actually thanked me afterward for the huge favour I've done them. One actually apologised for spoiling my quiet evening out.

So how does one arrive at this desirable state of affairs? I figured it out recently and, believe me, what you are about to read could possibly be the most useful lesson you will ever learn as an aspiring impromptu hypnotist.

6. Get a pack of cards. Learn some tricks.

You heard me.

I should explain. A couple of weeks ago I was at a party in London that John Morgan had invited me along to. It was a charity fundraiser, and so John had also invited along another of the London Magic and Hypnosis crew, a magician called Mike Stoner.

Now, Mike is absolutely awesome at what he does, and he's also a people approaching machine. So after we'd spent a little while catching up we started wandering around the tables and Mike wowed each with some incredible magic and mentalism. Now, when I say incredible I mean "that card you chose and signed with a pen isn't in the deck, it's actually here in my wallet" and "also, the name of the card you chose is written on the pen I gave you at the start" incredible.

More than watching Mike at work though, both in seeing how easy he found it to approach people and in his presentation, I am indebted to him for what did next, which was to say this:

"If you think that's impressive, my colleague here is a hypnotist."

And I was in!

Did I mention that this party had the largest number of attractive young women I've seen in one place? It's a hard life it really is!

What's the lesson here?

I'd say it's this. There's a reason why the thought of approaching a group of people and saying "Excuse me would you like to be hypnotised?" feels weird, and that's because it is! It's such an unexpected and unusual proposition that a lot of people will default to the safe "no thanks" answer before even considering it.

As I said before, a different frame is needed. If you approach a group of people with a pack of cards and whilst shuffling them in your hands ask if they like card tricks they are much, much more likely to be intrigued and keen to see what you have to offer. Often if you're at a party all you need to do is produce the cards and shuffle them before someone asks you if you know any tricks with them. Seek out any environment where people want to be entertained and you'll find an impromptu magician is always welcome.

You don't even need to learn that much magic. In these days of YouTube it's so damn easy to learn a few basic tricks too. I know just four, all based on the overhand shuffle, but that's more than enough. You can go from group to group doing the same few routines over and over and getting good at them. Your audience don't know that they've just seen your entire repertoire and they don't need to know.

Set out to do magic, not hypnosis. Set out to entertain others, not acquire something for yourself. Let the subjects come to you.

What you are doing with each group is you're setting the frame. In their eyes you become an authority figure on magic and that sort of thing, you're demonstrating to them that amazing things happen around you and that you can lead them through fun experiences.

I have found that people are naturally curious about how and when you learned magic and when the inevitable question about that comes you can reply thus:

"I'm actually a hypnotist; the magic's just a hobby."

Try it. You'll be amazed at the responses you'll get.