Anti-Carefree

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A supporter passed along this post from facebook asking what I thought.

So, the contention here is that “being a magician” means doing difficult tricks, executing tough sleights, managing complicated setups, and relying on memory work.

I used to believe that too. When I was getting into magic as a kid, “self-working” wasn’t really considered a good thing. That term was reserved for the kind of magic you’d find in Dover books—stuff for beginners or children. Unless you were teaching magic to adults with special needs, why would you want to know a bunch of self-working tricks?

I still remember when Ammar’s Easy to Master Card Magic series came out. One common complaint about it was that magic shouldn’t be easy to master. Others argued that many of the tricks in the series actually weren’t easy at all.

So you had two kinds of pushback: one group saying magic should be difficult, and another insisting that these supposedly “easy” tricks were actually hard—and that they’d proven their chops by mastering them. Either way, the message was clear: magic is difficult, or it ought to be.

I also grew up hearing that you should rehearse a trick for three to six months before performing it for anyone. Just one more way to reinforce that being a magician meant doing something hard.

Why do we think that way? Here’s my theory.

There was a time in history when the magician was a “wizard”—a special person who commands your respect and awe.

Then humanity got wise. “If this guy’s so special, why does he dress like a buffoon? For the love of God, man, tailor those sleeves. And ditch that goofy hat for a kicky beret!”

Once we left wizard-times, we needed a new angle. If we couldn’t pass as mystical beings, then at least we could be seen as highly skilled practitioners of a demanding craft.

And that magician-centric mindset—where difficulty equals legitimacy—has prevailed for the past century or two.

I’m not here to tell you how to perform. But I will say this: my magic became ten times more impactful the moment I stopped doing anything that distracted from my presence with the person I was performing for.

Difficult Sleights – They’re almost never worth the effort. Getting them to the point of being truly “invisible” requires far too much effort, and—in fact—almost never happens. You might think you’ve executed something flawlessly, but I guarantee most spectators will sense that something just occurred. Truly difficult sleights are mostly for impressing other magicians.

Complicated Setups – Another major obstacle. Intricate setups get in the way of spontaneity. Sure, for special occasions, you may want to put in the work. But for your core repertoire, you want tricks you can get into with minimal prep—ideally none. I’m constantly looking for ways to trim setup time to zero. The moment I think, “Now would be a good time for this trick,” I’d like to be able to flow right into a performance.

Memory Work - Sure, almost all tricks will require some memory work—if just to remember the steps to perform it. The question is, can you do that memory work without breaking your connection to the person in front of you? If not (and with heavy memory tricks, the answer is usually no), it’s not a good fit for you. If you ask for a card and a position in the deck and then your face goes blank and you gaze off into the distance like you’re having a Vietnam flashback, you’re not fooling anyone that something “magical” is occurring.

The style of magic I advocate for—the Carefree Style—is built on the core principle of eliminating unintended tension. Every item mentioned above can introduce friction and break immersion—little moments that pull your audience out of the experience and remind them, “Oh right, this is a trick.”

I think what draws many magicians to difficult methods is guilt. It feels wrong to get a strong reaction from something simple. We want to feel like we’ve earned it. But in the process of trying to earn it, we often sabotage the very moment we’re trying to create.

The best way to alleviate that guilt is to make this moment not about you. Make it about immersing them in the story. With that goal in mind, you’ll always be focused on the most direct path to that place, rather than caring about how much you struggled to get them there.

Mailbag #136

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I was in the setup for a "big" trick with two friends and one of them asked if I've tried this trick before.

Wondering what your approach is if/when someone asks you that question for an experience that ideally feels like it's custom happening just for them in this unique moment.

Don't love lying, but also don't love diminishing the uniqueness of the moment.—JT

This is a question that comes up a lot (not the writer’s question, but his friend’s question).

“Have you done this before?”
“Does this always work?”

My approach is to let the nature of the trick decide my answer.

If I’ve framed it as “something I’ve been working on” or “something I’ve been looking into,” then, built into that framing is the idea that yes, I’ve done it for others. But I still won’t say, “Oh yeah, this works every time.” Instead, I’ll say something like: “I’ve tried it a couple of times, but this is the first time this has happened.” That keeps the uniqueness alive, without having to claim total novelty.

Of course, sometimes the premise is: “This weird thing always happens.” So in that case, I might shade the truth the other way and suggest it’s happened more than it actually has.

But if I’m creating an experience that is supposed to come off as a one-off impossible moment, then I will say or imply that no, nothing like this has ever happened before.

Is this lying?

I guess, maybe.

I’ve made the argument before that magic tricks are little stories that have no end, until the person you’ve performed for is 100% convinced it was “just a trick.” So, for me, the trick is always going on.

So if I say, “This is the first time I’ve ever done this,” I don’t feel like I’m lying any more than when I say, “I put the ball under the cup.” This is all part of the ongoing story we’re building together.

I’m pretty good at determining if a lie is self-serving or serves the experience. Telling someone you can read their mind because you have a soul-connection in order to get them into bed is a self-serving lie.

But saying, “No one has ever separated the deck into all reds and blacks like that. That’s incredible”? That a “lie” that builds on the experience. It lifts them up and adds to the texture of the moment I want to create for them. I’m fine with that.

That said, a few caveats:

Don’t say, “I’ve never done this before,” if there’s a good chance they’ll run into someone you’ve already done it with.

Also, the people I perform for regularly, already know that the magic experience has some level of bullshittery to it. So even if they did find out I’ve done something before when I told them I hadn’t, they wouldn’t flip out about it. If I was performing for someone who I thought would be genuinely upset to find out I wasn’t completely honest about it, then I would feel like I was performing for someone who was taking it all a bit too seriously for my taste.

Remember, my goal is for people to know it’s a trick, but also entertain the idea, “But… maybe it’s not?” When people get that “spirit” then they’re not going to get too worked about things either way.

If stuck, I’ll usually revert to the line I mentioned earlier, “I’ve tried something similar in the past, but it’s never gone like this.” That’s vague, and true-ish. Even if I’ve done the trick 100 times before, it’s never been with this person. You can never step into the same river twice and all of that.

I’ve always loved ‘printing’ effects, and I’m looking forward to getting this version with credit cards by Craig Petty. Can you think of any way to ground the performance and give it a little more weight?—LO

Yeah, that’s a tough one.

I’ve never loved the “printing” plot. I think it’s a fun trick, but the pacing of it has never felt great to me. It’s a series of okay moments that get weirder, but not necessarily more impressive. The pacing doesn’t match the rhythm I usually go for, which is to build toward one clean, impossible moment.

Also, if I was a non-magician watching the trick, I think part of me would be distracted by wanting to see the other side of the card again before the next printing happens. At least after the first couple have been printed. And yes, I know they see the cards blank at the beginning, but once the magic starts happening, that moment fades into the background pretty quickly.

As for grounding the effect… I’m not sure that’s the right approach.

The printing, the concept of credit card “blanks,” the way the credit cards themselves look—all of that makes this more of a cartoonish trick than something “real.” So I would let it live in that absurdist world.

I would frame it as a counterfeiting technique. (I can only guess this angle is mentioned in the instructions. It makes perfect sense.)

“I read this article about credit card cloning—apparently people can duplicate cards using these cheap blanks you can get online. Totally freaked me out. Now I won’t even let my card leave the table at a restaurant. Here, let me show you how it works…”

It gives you just enough plausibility to start with—but the moment the visuals kick in, you’re clearly in fantasyland. And I think that’s where this kind of trick works best. If you lean into the absurdity, it can be an entertaining, visual piece.

Dustings #123

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Look, it’s easy to judge. But haven’t we all been there? Haven’t we all made a few questionable choices—lost in the fog of desire—for a card duck?

Just last week, I woke up under a bridge on the wrong side of town. Needle in my arm. Pants around my ankles. Wallet empty. Rectum sore and bleeding. And why?

You know the story—just a tragic chain of missteps, set in motion sadly (but perhaps inevitably), by that insatiable longing… that raging, godless hunger… for a card duck.

Rick L. sends this along. Proof that the large motion covers the small motion.

The most embarrassing thing for the Magic Circle about this article isn’t that they didn’t want to allow women into their organization.

It’s that this is what they did want:


Out of This World and the Case Against Imperfection

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I was watching a YouTube video about a version of Out of This World that only uses half the deck, and where the spectator always gets one card wrong.

The thinking behind this choice is that guessing the colors of all 52 cards is a 1-in-4.5-quadrillion shot—so by using just half the deck and adding in a single mistake, the effect becomes more “believable” and “realistic.”

Well… I mean… I guess.

But that strikes me as the wrong way to think about it.

First off, I can’t exactly imagine a spectator thinking: “Correctly guessing the colors of all 52 cards is a 4.5 quadrillion improbability. That’s absurd! Guessing 25 out of 26 cards correctly is just a 1 in 2.6 million improbability. Totally plausible!”

Neither scenario is believable. No one thinks one is realistic and the other isn't. They’ll either believe both, or they’ll believe neither.

And this way of thinking also fundamentally misunderstands the Out of This World premise, in my opinion.

What is supposed to be happening in the trick?

In most presentations, it’s not about doing something incredibly unlikely.

In most (good) presentations, it’s a manifestation of something else. The spectator is tapping into their latent psychic ability. Or you’re mentally guiding them to separate the cards by color. Or maybe there's a “subliminal marking system” indicating the color on the backs of the cards that only their unconscious mind can detect. Whatever the premise, there’s usually some explanation—explicit or implied—that frames the outcome as the result of something other than luck.

So you're not demonstrating a 1-in-4.5-quadrillion impossibility. You're showing what would be a 1-in-4.5-quadrillion impossibility—except for this “other thing” you’re supposedly revealing (their intuition, your influence, the markings, etc.). The trick is about that thing. And it's that thing that makes the result feel possible—even if extraordinary.

Is this making sense?

Look, if I go to take a dump, the shit can land in the toilet or it can plop on the bathroom floor. Is it a mathematical miracle that I got it in the toilet 52 times in a row? No. Because we assume my ability to center my rectum over the toilet bowl is going to influence those odds.

The weakest way to present Out of This World is to treat it like a string of random guesses that just happen to defy astronomical odds. It’s far more powerful as a demonstration of something that makes those odds irrelevant.

In certain situations, being a little off can reinforce the premise of an effect. If I’m straining to read your mind and I say “better” when you were thinking of “butter,” that kind of near-miss feels “realistic.” We’ve all struggled to interpret something fuzzy or unclear. The miss supports the idea that I’m genuinely “reading” something.

But in Out of This World—and in many other effects—misses make much less sense. And they will only muddy the waters unless the mistake is baked into the premise. For example: “This is the moment I broke your concentration… and that’s the one card you got wrong.” Or some other narrative disruption that explains the glitch as a momentary breakdown of the power behind the phenomenon.

An unmotivated error doesn’t make the trick more realistic—it just makes the story harder to follow. It’s like saying, “This is the world’s strongest man. He fought 26 people and beat 25 of them.” Wait… what happened with the 26th? It doesn’t come off as a more believable story, it just raises unhelpful questions.

Magicians and mentalists often think, “If it’s not perfect, it’ll seem real.” But unless the imperfection grows naturally from the premise, that’s not how people interpret it.

No one thinks, “I got one wrong out of 26—that must mean this wasn’t a trick!” What they think is, “I got one wrong out of 26—huh. I guess he messed up the trick just a little bit.”

Detoxing

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Okay, let’s talk about some alternatives to the standard Toxic force. After about six weeks of exploring options, I’ve settled on the approach I’ll be using going forward.

My needs were simple. In fact, so simple that “needs” is an overstatement. I had one need: the ability to force long numbers: a phone number, a date, or maybe a number for Cryptext. I don’t have a single go-to trick that demands a long number force—it’s just one of those tools that comes in handy when improvising effects on the fly.

In the past, the Toxic force was my go-to, but recent changes to the iPhone calculator have taken it off the table.

I considered going back to an actual calculator for this—just have one in my bag—but then I realized we’re well past the point where carrying around a calculator could be considered normal. Usually older tech reads as more innocent than newer devices. But calculators are now so obsolete that even a basic dollar store model might raise eyebrows.

So I looked around for some alternatives…

Toxic+ is an app that has been around for a while and gets nearly universal praise. It’s packed with features and clearly built with working performers in mind.

Calculon is another app option—this one lets you perform the Toxic force on the spectator’s phone. And that’s just one of the features. You can force numbers, peek numbers, and even perform more visual effects where digits appear, vanish, or change on the calculator.

I didn’t go with either of these. For my needs, they were overkill. Like handing me a Swiss army knife when all I want to do is shank my cellmate in the gut

I’m sure plenty of performers would appreciate the range these apps offer—but my goal is always the same: find the simplest good option. The minimal effective dose, so to speak

Another option I looked into was the Argon project by Mark Lemon. This isn’t just a Toxic replacement—it’s a full suite of calculator-based effects. Two that stood out to me were The Atomic Code and Sum Duo.

The Atomic Code lets you reveal a seemingly random number your spectator generates on their own phone. This uses nothing but their phone (or even their own actual calculator). There’s no app, no gimmick—you never touch their device. It even works over video chat or a regular phone call. It doesn’t force a particular number, but following the process will allow you to know what number they’ve created.

Sum Duo is one of the simplest calculator forces out there—at least from the spectator’s perspective. You enter a number, your friend adds any number they like (without seeing yours), and yet the total is forced. Normally, we rely on the complexity of the math to build the mystery: “How could I possibly know the outcome of all these operations?” But this version flips the script. The calculation is so simple, it seems to rule out the very idea of trickery.

I’m still searching for the right presentation or premise for these, but both methods have a lot of potential.

And now for the Toxic variation I’ll be using going forward.

It’s called I.C.F. by Thomas Pelzer, available here for about $10.

The core technique behind I.C.F. is something I’ve seen a few performers gravitating toward as a Toxic replacement (including Mark Lemon, who uses a similar idea in one of the effects from the Argon download above). But I first encountered it in this manuscript when it was sent to me back in January 2023. At the time, Toxic still worked fine, so I didn’t give it much attention.

Since switching over, though, I actually prefer it to Toxic

Toxic has two major drawbacks:

  1. The math doesn’t hold up if someone actually tries to reproduce it later, or even if they’re just smart enough to generally follow along with it in their head.

  2. You need to prep your phone—or the spectator’s—beforehand.

I.C.F., by contrast, is performed on the spectator’s phone, requires zero setup (at least the way I do it) and the math checks out.

Soon, I’ll share a few adjustments I’ve made to the handling (without exposing the core method) that have taken this from good to great. As written in the manuscript, I’d rate it a 7.5 out of 10. With my tweaks, it’s more or less a perfect 10 (based on the criteria that I value). I recommend picking up the pdf if this is something that interests you. My additions will make much more sense if you know the core method.

As it stands, I can now force any number, of any length, at any time, on their phone—with no prep—and the math checks out. Details on the changes I’ve made coming next week. If you get the manuscript and have any thoughts you want to share, let me know by then.

Mailbag #135

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On the Tornado Bottle...

Tricks of this genre to my mind have the strong potential for your audience to want to keep the twisted item as a souvenir. If I could really so easily do this, why wouldn't I cheerfully give it away? It strikes me that at best it's a close-up effect for a roomful of strangers, none of whom feels entitled to ask for it. And is the magician supposed to put it back in the kitbag following examination? At $100 it's an expensive way to impress a booker, if this is the context.—BL

You’re correct: “I’m going to twist this normal, everyday bottle. And now I’m going to go home with it.” Is not something that any person who had the “magic” ability to twist bottles would do. It is what someone would do if they had a special $100 bottle they bought to do a trick with.

In a parlor situation, you could get away with just setting it aside. But it doesn’t strike me as a great parlor trick.

When wouldn’t you give something like this away? Maybe if you frame it as a moment that even you didn’t expect—something you’ve been trying for years, and it finally worked. Then it makes sense to keep it as your own souvenir. You could invoke some old judo technique that lets you “become one with the glass” and bend it to your will through breathing technique and application of precise pressure. (“Glass is technically a liquid,” you add.) If you act stunned—“Holy shit, I can’t believe it finally worked!”—then keeping it feels justified.

Otherwise, yeah—you’ll need to look into refill bottles so you can give one away.

Though that still leaves you with a twisted souvenir proudly labeled Baduueiser.

“Ah yes, my favorite. Baduueiser—the Kong of Bērs. For all that you do… this Bad’s for you.”

Re: Presenting Coincidences

So back in 2018 when you did that post,  I went and got a shelf, put it by my door and had a deck there, just like you said, I figured I'd try it.  (I would make a great cult member. you say do it, i'll do it)

Over the years I've had a bunch of people name a card, shuffle, turn over the card.  

A few weeks ago, it actually worked.  A friend came over, named a card, shuffled and turned over the top card.  She thought I had something to do with it.  I assured her, no, it was straight up coincidence, I wasn't winking, I was being dead serious, she did NOT believe me.  She really thought I had something to do with it.  

I didn't even follow it up with anything, I was too stunned.  

The cool part about it all was I was genuinely excited for it, it was magic to ME, I may have gotten more out of it than she did.  I KNEW it was a coincidence. —GC

Let this be a lesson.

This is a perfect example of a magical moment with no method. She named a card, shuffled the deck, turned over the top card—and it was the one she named. It all happened in her hands. The deck was shuffled, normal, examinable.

And yet… she still thought it was a trick.

There is no level of purity you can reach with an effect where someone won’t still assume it’s a trick.

All you can do is strip away anything that screams “method.”

Then, you give them a story—one that lingers, if you’re lucky. One that makes them think: Wait… could that actually have not been a trick?

The best case, when presenting magic, is this: the charm and romance of the story nestle in their head or heart just enough that they can’t fully dismiss the moment. They know it had to be a trick. But something about it—some subtle echo in how the experience felt—keeps tugging at their mind.

Re: An article in The Love Letters newsletter #34

Just a short email to let you know that Derren Brown's Notes From a Fellow Traveller contains an effect basically identical to Key Flightless, down to the idea of throwing a similar sounding / looking metallic object.—ND

Now, I don’t think anyone assumes I lifted something from a book by our most prominent practitione that was released just a couple of years ago, but I wanted to say a few words about it, if only to acknowledge that I’m aware of the similarity.

I own Notes From a Fellow Traveller, but I haven’t read it yet. I ordered it when it came out, but before it even arrived, people were already messaging me to say it sounded like something I’d write.

And honestly, hearing that made me not want to read it—at least while I’m still actively doing this site. I don’t want to be influenced by things that are too similar to my own approach.

The method for the trick I described in the newsletter came together back in 2020, through an email exchange with Steve Thompson (creator of Flite). That conversation was sparked by Marc Kerstein sending him a segment from this post, where I first started toying with the idea of doing Ring Flight with a key.

[One of the other things discussed in that exchange was a version where their key appears on your keyring, and your key appears on theirs. And the method actually seems pretty workable. I’ll let you know if anything ever comes of that.]

To be clear, I’m not trying to claim ownership of the concept. I doubt I was the first person to think of doing Ring Flight with keys. And throwing a coin somewhere unreachable has long been a way to “vanish” a ring in routines like this.

I just wanted to note that if you enjoyed the idea from the newsletter, you should check out Derren’s book. I imagine his version is conceptually far more layered. While my premise was a straightforward magical transformation—your house key turning into theirs—Derren’s version apparently involves a forgotten previous reality, which sounds fascinating.

Okay… maybe I’ll finally go read that part now.