Mailbag #73

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You-Not-I is so good.

Do you think it’s even necessary to bring it back to the performer at the end? I wonder if you could stick with the ‘you’ and say something like, ‘So if I asked you five minutes ago what word you’d be thinking of right now, would you have any idea at all?’

And then begin the revelation. Probably a small point that makes little difference, but I guess I’ve never really liked that ‘there’s no way I could have known’ line anyway. —HC

I believe the You-Not-I technique benefits from bringing yourself into the equation at the end. I know the implication is already there—the implication that says, “If you didn’t know you would do/think X, then of course I couldn’t have known either”—so you may feel it’s unnecessary to say it yourself. But my feeling is that I can’t be 100% sure everyone will do that same math in their head, so it’s good for me to “close the loop” for them on that idea.

Thais could all come down to a matter of personal preference and how much you want the other person to to have to think. As was obvious by my posts last month on clarifying conditions, I think it feels more real and natural to be as explicit as possible with these things.

If you prefer to be less explicit, then you don’t have to bring yourself into it at the end.

So you can use the technique in an implied way or an explicit way, and a third way as well…

You-Not-I Implied

“I asked you to think of an animal and change your mind a few times. Could you have known what animal you would write down on the business card?”

Here the implication is if they couldn’t have known, then you couldn’t have known.

You-Not-I Explicit

“I asked you to think of an animal and change your mind a few times. Could you have known what animal you would write down on the business card? And if you couldn’t know where your mind would go and what animal you’d think of, then of course I couldn’t either.”

Here’s the third option:

You-Not-I Mid-Range

“I asked you to think of an animal and change your mind a few times. Could you have known what animal you would write down on the business card? Right, and if you couldn’t have known, then of course no one else could either.”

This “Mid-Range” option may be the most appealing. You still finish the thought for them, but you don’t bring it specifically back to yourself. “If even you didn’t know what card you’d go for. Then nobody could have known.” You’re just lumping yourself in with the rest of the world.

What do you think about Feel Better by Chris Philpott?

I like the idea of the word on the card changing in the image on the spectator’s phone, but I don’t know how I feel about the “pandemic” presentation. Is this something you think you’ll pick up? —JF

I’m kind of torn on this one. I may get this, but if I do I can pretty much assure you I won’t be mentioning the pandemic when I use it. In general I do my best not to base my presentations on something that possibly killed my spectator’s dad four months ago. There’s also absolutely no reason at all to present it in such a way. You can just talk about negative emotions, indicate to them that you don’t want to go into any super traumatic places emotionally, but for them to pick out something unpleasant that they occasionally feel, etc., etc.

I’m perfectly fine with a trick that hits on unpleasant themes, but I would want to guide them so they don’t go too dark. And the fact of the matter is, you just don’t know how someone was affected by the pandemic, so it would be a weird thing to use for a magic trick.

That being said, this seems like a nice structure for a trick:

  • they concentrate on a negative emotion they sometimes deal with

  • you “read” that emotion from them

  • you take their picture holding the card with that emotion written on it

  • you conduct some sort of little ritual, or give them some kind of advice to put them in a better headspace when dealing with that emotion

  • you reveal the emotion on the card has changed in the picture

I like that quite a bit.

My issue with the 100th Monkey principle (which is used in this effect), when used in close-up, casual situations, is that the words already look somewhat odd when you initially read them. There’s something “off” about the words. So the fact that something strange happens with the word is less impossible seeming. The “font” becomes a little suspect (how could it not). And it’s very natural for someone to ask to see the word again. You can deny that request, of course, but then you’re just kind of confirming their suspicions.

So if I was going to get this—and I might—I would get it knowing that the power of the routine would come from the totality of the experience. I wouldn’t buy it thinking, “And the word is going to change in the picture on their phone and they’re going to have absolutely no clue how that happened!” Some people will have a pretty solid clue. But for them you can play off the finish as an interesting allegorical optical illusion about transforming these emotions by gaining distance or changing our perspective… or something like that.