Astrological Cycle
/In the last newsletter, I wrote about various star sign reveals I’ve used.
After writing that, my friend and publisher of the site, Andrew, wrote me and said I was missing the best star sign reveal in my write-up. I asked him if he would demonstrate it for me. Andrew is one of a handful of people I often ask to learn a trick before I get it, so I can be on the spectator side of an effect before learning the inner workings.
“No, I’m not going to bother demonstrating it for you,” he said. “It’s not going to fool you.”
“You never know,” I said. “You’ve seen me be fooled by stuff I should know.”
“Yeah, but that won’t be the case this time.”
“Why not? Whose trick is it?” I asked.
“It’s yours,” he said. “It’s your app.”
The beauty of this star sign reveal is that there is no process. You could meet any stranger anywhere and immediately write down their star sign. That’s it. And it’s essentially impromptu.
That being said, you need to have a process. Otherwise, you’ll have the most boring trick imaginable. One where people will walk away thinking, “Well, he must have got my birthdate somewhere, somehow, I guess.”
When I say there’s “no process,” I just mean there’s no process required for the method.
But do something.
You could ask them some psychological questions to build up a quick profile and figure out their astrological sign from their answers.
You could ask them their favorite breakfast cereal and their least favorite breakfast cereal, and from that you “calculate” their sign. “I don’t really buy any of that astrology stuff. I’ve looked into it for years. I don’t see any real correlation between personality and when you were born. Except when it comes to your choice in breakfast cereal.”
Or your process could be to take them outside and look at the reflection of the stars in their eyes.
Just give them some story to hold onto.
The method uses the Draw Cycle utility on the Jerx App.
This feature cycles through a number of outs you’ve written on your phone and then locks in that out as soon as you move the phone.
Normally, using this method, you might say, “I’m going to guess your star sign.” You write something on your phone. “Okay, what’s your star sign?” They tell you, then you show them you got it correct.
That moment where you’ve apparently written it down, but then you ask for it before revealing what you wrote, is a Hitch in the process. It doesn’t ruin the trick, but it can stand out as a little weird for people. (And occasionally people will lie to you at that point just to mess with you.)
Andrew has a way of getting around that Hitch that I like a lot.
So here’s what the effect looks like. You meet someone, and somehow it comes out that you can figure out their astrological sign.
“Do you have a pen? That’s okay… I’ll use my phone,” you say.
You go through your process to figure out their sign, then you write something on your phone to “commit” yourself. “Wait…,” you say, “Hmm. Maybe it’s not that. Maybe it’s…. Okay. I think I got it.”
You go into your reveal. “You were born in a warm month, correct?”
Yes.
“I sensed that immediately. I actually picked up that you were born in the middle of the summer. The end of July, You’re a Leo, yes?”
No.
“Damn. Was I close?”
Ehh… I’m a Gemini.
“Oh… okay. Yeah, for some reason my first instinct was Leo. But I’m a Virgo. And Virgos never trust their first instinct.”
You show them what you wrote…
So your phone is cycling through the outs like this:
All have “Leo” crossed out at the top. (Except for Leo, of course.)
So, with this structure, you can immediately start going into the reveal, without them giving you any information. That feels like what you would expect if you were doing it for real.
Then, by getting it wrong, people’s guard drops, and they feel comfortable outright telling you what it is. You’ve apparently already failed. Again, this feels like how things would progress if this was playing out for real.
Because the flow is so natural, there’s nothing for them to question, really. Then, at the end, your intentional misdirect also has a purpose because it adds a little more drama to the proceedings. It wasn’t something you just did for nothing. It wasn’t something that must have had a methodological purpose.
And, of course, one out of 12 times, you just nail their zodiac sign completely directly.
You’re not limited to zodiac signs. Anything with a reasonable number of outs could use this structure.
Directly go into the reveal just hoping to get lucky
Get it wrong (most likely)
Reveal that you knew you got it wrong, and that you knew what the correct option would be.
There’s something about the wrong answer being crossed out that almost makes this feel more legit than if it just had the right sign there by itself. (If you disagree, you can certainly just have the right sign on there by itself.)
Thanks to Andrew for the idea, Marc for maintaining the app, me for coming up with the concepts behind the app, God for creating astrology, and the stars for letting me know deep insights like, when it comes to home decor I like, “aesthetically pleasing interiors.”