Thoughts Govern Action

Suddenly, Max was aware of his surroundings; he was in a hospital. The last thing he could remember was a total stranger telling him that he didn’t look well. Slowly he began to remember that more than one person had told him that he didn’t look well. In fact, five total strangers, within one hour, had told him that he didn’t look well. After the fifth person, everything was a blur.

This is a dramatization of a true story, or rather an experiment that was conducted by an early 20th century journalist named Napoleon Hill. The “strangers” were people who worked for Napoleon Hill. The goal of the experiment was to find out what would happen when a perfectly healthy person was told that he looked ill. The result? The “perfectly healthy” person passed out. This experiment demonstrates that the mind is extremely powerful and that if a thought-seed is planted, it will, most likely, become a reality.

Adolf Hitler demonstrated this powerful principle by actually taking someone’s life with a game of the mind. Hitler had one of his soldiers conduct an experiment on a prisoner. The victim was tied to a chair and blindfolded. Then the soldier used a piece of ice to “cut” the wrist of the prisoner. No cut was actually made, however the soldier held the melting ice on the wet wrist, allowing the dripping water to fall into a bucket. Next the mind game began; the prisoner was repeatedly told, “If you tell us what we want to know, we’ll stop the bleeding!” The feeling of a slice, the wet wrist, and the dripping sound along with Hitler’s words were enough to convince the prisoner that he was bleeding to death, so he did; he bled to death without actually bleeding.

These two stories are negative examples of how strong the mind is, but if the mind is powerful enough to kill, then it is also powerful enough to create happiness and success. A person is, literally, what he thinks. Our circumstances and surroundings are a product of our deepest thoughts and subconscious desires. Most of us have heard the old adage, “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” This is a true principle. However, the meaning of this cliché is not found in the physical act of making the lemonade (turning the bad to good), but rather in the attitude that leads one to discover that lemonade can be made in the first place. Even the character Doc Brown from the hit movie Back to the Future demonstrated his understanding that attitude and thoughts govern action when he said, “If you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything.”

If a man can think he’s bleeding to death and die from the thought, then a person can think he’ll be successful and succeed from the thought. If we truly believe without a doubt that we can do it (‘it’ being whatever we want out of life), then we will do “it.” As Henry Ford said, “If you think you can do a thing or you think you cannot do a thing, you are right.”

Root:

Let’s Remember Our Roots. The Root: Your mind is your most valuable tool. The above essay was written for a college assignment years ago. I recently came across it and decided to add it to the magazine because it teaches a great lesson that we magicians can apply to our performances. First of all, if nothing else, it might make for an interesting premise for an effect.

Looking beyond that, I think the power of this is found in how we connect in our audience. When we perform, we connect with our audience via trickery, patter and costume. Why not other things? Why not with our mind? Or at the very least, why not use our mind to improve how we use trickery, patter and costume to connect with our audience.

Branch:

Let’s Build Our Branches. Your Challenge: Believe that you’re amazing. I know the world of magic is filled with enough ego already, and there’s a fine line between confidence and arrogance, especially in our industry. Try this, however: check your ego. Then believe that you have the most amazing performance, effect, show, etc. Don’t go around shoving it in people’s faces and rubbing their nose in it, just quietly believe it.

Don’t put yourself in denial either. In fact, you’ll want to do the exact opposite of denial. Take extra time to get feedback from filming yourself, or asking people, etc. Whatever criticism you get, DO NOT DISMISS IT. Just the opposite. Think about it. Ponder it. Really open your heart and mind to find the truth of critique that you receive.

That may sound like the opposite of “believing you’re amazing.” However, it’s not. When you tell yourself you’ve got a great show, and you really truly start to believe, your actions, subconsciously will try to play catch up with your brain. You will, on a very subconscious level start attracting things that will make your show better, so when you start believing in yourself, the doors will open and paths will clear and you will eventually catch up to where you think you are. Just remember step 1: check your ego before you do any of this.

Put this to the test in your next show. Tell yourself repeatedly that you will get a standing ovation. I’m not guaranteeing that you will. However, what will happen is that the more you tell yourself that, the more your mind will work on ways to head you down that path . . . just don’t forget step 1!

Now got study the classics and go discover your true magical self.