- This may or may not work.
- All right.
- All right, it's only gonna happen in your head.
- Okay.
- Isn't mentalism
the coolest (bleep) thing in the world?
Really think about this:
How amazing is it
to make someone believe
that you're inside their head
or that you can read their mind.
It's kind of like a superpower.
Let's talk more about mentalism,
but I gotta go get some coffee.
Also, this.
I just got some new puzzles in the mail.
Obie!
Obie, come help me open this box.
(squeaking)
Obie!
Ha ha, look who I found!
Wanna help me open this box?
You love this little raccoon, don't you?
Ooh, this one looks really cool.
We'll call this puzzle number one.
Puzzle number two.
And puzzle number three.
Let me know which puzzle
you think I should do next on the channel.
One, two, or number three.
Here's also something cool.
There are brand-new Under Armour sneakers
that are pre-launch.
They are called Bantam.
Check these out.
So here's the thing:
This is not a paid endorsement.
Well, it is and it isn't.
So they didn't pay me to talk
about this on YouTube, but I thought it would
just be interesting to share with you guys
that I'm gonna take Instagram pictures.
I'm getting paid to take Instagram pictures
of these sneakers.
I just thought that was cool
and I wanted to share that with you guys.
'Cause if you woulda told me
a couple years ago,
"Hey man, we're gonna pay you to take pictures
"of awesome sneakers," I would've been like,
"Yeah, let's go."
(upbeat accordion music)
♪ Enchanté ♪
- Let's go.
So mentalism has to be, like I said,
probably one of the coolest things you can do.
So many times I hear from people
who are non-magicians, "Do you do mentalism?"
I know this one guy, he's a mentalist,
he's not a magician.
It's kind of funny to me as a magician
because we know that mentalism and magic
come from the same school.
We kind of use the same techniques,
but that tells you a lot
about why people find mentalism so fascinating.
Because they actually think it's some gray area,
it could be real.
Hmm.
♪ Enchanté ♪
♪ Dansé ♪
♪ Garçon ♪
(upbeat electronic music)
- So I want you,
I want you to imagine you're sitting on a bench.
- Okay.
- You're looking out
and you see a rainbow.
- Okay.
- And there's like a, no, that's okay.
You see a scenery,
and now I want you to imagine you're
on the rainbow, okay?
And you're looking down
and there's a bunch of colors.
Just seven colors.
There's red, green, orange,
blue, pink, purple, yellow, okay?
But in a second you're gonna choose one color.
Don't choose one now.
And whatever color you choose,
you're gonna sort of paint a scenery.
So, for instance, if you were to take green
you might paint a scenery of a field of grass.
- Mm-hmm.
- If you were to take pink or purple,
maybe you paint a scenery of flowers.
- Mm-hmm.
- So take one of those colors
and I want you just to paint a scenery.
Can you do that in your mind?
- Yes.
- Okay, close your eyes
and I want you to imagine
that you're there.
I actually like the color tones
of the snow here,
and this church has a red door.
I think that might be a really cool spot
for me to snap a quick picture of these sneakers.
The awkward part is that I only have
these shoes, so I have to take off a shoe
to take a picture of it, so yeah.
Insert picture of the photo now.
(camera clicks)
All right, so honestly not sure if I'm gonna use
any of those photos, but it was worth a try.
One of the questions I get asked the most
on this channel is, "Where do I learn mentalism?
"How do I become a mentalist?
"How do I go deeper into mentalism?
"How do I do propless mentalism?"
And a lot of mentalism is,
just like magic, it requires a lot of practice
and it requires a lot of people skills.
You can't be a good magician
if you're not good with people.
That's something you have to work on.
But if you do wanna learn some
of the techniques,
I will give you some examples
of my favorite places to look
for mentalism and especially propless mentalism,
which by far my favorite.
First of all, if you guys don't know about Peter Turner,
Peter Turner's an incredible mentalist,
and I've hung out with this dude so many times.
He just blows minds with nothing in his hands,
nothing in his pocket,
just his words.
One of my favorite things about Peter is
Isabella Star Three.
- You were born on the 22nd of March.
On March sixth or seventh.
Oscar, Oscar.
Oh, you went for Neil.
- Yeah.
- Red. - Yeah.
- I keep seeing it, like Capricorn, Capricorn, Capricorn.
- Yes!
- So that's literally a star sign divination,
but so much more.
Definitely check out anything Peter Turner has to do
with anything.
My hair is out of control.
People are just looking at me super weird
speaking to my camera.
That's another thing, it's like,
just being a magician, you have to own it.
I am a vlogger, this is what I do,
I'm a magician but I'm also a YouTuber.
So when people see me out in public
talking to a camera like it's a person,
and they're looking at me like I'm an alien
from a different planet, well,
that's just something I have to live with.
Have to own it.
Next book, one of my favorite forms
of mentalism is cold reading.
Let's go take a walk.
Cold reading is the ability
to basically tell something about someone
without actually knowing anything about them.
Psychics, quote unquote psychics, mediums
use these techniques a lot.
- [James Van Praagh] I see someone sitting with a pillow
at the back of her.
- No.
- [James Van Praagh] Or is that you?
- No.
- That doesn't make sense to you?
- No.
- And I think they're some of the strongest
things you can do without any props on you.
Ian Rowland put out a book called,
I believe, correct me if I'm wrong,
I'm gonna throw some b-roll on this
right now when I get back home.
Full Facts book about cold reading.
I probably shouldn't even share this
with you guys.
This is just too good of a secret,
but I'm gonna share it anyways
because I know only some of you are
actually gonna go out and pick it up.
I think I spend more time
at the barbershop than I do
at my actual house.
You know what?
We're just gonna own it.
We're just gonna own the bad hair today.
We're just gonna own it
and run with it, all right?
So, System 88 by Doc Hilford?
It used to be used by pickup artists
back in the '60s.
You guys have probably seen
the article going around on Buzzfeed
I think last year or the year before?
Which talked about the cube in the desert test.
By telling someone about a cube
in a desert and a ladder and all these things,
I could go deep into your subconscious
and tell you about yourself
without knowing actually anything about yourself.
And that's something I've been using
time and time again.
It's just something if I have nothing on me
and I have a group of people,
'cause this you can perform to many, many people.
It's not actually a magic trick,
it's not actually mentalism.
There is cold reading involved,
but it's more of a psychological test
and that's how the premise works.
It's like, "Hey guys, this is a psychological test,
"it's not a magic trick, I'm not psychic.
"Use your imagination with the questions
"that I'm gonna ask you.
"You're gonna get a lot out of this."
Man oh man oh man,
I've had people cry,
I've had people tell me things
that their best friend didn't even know about them.
They just feel like opening up,
and this is a crazy, crazy thing.
So it's a lot of fun.
Takes, definitely, a long time to sort of master
and practice, but once you have it in here,
you never forget it.
And that's something I could just run with.
I don't need a deck of cards,
I don't need a pad and paper,
I could just go, perform for five people live
and it's like a good 15, 20 solid minutes
of craziness.
I think if you're talking
about propless mentalism, you can't talk
about propless mentalism without mentioning
Psychological Subtleties by Banachek.
Psychological Subtleties One, Two, and Three
where basically Banachek, who's a world-renowned mentalist,
talks about the human mind
and how a lot of us think along the same lines
and using that information in order
to, you know, perform impromptu mentalism
on a spectator.
So that is really cool.
If you're just get started in mentalism,
13 Steps to Mentalism by Corinda is
kind of like the holy bible because
if you're willing to delve,
you're gonna have a lot of fun.
If you wanna dabble, I would say don't get into mentalism.
Just imagine yourself in this place,
really imagine yourself here.
- Mm-hmm.
- Is this a place normally
where there's a lot of people,
but right now you're kind of alone
in this place, is that accurate?
No, there's not a lot of people at all?
Is it a warm place?
- Yes.
- It's a warm place. - Mm-hmm.
- Keep your eyes closed.
I want you,
I want you to plug your ears
with both your hands.
Plug your ears so you can't hear anything.
I'm gonna put my hands on your head
and I want you just to imagine
and just let me know
what it is that you feel, that you hear.
One of the problems with mentalists,
I think personally, not with mentalists actually
but with magicians is
that they can't commit to either being a magician
or being a mentalist.
They dabble.
Darren Brown, who's one of my favorite mentalists
in the world, even said so himself.
He used to be a magician
and then he would slowly go into hypnosis
and mentalism.
Figured out that he had to relinquish magic entirely
for the mentalism, for it to have
reverence, for it to be considered
fringe reality, for it to really spook people out
or creep people out.
He had to drop the card tricks,
which makes complete sense if you think about it.
If I'm gonna have you pick a card,
find your card, then read your mind
and then after that,
do another card trick, I mean,
I suspect in your mind it's like, "It's just a trick.
"Obviously he's not a real mentalist."
You get what I'm saying?
If you wanna dabble, it's a lot of fun to do.
I personally don't take myself too seriously
as a mentalist because I am a magician
and so when I perform and I do mind reading feats,
if they ask me, I say of course this is a trick, you know?
This is, I'm a magician, these are all tricks,
but nonetheless, we're having a good time, aren't we?
So I've given you resources,
I've given you knowledge,
and I told you where to go
and I've told you what to study
and I know for a fact
that in a month's time
or even a week's time,
I'm still gonna get these questions
on this channel because new people come all the time,
but also 'cause a lot of people
just want shortcuts, and that's the reality
we live in today is that
most people are lazy
and will not take the time
to properly learn something.
They will not devote the time for them.
"I've been doing something for six months
"and it's not working."
Well, six months isn't a long time.
Nothing comes easy, especially
if you're trying to fool intelligent people.
If you're trying to convince intelligent people
you have mind powers and stuff like that,
yeah, that's not gonna come easy
and definitely not gonna be easy
if you're 13 years old.
Let me tell you, mentalism should only be performed
by adults, and that is a,
and the only reason I'm saying that is
because there's no way
that an adult will take you seriously.
And that's just fact.
And you guys have probably lived through that.
You guys probably lived through
that frustrating reality
of being a kid but wanting to read minds and stuff,
and they're just kinda looking at you like,
"Aw, that's cute, this kid's cute, he does magic."
So my advice to you would be
learn the techniques, learn everything you need
to know about mentalism,
practice it on your friends,
practice it on your parents
and that type of thing,
but you're gonna try to tell people
deep, dark secrets about themselves
when basically you know nothing about your own self.
It's not a pill
that most people will likely swallow.
And I don't mean that in a bad way,
I mean that in a very honest way
and I'm being honest with you
because I think you deserve someone
to be honest with you
and I wish someone would've been honest with me.
These are the things that I've learned
as I grew up.
That doesn't mean don't learn it.
I mean, like I said, the same things apply
to magic, the same laws apply to magic,
so just play around with it.
I'm not gonna give you shortcuts.
For the people saying, "Well, how did you get them
"to say the six of clubs?
"How did you get to think of this word?"
I've given you resources.
Do your research.
There are no shortcuts,
and that's the brutal, honest answer.
It sucks to hear, but welcome to magic
and welcome to mentalism.
If you wanna learn, get crackin'.
Stop being lazy and just keep learning.
Keep learning and in three, four, five, six
years from now, you're gonna get it.
You're gonna be like, "That's what he was talking about."
Do you hear anything?
- Yo. - What?
What are you hearing?
- The sea.
- The sea? - Yeah.
- What do you mean? Explain.
- Oh my god.
Oh my god.
(laughs)
I'm at the sea border.
- You're at the sea border. - Yeah.
- And is that what you were thinking of?
- Yes.
- You were thinking of the sea?
- Yes, yes. Whoa.
Whoa.
That's crazy.
- Crazy, right? - Oh my god.
Aww, man.
You know, I was thinking about the sky,
blue in the sky
and I was like, "I'm gonna switch it real quick"
and I switched to the sea, like a beach
- [Chris] And you started hearing the sea.
- Yeah.
- [Chris] Started hearing what, the water?
- Yeah.
- [Chris] Like the waves?
- Exactly.
That's crazy.
- Pretty freaked out right now.
- Yeah, I am, really.
♪ Enchanté ♪
♪ Dansé ♪
♪ Garçon ♪