Derren Brown: UNLOCK The Secret Power Of Your Mind! | E212

I've been asked by the FBI, been asked by the police to help. What did the FBI or the police want help with? Nah. Ladies and gentlemen, the incredible Derren Brown! A psychological illusionist. Doing extraordinary television and even better live shows. Derren is a national treasure. Welcome to the show. The story we tell ourselves is not what's real. Like, for example, I did a show called Miracle. The Lord has his work cut out tonight. And the second half was healing. A woman came up and she'd been paralyzed on one side of her body since she was four. In floods of tears cuz she could move her left arm for the first time. What you're seeing is that it's the psychological component of suffering, right? Like, nothing's happened, nothing's changed, but their relationship to their suffering, that's been made to change. It's not the things in life that cause you problems, it's the story that you tell yourself about them, it's the judgments that you make about them. There's a lot of people that are trying to sell you on this that they can take your traumas or your your insecurities to zero. I've never seen it happen. We've completely obliterated the idea of just fortune in life. Sometimes life's throwing stuff back at us that we have no control over. Your anxiety is still somehow the demon. But, you know, without anxiety, how do you know to change anything? You know, you can't do that without embracing anxiety to an extent. Your work is primarily based in psychology, right? So, have you ever done anything and thought, "How the did that happen?" Huh. Don't go home and start doing that. Two things come to mind. Before this episode starts, I have a small favor to ask from you. Two months ago, 74% of people that watch this channel didn't subscribe. We're now down to 69%. My goal is 50%. So, if you've ever liked any of the videos we've posted, if you like this channel, can you do me a quick favor and hit the subscribe button. It helps this channel more than you know, and the bigger the channel gets, as you've seen, the bigger the guests get. Thank you and enjoy this episode. I've spent the last few days reading all about your childhood. Oh. Truly fascinating. Thank you. I actually I've actually got a picture here of you um How strange that you have that picture. Yes, that's me with a um a parrot on my shoulder. I love that you have This little boy. Yes. What do I need to understand about about him and the world he lived in and the way he saw the world to understand you? What do you need to understand? Well, I was an only child till I was nine. So, I guess that's kind of a that's a pretty formative thing, isn't it? Quite creative. Like I always always drawing and building things, LEGO. Always been a bit of a people pleaser and maybe that at that age. Kind of yeah, sort of happy. Didn't didn't have a lot of friends. There wasn't like a didn't have a big gang. I never really did. I've always gone through life just with sort of a small number of of of good friends. But, I think that's what I that that feels like a happy a happy time to think back on. I remember sitting with Jimmy Carr and him telling me that um people often think of comedians as being like they're depressed so they're trying to impress other people to get some kind of thrill for their own sort of self-gratification. But, Jimmy said to me, he said, you should actually ask which one of my parents was depressed that I was trying to impress to understand how I became a comedian. I wonder in your you know you said that you're a bit of a people pleaser. You clearly have this huge affinity towards entertaining and getting the reaction back from people, the amazement. Where where did that start? Can you have you pinpointed where that started in your childhood? Yes, I think I could. So, when I was at school so my dad was a swimming teacher at school. And he and I wasn't very sporty so I kind of um it shielded me from being like uh bullied as an as a non-sporty kid, but I didn't love school mainly because I I said I found a lot of the kids the sporty kids quite intimidating and and so on. So, I kind of like but dad teaching there helped. And then when I got to and I was I was in with the wrong group, the the sort of classical music loving group or the puff gang as we were less charitably known. Um didn't even like classical music, so it was a pretty miserable group to be stuck with. Um in sixth form, I remember everybody sort of seemed to grow up suddenly and become a lot more uh friendly and so I kind of uh I sort of exploded in a way into sort of like attention seeking and I went from being very sort of quiet and a bit a bit intimidated by these sort of uh kids to sort of suddenly they seemed to sort of, you know, like me or at least, you know, they were fine. So, I I I started doing impressions of teachers and I would draw caricatures of them and I was definitely I became kind of really I would imagine quite irritating certainly some of the teachers. Um attention seeker. So, I think it all happened around then. Um and then uh it just sort of then progressed into university. Most of my 20s was um probably a lot of it was around, you know, based around that. Uh and it it was quite a handy thing, you know, if you're going to perform it takes care of that need to just sort of, you know, just kind of impress. I think it was probably a a good thing. Were you picked on or teased or anything in school before that point? No, it's I think because my dad taught there it helped, but I was I was definitely, you know, I was chosen last for the teams and and things. Hated uh sports and so on. There were a couple of kids that were probably I mean generally fairly nasty anyway, but I certainly got a bit from them, but no, I think I think I sort of did all right. I think I generally didn't enjoy school that much. And I felt like I was sort of um I said intimidated, but I don't I don't really remember ever getting sort of I never got beaten up or bullied or no one was making my life particularly miserable. I think it was just the general feeling of not quite fitting in. And religion? I was incredibly religious when I Were you? Yeah, and then I lost it at about 18, became incredibly atheist. Yeah. And you I I read a similar sort of journey in your story it's at 6 or something you'd asked your parents if you could go to Bible That's right. Mrs. Whitaker, one of our teachers at school, was uh I really liked a lot and um she ran it was called Crusader class, but it's basically like a Sunday school thing. Um and uh cuz I was 6 and she asked me if I wanted to go to it. I just sort of presumed every everybody did. I didn't know any different, so I said to uh I I asked my parents if I could go and they said yes, of course. So I did and then by the time I realized that oh no, no, this is actually like a a a thing that I now believe in and it was sort of I was pretty much inculcated, so it was uh hard to step out of it, but I did eventually at university. So many years later I uh through doing hypnosis first and magic and they they always give you quite a skeptical outlook on things because you just see how people fool themselves and and so you sort of naturally start to view a lot of belief systems, I think, through those eyes, including your own. I don't know how it works for you, but I um and also the very idea of doing hypnosis um I just remember that was cuz I was a member of the Christian Union in my first year at university. I went to Bristol. And they were just totally up in arms. I had I had um members of the that uh Christian Union at the back of one of my shows exorcising me and casting out demons whilst I was hypnotizing people on stage. So again, all of that just sort of uh made me quite just just helped with the sort of general skepticism and took a little while to properly come out of it. In fact, that the Richard Dawkins book, The The God Delusion, came out around the time that I had sort of mentally made that step, but didn't quite maybe have the sort of proper language for it. So, that was if that was a helpful book, actually, as I'm sure it was for many people in terms of giving that lack of belief a kind of a structure. It was for me. One of the very sort of pivotal books in my life when I when I was about 18 years old. Um also read about like compulsive behaviors from your childhood, things like knocking your knees together and Yeah. a series of other things. Really twitchy, yeah. A little on that sort of kind of Tourette's sort of scale. I think it's a There's a There's a wedge that ends with um quite severe things, but a lot a lot of people have that experience of um making little funny tickly noises in the throat or having to, you know, not step on the cracks and uh then there's all the kind of OCD thing that that starts to get accompanied by feelings of dread and so much. I never had that. But, yeah, I was twitching. I I I I find a lot of um kind of creative creative kids are I don't I don't really know what what it is. It's a It's a Seems to be a form of auto-suggestion. Um It's like when you get you get the idea in your head and then it's very hard to let it go. And then sometimes I I get it now. Sometimes I get it on stage cuz there's a certain amount of There's a lot of muscle memory with doing a stage show. So, if you've if something if a little twitchy thing has crept in at one point during the show, it'll just creep in every night. Um so, I still kind of uh still aware of it. Um little more of the last few years cuz obviously it's been such a, you know, weird few years for everyone's mental health. So, I've noticed it more than I have before. Um But, uh uh yeah, that and it was quite It was a It was a lot. My parents were quite despairing with it cuz I think it's a very painful thing to watch your child do and not know What were they watching? help. Knees knocking, sniffing, terrible sniffing. Yeah, like really but really loud really loud. I went to see a um Alfred Brendel the pianist playing in Berlin once when I was uh studying out there, I think, or did my gap gap year, I think it was out there. And just I mean this guy's playing the I think it was the Beethoven piano sonatas. Just him on his own on the stage at the Berlin Philharmonic. And there's this incredibly loud sniffing that I'm doing with And by the second half, everybody had cleared out. I I was just basically a whole empty area of the audience. But, yeah, it's just it's such a bizarre thing. Um you just can't really stop it with the best will in the world. You can't stop yourself from doing this this these things. And it's um And also, you don't have the language for it as a kid. That's That's the worst part of it. You don't have the language to explain that it's a compulsion. It You sort of feel like you're in control of it. You say you feel like therefore the only only thing you can say is that you want to do it. You don't want to do it because it's horrible. You would really really want to stop. And it's it's hard and frightening cuz you can't articulate it and it um uh And I I think there's no answer to it. I don't know. It just it sort of passes. As you've um as you've matured has your perspective of your childhood evolved? Cuz I've found that mine certainly has. It's almost like with with a bit more wisdom I say that I'm 30 years old now, but with a little bit more wisdom I've I've kind of have a different perspective now on the events of my childhood. At one point, I would have kind of narrated them differently, but now I see different sort of truths and through lines in my early experience. I think I'm quite fond of my memories of myself as a child. And I um it felt like there was quite a clean break once I sort of went off to university. It felt like life sort of stopped and started again. So, I when I think back to my kind of um the sort of story of myself that I guess I'm sort of quietly living out of the back of my head. I sort of don't really go much beyond uh university age. Um and I'm I'll happily find anything excruciating like, you know, more than you know, anything I've said or done 10 minutes ago. I find that quite easy. Um and that feeling I suppose kind of gets weaker and weaker the further I go back in terms of finding myself you know, embarrassing or I And then by the time I get to childhood, it's all perfectly it all feels fine. I mean, I'm aware as I said that I was kind of would sort of just get on with my own things, but nothing I I I I uh I think I was sensitive. I think I still am. I was quite a sensitive child. I used to I used to I did used to cry a lot. I know that makes me sound unhappy, but I I used to it didn't take much to make me cry. Um and I think I probably retained a sort of uh sensitivity which is sort of interesting cuz I sort of write a lot about stoicism and a lot of the things I think people you people do tend to write about the things that you know, that they either need to learn for themselves or are learning cuz I you you know, you you express those things um often better because you're discovering them for your for your for yourself. Um So, uh perhaps like a lot of Stoics I'm you know, secretly quite uh quite sensitive too. So, I remember that, but not not um not really unhappy. Not not particularly blissfully happy either, but just a a kind of fairly content solitary kind of kid. That sensitivity, um I've always wondered if if we're particularly taken by the applause, are we therefore also taken by the criticism? So, people that end end up committing their lives to being like public entertainers and living for the response and the reaction that they their work has, are those then also the people that are most susceptible to when, you know, the opposite of applause? Uh Yeah, I I Yes, I guess so. You're definitely putting yourself out there, aren't you? If you you perform and then you sort of you are kind of you are um opening yourself up to both extremes of reaction. But, it wasn't really about that for me. I I um I think it was about control was a big part of it. And also, as I sort of um like I didn't come out till I was actually sort of quite late, in my 30s. Um and I think at the around the time that I was getting into the hypnosis. So, that was, you know, sort of university time, really. Uh And I think first of all, it was and this is all wasn't clear to me at the time, but with hindsight, that the control aspect of it was very um clear. Uh And that clearly ticked Well, if you watch a hypnotist hypnotizing people, I mean, it's just that the whole thing is a big exercise in in control. And I think I sort of that was appealing to me. Although, I didn't know it in that I didn't it didn't strike me quite in that language at the time, but I think looking back, um that was helpful. Um And also, I think if the the old um outmoded cliché of the the gay man in particular being, you know, a hairdresser or a interior designer and all all of those sort of horrible old clichés, what they have in common, actors as well, is the um the notion of uh um being able to create dazzling surfaces because they they deflect people from the the more difficult. If you're feeling shame about, you know, what's underneath um and I think magic's very good for that as well. You know, you're you're sort of creating this bubble around yourself, this sort of this um you're literally hiding behind a trick and people will look at that trick and go, "Oh gosh, you're amazing. How do you do that? You're amazing." And that's a very appealing thing. A lot of kids get into magic just cuz they're under-confident. Um and a lot of people even going into magic into adults, they they've learned to rely on that to impress people and haven't had to go back and just work through normal social skills that most people do. So, it's it's a very appealing thing. And I think all of that was all of that was helpful to me as somebody that was not out and, you know, kind of working all that stuff out. You used the word shame there. It reminded me of listening to your audio book where you talk about those two kids beating you up in your sleeping bag. I can't remember the Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. And one of the lines you said in that section of the book is that you were very good at I think you said embodying shame, but I know that's not the exact word you used. But you were very good at liking to holding shame. You were full of shame I think was the the um the message. Yeah, I I can't I can't I can't remember exactly what I wrote, but um yeah, it kind of it creeps up on you. I said I I I find now it it's um yeah, I can ease I'm I'm prone to it. You know, if I feel I've uh upset my partner, I'll it's it's shame that I'll go to rather than defensiveness or, you know, I said yeah, I just I I'll easily I can easily get back to a feeling of like oof, I've, you know, I've been bad. I've just sort of let this person down. Is that what what does shame mean to you cuz I think I've been using the word a little bit without um a very focused definition. I've been saying that I felt a lot of shame because I was the only like black kid in an all white school and we were the poorest family and so that feeling of shame turned into like a motivation which made me want to become a happy sexy millionaire. Huh. But what does shame mean to you in that context? Well, I suppose if you distinguish it from embarrassment, embarrassment is sort of where you've sort of you've let yourself down in front of or you've you've it's it's a feeling you're going to get from other people. They're they're important in that. It's how you've appeared before them whereas I suppose shame is how you've appeared before your yourself that you've sort of let something down within yourself. It's that, isn't it? Um uh But I think the experience of it is just a sort of um it just becomes an easy resting place. Whatever it is but it might be for someone else, it could be anger or fury or whatever. If there's just a an emotional through line that you've that was a familiar place when you were young, it's just you just find yourself settling back into that. I suppose part of getting older is recognizing those kind of things, aren't they? Recognizing ah that's that is a you know, a needless pattern. And as you said with your own experience with that kind of those things can be really helpful. They can provide a real impetus and a motivation to um you know, to do things you wouldn't if I mean like not not being out all that energy into creating this Mr. Magic kind of persona. And I you know, all that and although it's easy to say, you know, you should always always come out and all the rest of it. Of course those things are important, too. But I don't think I'd be I wouldn't be sitting here talking to you now, I don't think if if that had been an easy ride, you know. Um Shame being a a a familiar resting place as you kind of describe it and you said that kind of starts in your childhood. I just want to be cuz I want to make sure that I'm clear on the context here. That that has a familiar sort of um history in your childhood because of the social dynamics of your childhood, because you felt like a bit different and a bit like a loner. Is that what you're saying? Or is there other dynamics with parents where they I know, I think it's specifically with sort of the the gay thing. I think I think I think that's what it is. I think if you feel and hopefully it's different now, but it's just you know, it's just going back a bit. I'm 51 now or so, but if if you feel like those things are just embarrassing and awkward and you're kind of you know, it's not like you really get to well, you're finding it out in real time about yourself, aren't you? So, there's just uh it becomes an uncomfortable center of everything that starts to affect so much of what happens on the surface. And there's a real experience, I think, if you're not out, which I've recognized in many friends as well, where there's a bit of just a bit of a bubble around you, cuz you're sort of you're having to maintain a kind of a um a sort of curated exterior. And and part of that then is then what's happening underneath is is uncomfortable and difficult and feels shameful. Um So, I think that's it. I think that's where I don't remember feeling that as a kid. As I said, quiet and so on, but I don't remember feeling that as an experience, but it just sort of just kind of crept in and the more the more I sort of um uh kind of was leaning into the magic persona thing, the more the the more the outside becomes sort of you know, the the the harder and more sort of um uh opaque this sort of exterior presentation becomes, I think, the it goes hand in hand with a more shameful interior until in the end you just sort of go, "Fuck that." and just sort of let it all be fine. Was Was there a point, and this might be a really naive question as a straight guy, but was there a point where it became crystal clear to you that your your sexual preference was different or was it slow sort of realizations and Yeah, it was kind of um it's sort of because you can never really climb into anyone else's head and sort of understand what their experience is. It's it's it's sort of um it's often difficult to really know. And of course at the time I was also proper Christian um which uh slightly kind of messes the thing up and just slightly gets in the way of the whole thing. I had a friend who went through the um some of that kind of uh Living Waters movement which is the kind of gay conversion that is got called gay conversion therapy. It was a bit more subtle than that, but it nonetheless is basically that. So, he was going through that and although I didn't, I was kind of um skirted it a little bit because I was his friend and you know, it was something we were talking about a lot. Um So, all of those things And obviously by the way, it doesn't work. Just in case in case anyone was wondering. Um I mean, I went in straight. It worked for me. Uh So, yeah, it was sort of um I don't know. I don't know. There's never just a clear moment. It's just uh I think as I just got in the public eye, I thought I don't want this to be some weird sort of thing that's like a secret. Um so uh And then you come out of it. You come out about it. And then actually the um the the joy the reason why it's liberating at least it was for me and probably hopefully most people now is that people just don't care. Like this thing that you've carried around and that experience that shameful center that's there. Again, shame is a really strong word, but nonetheless it is kind of just this sort of awkward thing and eventually when it when you sort of are open about it, it's just people don't care. Why why would they care? So, that's that's the libe- that's why it's liberating. It's not because suddenly you can you know, spin around in the street with your shopping bags. It's um it is just that oh, no one cares about you doing difficult private stuff in the best way. So, actually and you've done the big one. Like you've So, now anything else after this will be will be fine. That I think that's why it's a liberating thing. I read a quote, I think it was in the Telegraph where you'd said that um maybe the journalist was commentating that um something as simple as mislaying your keys can trigger a whole new wave of self-hatred. God. That was me saying that, was it? Uh yeah, that's just fury though, isn't it? When you can't find a sock or you can't find your keys or your pen. Um Self-hatred I mean is a strong strong word. Uh I think the piece Maybe yeah, maybe it does yeah. I would probably would yes, I would reflect it back on myself rather than being angry at my partner or anybody else who's probably lost it. That's what he'd do. He'd be angry that I I must have put his keys somewhere because he can't find them. I would just be yeah, beating myself up for why am I always losing stuff? Why can't I remember where I put things? Yeah, I definitely would do that. Interesting. I wouldn't. You wouldn't? No, no, it wouldn't I don't think it would reflect on my my own self-image if I lost the keys. Or even if it did, it wouldn't negatively affect. I think that's just who I am. That's who I am, yeah. I'm more organized versus like oh, I'm so unorganized. I hate I hate that about myself. Yeah, well, I I don't know when I said that. I That was probably quite a while ago and uh I don't know if I'd necessarily be that hard on myself now. Plus one has to exaggerate these things for rhetorical effect. Um Has anything changed? Like on a really fundamental level. I'm so curious about how how how good we are at actually changing some of these things cuz we say it, we we about it. But as I've got gotten older and older and as I've done more and more of these interviews, I tend to find that the like real fundamental stuff is never healed. It never goes away. And I actually think that's really good news for people because there's a lot of people that are trying to sell you on this that they can take your traumas or your your insecurities to zero. Yeah. seen it happen. No, that's all wrong. And even I even Stoicism in a way is sort of um a little guilty of that. Um even something that's talk about talk about rolling with the punches of life is still kind of suggesting that and if you get this right, you won't be disturbed. You know, you won't experience anxiety. That is all that's a little bit off really. I think the the nature of life is that it is it is difficult and uh not all the time but a lot of the time things really go badly. They certainly don't go as you planned and you know, that you actually as you start to get older, you realize your plans probably have nothing to do with how things are turning out. But the illusion that they are is what propels you through the first half of life. So uh actually I think the project the task our task is um a certain amount of is sort of personal development and in integrating ourselves with the parts of us that we are uncomfortable with. So again, that's the project of relating to what's difficult within ourselves and then how we do that in life as well. How we relate to things that are difficult and and tricky in life cuz the the thing about it all that experience can be very um isolating. Those feelings of you know, when life lets you down or you feel you've failed, they tend to be quite isolating experiences. Um like shame, right? That's a very isolating thing. Whereas actually and weirdly this is I'm doing this show showman at the moment and this is entirely what the show's about. Those isolating experiences like they're exactly the things that join us all up. That is the That is the human experience. How How do we deal with the difficulties of life? You know, when things are going badly and we feel like we failed, that's that's what we all have to find our way through. So, the things that feel most isolating are the things that tend to connect us. Um so, I don't think it's about trying to bury them under sort of you know, some sort of forced optimism and it isn't about reaching a nirvana of of um a problem-free life. I think that's uh it's a really sort of terrible project cuz you're going to end up blaming yourself for for failing. You won't be good enough stoic or you won't be good enough optimist or whatever. Um always reminded me of the faith healers that I um spent a lot of time watching and when they do that thing of saying throw away your pills and if your illness returns, it's cuz you didn't have enough faith. Like it's your fault. Uh and that's no different from the you know, the the secret, you know, the um the the law of attraction. This is Yeah, this is the same thing. It's the same thing. You have to completely commit yourself and if it doesn't work out, if the universe doesn't provide you with It's always jewelry and money and cars. It's a bit odd. Um then you didn't have enough faith. Um it wasn't you know, it was your own fault. Um so, it's a perfect cycle of uh blame. Um uh which exonerates the um the actual system completely and puts the blame uh entirely on on you. So, I'm Yeah, I uh There's a bit of an irony in the fact that people choose those books because they they don't want responsibility, but failure puts responsibility back on them. Cuz I think of like the the law of attract I actually had a conversation with um a girl I was dating many years ago in New York and she actually got out of the cab and walked off because I said to her that I She believed that she could visualize anything into existence. I went, "So, you believe that you can just think about something and then it will happen? So, you could think about becoming a billionaire and it will happen?" She went, "Yes." And I was like, "No, I I agree with that." And I go, "But but how?" She goes, "You put out into the universe and then it comes back. And what they're doing in that to me it seems like they're alleviating their own sense of responsibility. They're putting it up to the puppet master in the universe. But as you've described then, when that fails the blame is ultimately on them for not doing it right. Yeah, it must be your fault as opposed to it was just a bad idea to to begin with. And more helpfully how do we live comfortably with a universe that doesn't give a what we what our plans are? Well, why why would it? It doesn't make any sense. So, how do we how do we navigate and there's a there is an ancient uh sort of image. It's It's appeared in so many different forms of an x equals y diagonal. So, if you imagine a graph and you've got along one axis you've got uh the x axis is the stuff you want to achieve in life, your aims and your plans. And then the other axis, the y axis, is just life, what they used to call fortune. It's all the stuff that just gets thrown at you. Um if you imagine the line that we lead in our in our lives, it's a sort of an x equals y line, right? It's sort of an undulating line. So, sometimes our plans are winning and we're doing great and sometimes life's throwing stuff back at us we have no control over and things have gone horrible and someone's got ill or whatever it is. So, we're there's this sort of undulating x equals y diagonal where we're being pulled in these two different directions. That's what we live. That's just sort of reality. And the nature of the kind of the American optimistic model is that by believing in ourselves we can And this is an old It's an old hangover from Protestantism, um the sort of work ethic, that you can by believing in yourself you can crank that line up so it's in line with your aims and your goals. Um and we just It's It's a We've completely obliterated the idea of just fortune and life from that. You know, we used to we used to call people um unfortunate. Now we call them losers, know? So, there's a there's a a lack of respect now for just the fact that life is throwing stuff back at you. So, how do you how do you navigate that? And I think actually stoicism is a very good toolkit for And stoicism, as I'm sure pretty much all of you listeners will be familiar with, but the the bottom line of it is is that, you know, the the the the things in life It's not the things in life that cause your problems, it's the the story that you tell yourself about them. It's the judgments that you make about them. Which is a very good and sensible idea that's made its way down to us um over the last couple of thousand years. And then allied to that that you take all the stuff that you have no control over outcomes, what other people do, and what they think, and so on. And you can just decide that that stuff is fine as it is, and you can just focus on the stuff only try and change the stuff you can actually change, which is the world of your own thoughts and your own actions. And that's where we should put our attention. And then there's interesting there was a middle ground of you know, like if you're well, success of any sort, you know, there's parts of that you're in control of and parts that you're not. So, it's like a best analogy I've read for it is like going into a game of tennis. If you go in determined to win and then your your opponent is playing better than you, you're probably going to get anxious and you're going to feel that you're failing. Whereas if you go in determined to play as well as you can again, just to control the part you're in you're in charge of, then it sort of doesn't matter if your opponent's a bit better than you or they start to win, you're not you're not failing, you know? You're And the same goes for um you know, the the stoics were big movers and shakers. You if you want to change the world, you can, but you're only going to emotionally commit yourself to your intention and your actions, not the outcomes, which may happen a generation after you've after you've died, you know? That's something out of your hands. I I think all that's very helpful and very useful. The only thing if you see it as a toolkit um to be lent into when it's helpful, but the uh even that uh if you take it as a sort of a you know, almost like a spiritual way of life can fall into the um problem of and therefore we shouldn't have any anxiety, therefore anxiety is still somehow the demon, but you know, without anxiety, how do you know to change anything in your life? How do you know to change your job unless the current job is making you feel bad or you know, things have to become anxious and things have to fall away in order for us to move forward and grow and we you know, you can't do that without embracing anxiety to to an extent. As I've aged, I've started to um realize that the kind of compass of my life is how I feel and that's kind of what you've um alluded to there that we have this signal. Mhm. Sometimes it comes in the form of anxiety, sometimes it comes in the form of fear, but these are all like really useful signals. Mhm. Do you resonate with what I just said there in terms of like feelings that our body is giving us are the greatest signals for our for us to navigate versus like narratives, versus like what my mom wants or you know, I end up in a working in the city in like a suit and a tie because that's what society had an expectation of, but I'm feeling a signal inside which is I don't know, depression or I'm feeling you know, I think those things are very important to to listen to. I think we we do live out stories very easily. We do tend to uh see things in terms of a narrative and that's um So, it's an interestingly double-edged thing because on the one hand whether you know, someone's written in or out of a story has become very important. Language and harm and all of those things have all got suddenly very tied up and stored the very notion of story has become so important um taking authorship of your story and so on, but the other the other side to that which you know, I live out in my in my job as a magician is that stories are just stories. You know, if a if a magician fools you with a trick in a way that works, you what you're being shown is that your story that you were forming with the world isn't quite right. Like, there's something you missed. And you always feel like you've properly paid attention, you saw everything, you you were taking in all the information. But it shows you that you've missed something, that your narrative of what reality is isn't the same as the world. Um and uh so the the the story side of things is seems to be part of just our our makeup, but it's important not to fall in love with it too much and to realize that the nature of a story is that it it's there's stuff you're excluding. There's a an image of isn't there of telling a story over a campfire in a clearing, and it's cozy. Um but then there's all the forest in the darkness with all the stuff that you're uh excluding from that story. And that's where the monsters live. And the nature of monsters is that they come and bite you. And all the stuff that we don't include in a story, whether it's the story we tell about tell ourselves about ourselves, um or whether it's a story we tell ourselves about our nation or our culture, whether it's a social thing or whether it's a private thing, the stuff that we bury and the stuff that we don't include within the narrative because the narrative is really too simple is goes deep. Like, it's get it it sort of gets buried. It gets buried in our own unconscious or it gets buried in the untold story of whatever the thing is. And that's what comes back and bites us. That's the that's the stuff that comes to own us in our own lives and and in our you know, in in our societal lives as well as the stuff that we've buried. And I think as you as you get older, this is where that those feeling signals come in. I think it becomes more and more important to pay attention to the things that we are banishing from our stories. You know, what what do we If we think about what makes us feel resentful or what we envy or you know, what are what are those things? Because those are the things that we're bearing somehow and I think there's a shift in the second half of life and I'm not much I'm a chunk older than you but um where we can disengage a bit with the the story that we've been telling of how to move forward in life. That's all about a dialogue with the external world. That's where we're getting our cues from. People showing us what we need to be successful, what we need to look or act in a certain way that denotes moving forward and progress. We do that for the first half of life and it is sustained a little by this optimistic illusion that the child that the castles that we're chasing in the air that we'll reach if we just you know, a lot of happiness deferring going on and a lot of you know, focusing on the future and then something happens around midlife where actually the project shifts to taking the cues from within rather than from the outside world. And I think then that's a good time for priorities to shift from what will give me success in the future to what is actually what might bring pleasure and satisfaction and meaning now in the in the present. I think that's a a useful thing to lean into towards the second half of life. It was university that's um sort of sparked your interest in hypnosis, right? Mhm. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You saw someone on campus doing Martin Taylor was doing a show. Yes, it was in my freshest week and uh Wow. It was amazing and I I left and walked back that night with a friend and said I'm going to learn how to do this. And my friend Nick said, "Oh, yeah, so am I." But I knew I meant it. I knew that I'd never seen it before, never come across hypnosis. I obviously heard of it but um and it was a good show like it wasn't you know, embarrassing people or making them look stupid. It was sort of just jaw-dropping. Um How did you know that you meant it? Because I've had that feeling in my life before where something just connects. Yeah. Well, I think it was the again, there was boxes were being ticked. Something about performing, something about control. Uh I didn't really know it. It just felt like I want I I have to do that. It's the most amazing thing I've seen. And it was uh it was appealing in ways that just weren't really um it's ways I hadn't really thought about. I hadn't thought about performing. I hadn't uh But yeah, I think I think that's what's happening, isn't it? There's something is is resonating unconsciously. It's something that you kind of need. And yeah, it was absolutely No, there was no doubt. So, I I did bought, borrowed, stole any books I could find on the subject. You probably just learn on YouTube nowadays. But it's a probably a dodgy thing because you need to you need to learn it the long way round so that if you run into problems or if someone's having a weird time when you're hypnotizing them, you you can't be like fumbling around trying to Google what to do. You know, you need to have the skills there and the the wherewithal to to deal with it. So, I I definitely learned the long way round. Uh Yeah. And then you became, I think from what I was reading, pretty obsessed with magic and hypnosis and to the point that you have a conversation with your parents and you tell them that you you're going to Yeah, I remember saying to my mom, I think I'm not going to be a lawyer. I was studying law and German. I said, "I'm not going to be a lawyer. I'm going to be a um a magician." They said, "Oh, fine. That sounds great. Sounds much more fun." Which actually made me stop and think, okay, hang on. I'm probably being a bit probably being a bit rash. Um What did they say? So, they were okay with Totally. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. That's what she said. She said, "Oh, that sounds great. Sounds much more fun." It's nice, isn't it? I actually I wrote them a letter at the end of my first year saying cuz I I saw all these other law students really fretting about their exams because of what their parents were going to think if they didn't pass. And that had never occurred to me as a thing that your parents would make you feel. So, I uh wrote them a letter thanking them for for that, just for um letting me always do what I wanted to do. The only thing they ever put any pressure on me to do is learn how to drive, and I don't drive. You still don't drive? I still don't drive, yeah. It's It's It's quite a common story. I have to say that your obsession seemed to come from or at least be driven by some kind of insecurity. As in like the reason why hypnosis initially resonated so much was because it was giving you some It felt like it might offer you something that you were looking for or didn't have yourself. That's the story I hear all the time. are though, isn't it? Isn't that the nature of them? Aren't your own It's just that the level of obsession I saw when from that day when you discovered hypnosis, like getting all the books, teaching yourself. And then even beyond university where you start working in restaurants for many, many years. How long How long from that first day when you saw hypnosis for the first time until um let's say before you the TV stuff began. How long is that sort of tenure? I think the tenure is about is about 10 years. 10 years? I think so. Let me think. So, I I graduated 94, and then uh by that point I was doing the odd um hypnosis show for students. I Oh, actually the the first TV show went out in December 2000. So, I was into all It was about 10 years, but that also included my university career. But there was a 6-year period after university, by which point I was already doing it mainly for students. When I was just then signing on or just about scraping a living doing hypnosis shows, but a lot more magic. I was doing magic in restaurants in Bristol, and then people would book me for their parties and um and I wrote uh a book for magicians which kind of got me known within that world, which that then led to um being picked out for a TV show. That That led to me getting a phone call. Um my name getting uh passed around in that world. So, that's almost 10 years of practicing and um without any real money. When you say signing on for people that are in America Signing on as in welfare, I guess you'd call it. Yeah, I was I was I lived in this my student flat I stayed in. It was quite a nice flat. I had all my books in it and my parrot and uh so it didn't cost me very much. And I just loved this life. I would go out dreaming up magic tricks during the day, and then I would go out and do them in the evening and um so I developed my own sort of approach to it all. And uh that it Yeah, that I I I just remember thinking I I've never had any ambition at all and and I just remember thinking if I if I can take a like a a cross-section of my life, is everything in the right place? Like am I I'd like to get up whenever I like to get up. I'd like to feel I can make my own decisions about what I do from day to day. And I just had a vague idea of those sorts of things that were important to me and um and if anything didn't feel right, it'd be easy to sort of change. And that was all that was always how I was never about looking forward into the future. It was never about where do I want to be. It was just is this day, this week, sort of the life that I'd like to be living. And that's never changed. Um I suppose the difference is as you get successful, you start to have people around you that are doing those other jobs for you, the grown-up jobs. And you know, I've got a manager and I work with producers and all that kind of thing. So, it's not like that doesn't have to happen somewhere along the line, but it it doesn't come from me. I've I've um I You can feel like a a kid a little bit, a bit like a child in a world of grown-ups. So, I feel that sometimes. Except now the grown-ups are younger than me, which is uh strange. Um but also I think maybe that's a good way to feel. Maybe that's a nice way to be. If you contrast yourself from today Yeah. to the to that young man in those restaurants in Bristol doing the magic tricks. Is there a difference in your level of happiness? I think about this. I I I think it's about the same, but it's different. I mean the the um a bit like being a kid and playing on my own. Most of my 20s were Well, my 20s were sort of fairly fairly solitary as well. And that's another template that settles in. So, um that's again an easy place to go back to. I love my own company. All my interests, the things I love doing out of my job, painting, writing, and reading, and they're all like solitary things. That's a that's a comfortable place for me. So, part of me slight more of that then so slightly misses that, but actually that's you know, also aware it was that was lonely sometimes and um you know, I like being in a relationship too. So, it's different. Had a different feel about it. Um I think the the freedom to just do what I wanted to do and kind of um create this sort of world for myself. That was kind of lovely. And it's harder to do that as you grow up and you do have responsibilities and you know, you're contributing to a household and you've got a partner, you've got dogs and all of that. It's not not quite as easy. So, the a childish part of me would kind of quite like the idea of going back to that, but not really. Not really. I wouldn't really press a button to make it happen. It's just a a nice little sort of back of the head dream as we probably all have. Maybe don't we? Slight kind of fantasy thing. We'd never really live it out, but it's just something nice about about that. Um It's almost like um I feel like you were my head is like you you know you're in Bristol minding your own business enjoying the the simple life and then they pulled you they ripped you out of Bristol. Um you were really successful so they put you on TV that was really successful and sometimes when people are successful they sometimes forget and I think I've done this in my life a few times kind of we forget to take the moment of pause and consider how intentional this journey and direction and direction of travel is kind of get pulled and dragged and then ends up feeling a bit like you're throwing the coal in the the steam engine of the train just to keep it moving. Has there ever Have there been a moment of pause in your life where you've you've gone do you know what I need to take some time and just think about what I'm doing and why I'm doing it because I've been successful and then I've climbed the ladder. People do that a lot in the corporate world they become a good lawyer then they get promoted then they're a partner and then they go am I doing here? Yeah I think we have we drift towards the things we're second best at. It's like you know the the the great teacher that becomes a headmaster but would've been a better teacher than that's an easy thing to do isn't it? Um and I think that's something else I think about or might be quite nice to act. I think I'm doing exactly that thing of sort of going from being um someone who's really good at what I do now and I just to sort of why why would I want to do that might be fun but like what a strange thing we naturally start to drift towards things that we're not as good at. Um uh I the only I would say when you said that I was thinking of um the early the early TV shows when I was sort of which were very much a response to David Blaine's success in the states I'm out doing you know mind reading tricks and things and I I kind of felt like I'd grown out of it but I was that was sort of the mode that I was caught in and I definitely felt like I'm not really enjoying this and that led to a shift in the type of shows I was doing so the I mean the last show I've done is on Netflix called Sacrifice if people have no idea who I am and they've listened this far um uh, and generally what I've been doing for the last decade or so with the TV shows is putting people through these kind of Truman Show style big social experiments, often quite life or death situations they found themselves in without realizing they're part of a show. And what that allowed me to do is not be the center of attention. And the reason the reason for it is actually apart from just my own slight dissatisfaction with it, but just magically, if you if you can click your fingers and make anything happen, which is sort of what a magician does, dramatically that's a very, um, unsound uh, place to be. And this is, you know, Penn and Teller, the you know, yeah, so it's something that Teller, who apart from being a beautiful magician, is a wonderful thinker as well. He's spoken a lot about this that it's actually very bad drama if you can make anything happen. What we want dramatically are heroes, people that are struggling with a situation. And maybe they are trying to get to point A, but actually they end up at point B. Um, and his thoughts and my own sort of sort of dissatisfaction, I guess, with that first stage of my career led to this shift where I could be in the background pulling the strings, but actually you're watching a real member of the public go through quite an intense drama. And that has to be more appealing than somebody going, "Hey, look at me. Aren't I clever?" which is sort of the bottom line of what most magic is. So, I think that was a kind of semi-deliberate uh, shift that came from a moment of pause. Was it quite intentional for you to take, you know, I've seen multiple documentaries you've done where you're proving that magic or the supernatural isn't real? Mhm. And again, that's super compelling because we would expect you to be leaning into that and persuading us of the supernatural. Whereas some of the most compelling stuff I've watched you do, where you're confronting like a psychic that's pretending to speak to the dead, or I remember that reading you did where the woman had pulled up outside in the Mercedes and the On a Mini, yeah. Yeah. And you had you basically What was it? You You You read her not her future. You read into her life. I think it was that the psychic that I was challenging had mentioned um the mini that she drove a little red mini and she'd been really impressed by that. But actually I'd seen him pull up his car uh right parked next to her in the car park. Yeah, but actually I think it's the opposite. I think the um there's a long tradition of magicians pulling apart psychics and charlatans. And I think it's because we end up with a knowledge of how these things work. Um and it goes right back to Houdini and the seances and yeah, exposing the fraudulent mediums in the dark. You know, it's a long a long and probably before that. But there's a long history of it. Um So, I The only thing about it is that you're If you're just going, "No, this is fake." you're not being very entertaining. And by the nature of what those people do, it's more entertaining. So, they've kind of won the game. So, I've tried to avoid making when I when I have sort of, you know, attacked those areas, rather than just attack them and make it negative, I've always tried to recreate something and make it more interesting and and better while at the same time saying I'm not really doing this. So, for example, there was a In one of the shows I did I had an audience on stage. This was in Infamous, which is a previous stage show. And I um was giving them mediumship readings, right? So, I say, "Just come up if you've lost somebody, if there's somebody that you would that you'd want to get in touch with if you were to see a medium." And a skeptical audience kind of like me, right? Cuz they're my audience is but So, they'd come up and sit down and I would start to give them these readings and I would say, you know, "I'm getting a message from your auntie Jill. Is that right? Do you have an auntie Jill that passed away?" They say, "Yes." And she's saying She's not saying anything. I'm just making this up. But she's saying that you've got Oh, you've got a little dog called Bella that she really loves. Is that right? Yes. And um and I'm lying to you, but she said and so I I would like pepper these like impossible information I was giving with reminders that I was making it up. Um and I just found that really really sort of in interesting and and um theatrically it was really interesting and much more interesting than saying these people are fake and prove it and if you can prove it, I'll give you a million dollars whatever. So I've I've tried to find a more creative approach to that. Do some people think you are you are supernatural in your powers? Some well, I was going to say actually after that about a week into that show I came out there was a girl at the stage door said um I wondered if you could put me I said girl she was you know you know in her 20s but wondered if you could put me in touch with my grandmother who's passed on and I said, "Oh God, I'm so sorry. I hoped it was clear from the show that I can't really do it that stuff isn't real." And she said, "Oh no, no, I know I know you can't really do it and it's not real, but I just wondered if you could just put me in touch with her." Like it was extraordinary. Um how we kind of can balance these things in our in our heads. So yeah, I I I'm sure people believe all sorts of things about me. I think the the way of the way I look at it is a bell curve. So at one end of the bell curve it's people that think it's all fake, it's all stooges, it's all set up. Um and I never use stooges and that's not what it is and at the other extreme people saying I'm psychic and I won't admit to it, which is also not true. Um and then there's this main swell in the middle where people sort of get it. Um and that's really all you can I think take uh responsibility for really. There's always going to be people at the far edges that will have uh strange and extreme reactions. Um and then you know my I think there's a certain license on stage which is different from TV. If you're doing stuff down the barrel of a TV, if you're talking to people at home, there's a level of directness and honesty there whereas it feels like on stage there's a kind of theatrical quotation marks around the whole thing. So I feel like I can do things on stage which I wouldn't do on TV. Um so that changes it, too. It's quite an interesting line sort of treading treading that. I kind of in the very early shows, very early TV shows, it was very much like I'm I am doing this for real. This is what I said. This is This is not tricks. Um and then once the shows realized once we realized there was going to be some longevity and there were going to be more shows, it was important to me just to bring it back to a place that was honest and kind of ambiguous as well and to and I enjoyed that now. I like leaning into the ambigu- ambiguity of what I'm doing. Because again, it it it means that you can do more interesting stuff with it. The you know, if there's a lesson in it about how we see the world, how the story we tell ourselves is not what's real, how we mistake that story for reality. You know, we mistake the limits of our own um field of vision for the for the horizons of the world. You know, if we if there's something in there to be said in something as childish as magic, if there's some something worthwhile to be said, it's much easier to say that if you're not trying to make it about yourself. Has anything ever stumped you in terms of the supernatural? I you know, I was Your work is primarily based in psychology, right? So has there Have you ever done anything and thought, "How the did that happen?" Huh. Uh two things come to mind. One, I was in a restaurant in Bristol approaching a table which is always excruciating uh if people don't aren't interested. And I'm walking up with a deck of cards and I sort of introduce myself and it's two businessmen and one of them says, "Oh, no, no, thank you, sir." which And I said, "Okay." And as I walked away, the other one went, "But queen of hearts, 13 cards down." And I sort of laughed and walked away and then went into a corner and counted the cards down and the 13th one down was the queen of hearts. No idea how he did that. If you are listening, please get in touch. That's bugged me for 20 years. And the um the other thing was actually doing I did a show called Miracle, which is this this is also on Netflix. It was a uh previous uh stage show uh a few stage shows ago. And the second half was healing. It was like evangelical uh healing, people being slain in the spirit, and um had no idea if it was going to work cuz again very skeptical audience like not you know if you I've been to these events with these big big name healers. And of course people are arriving expecting it to work, and they've got a certain amount of you know uh readiness for it, which obviously helps. And I didn't know if it was going to work at all, but it did. And again I'm sort of undercutting it. Like I'm I'm doing it, and I'm creating these healings in inverted commas for people in the audience, but at the same time I'm kind of under cutting it too. But um it was extraordinary. I mean I remember in the first week a woman came up, and she'd been paralyzed she was probably in her 40s. She'd been paralyzed down one side of her body since she was four or something. In floods of tears cuz she could move her left arm for the first time. Um and night after night things like that. Sometimes as I imagine just you know someone people with a bad back that felt better, but sometimes really quite dramatic things too. And it was although I could explain it cuz I knew what I was doing it was um what what what you're seeing is that is the psychological component of suffering, right? Like if you take an x-ray before and after there's nothing's happened, nothing's changed, but that how that person is living out there um affliction, how they live their relationship to their suffering has that's been made to change. So what you're seeing is this is a mixture of two things that are going on. There's a certain there's adrenaline, which is a natural painkiller, so you make that you make the whole experience full of adrenaline. Um And you know, in the same way if a you know, lion walked into this room and you previously stubbed your toe, you'd run away and you wouldn't feel the pain of your toe, right? Because there's a bigger threat. Um so, that's just adrenaline. That's fine. And then, but this other thing that which is maybe kick-started by the experience of the adrenaline, that you you've this thing that you've lived out like presumably this woman her arm had been fine for many years, but she hadn't she just continued to live as if it wasn't and all and all the stuff that you build up around pain, you know, the the way people respond to you. So, you there's a whole network of um social aspects to it, overprotecting something that doesn't need protecting anymore, you know, it's much more complicated than simply the organic cause of of um of your pain. There's lots of other things that sustain it and can keep it going beyond really where it's useful. So, there she was having this extraordinary experience she couldn't explain. Um when really nothing had happened beyond she was just had been snapped out of something. That was that was sort of amazing and kind of wonderful. Then I started to, you know, do the thing of going, "Oh, wait, maybe I could do this. Maybe I could offer this as a show of like secular healing. It'll only work on some people and you're only dealing with relatively small percentages. Um and I did start to think that and of course that's where you start to go mad. That's where you start to think you're playing God and and then, of course, people cuz I when you go to these events, the big name healers I've seen Benny Hinn and others um what you what you don't really see when you watch those things on TV is that there are in some of these big venues hospital beds that have been brought in. There are people with, you know, a kid with Down syndrome that I spoke to the mom and she'd uh she'd taken her son to so many shows following them around the country. Um and things that just they're not going to get they're not going to get healed by those kind of dynamics. So, that's an uglier sort of side of that cuz people have become very dependent on it. I'm not going to get any help. And then there's the lack of any sort of follow-up. You know, there's plenty of infrastructure in place if you want to donate, but no infrastructure if you've been in any way adversely affected by it and you want help. Or if you've had a healing and that you you you'll don't know how to sustain that or what you're supposed to do other than being told to give more money. You know, you know when people discovered through your TV work that you had this skill and talent. Mhm. I imagine you got lots of approaches to use it for less ethical reasons. Cuz I I mean, help me get the girlfriend back, help me close the deal, help me rob a bank. A little. Not um I suppose people have to ask that, wouldn't they? The only I I remember I've been asked by the FBI, I've been asked by the police Really? to help. I mean, never It's never gone beyond that discussion, cuz I just I mean, even, you know, there's plenty of businesses as well, but it's just It's not my world. I feel like I'm I'm an entertainer. I'm also quite um introverted. I don't quite have that thing of like, you know, yeah, let me get out there and and A, change the world or B, I don't have to whatever that thing is that I feel like I could just apply this to What did the FBI or the police want to do with you or the to do with I don't know, cuz it never went beyond them saying, "Would you come and talk to us about something?" And us getting back and saying, "No, it's not appropriate." So, I don't know. Now, I want to know. I have a few words to say about one of my sponsors on this podcast. As the seasons have begun to change, so has my diet. And right now, I'm just going to be completely honest with you, I'm starting to think a lot about slimming down a little bit, because over the last couple of probably the last four or five months, my diet has been pretty bad. Um and it's started to show a little bit. Really over the last two months. I go to the gym about 80% of the time. So, I track it with 10 of my friends in a WhatsApp group and this tracker online and I'm currently at 81%. Um so, 81% of the days I've done a workout in the last 150 days, right? So, I'm going to the gym about six times a week. And so, one of the things I'm doing now to reduce my calorie intake and trying to get back to being nutritionally complete in all I eat is I'm having the Huel protein shake. Thank you, Huel, for making a product that I actually like. The salted caramel is my favorite. 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And as always, to find out more, head to intel.co.uk/evo. Your skill stack. When I think about the, you know, because there's lots of people that might have studied hypnosis or they might have studied magic or slight of hand or whatever, but they didn't end up on the level you're on, at the table you're at, on the shows you're on. When you think about why you got there, I understand the 10 years of the graft. And I see that in a lot of people that sit here. I see it in Jimmy Carr. Leaves university, goes and does all of these like gigs for 20 quid for years on years on years on years. I see it in Lewis Capaldi, the musician who went and played in pubs in Scotland for years and years and years years and just absolutely loved it and wanted to stay there. I see the tenure bit which a lot of young kids don't appreciate because we all want it now and we want it for the wrong reasons. But what else was it about you, the way your delivery, your style, that you think in hindsight made you compelling? Oh, it's a really difficult one to answer. It's difficult. Even if I knew the answer it'd be hard to say it. Um I I think I don't think it's that I think it's sort of it's not quite that intentional. I think you've probably grafted and done those things. I can't speak for Jimmy and others, but probably just because you really enjoyed them in and of themselves. You probably weren't thinking, "Oh, I'll do this if I get ahead, I can secure this for myself." Prob- probably. And if that is the case, if you are just doing it because you love it and that feels like in and of itself what you're doing and there's no particular need for a plan beyond that, then you'll keep at it. You'll get very You'll get very good at it if if that's if that feels like all you need in the moment. Anyway, why then why why wouldn't you you know, love it and put your all your passion into it and get very good at it. So that helped. Um uh And then when things did sort of take off a bit, my manager also had a similar um ethos of just sort of slow burn, slow burn. There was never any sense of me, you know, being thrown at a public or any sort of overnight success or anything like that. It was a very deliberate thing of just slowly kind of letting it get out there. And that So that was helpful. Um I think as I've I had a a good team around me. Um it's not like a one not really a one-man thing. There's always Although I had had my own experience for those 10 years of doing it on my own. Once I got into the TV, there was like a little group of us which I'm sure is fairly common. Um And then I think I think what does help is letting it grow up with me as I've as I've got older. I've just let the thing develop with me. Like it's I don't really know what job to, you know, you asked me before we started like how I'd refer to myself. I never really know. I mean, mentalist I think technically is what I am, but I mean I remember a couple of years ago I had the book on happy happiness come out which is essentially book of Greek philosophy come out the same month the same month as a ghost train at Thorpe Park. And I do remember thinking I don't know what I don't know what that is. I don't know what job that is that allows for those two things. It's certainly isn't mentalism. Um so um Um so yeah, just allowing allowing the thing to grow up with me. And in terms of like, you know, when I occasionally, you know, people talk about the brand and so on. It's it's um it's a very helpful thing I think just let it let the thing just be you. And not particularly be driven by the limitations of what Yeah, when I first started, I remember reading I used to go on them magic discussion forums and so on to see what magicians were saying about me. And there was a lot of like, "Oh, this isn't even mentalism." Like there's a certain type of magic called mentalism and I wasn't quite doing that. I was doing stuff that wasn't te- and they would they would see that as a real sort of negative. And I was thought that was Well, that's interesting that that that would bother anybody. A, who knows what the word even means, who cares? And B, that that would that I wasn't somehow sticking within that. Um so and that's another thing about playing on your own, isn't it? And um you you or being if you if you feel like an outsider as a kid, I think as you get older you start you value that. That becomes like a bit of a superpower. You you hang on to that feeling of of um being an outsider and you kind of use that. So, that's always helped me and I've just followed my nose for what feels fun and interesting and worthwhile. And as I've got older, I've let those things grow with me and um I find a lot of life much more interesting than magic. Magic's quite a childish thing, really. So, it means that the stuff I find more interesting about life, I can bring into magic, you know? I think if you got If you got both feet in your craft or your art form or whatever, if as in if the thing is feels to you so huge and expansive and all that you know, you can't you're you're sort of a bit overwhelmed by it and you can't move it anywhere. Whereas if you've got one foot in that thing and your other foot in the rest of life, at least you've got some leverage then to take this thing that you do somewhere interesting. So, maybe that's helped as well. I see that in your shows. I see how your other passions are riddled throughout the show. I remember watching your show in New York, which was just astounding. It's funny cuz I think of myself as a smart person, you know, I think I'll figure this out. I'll I'll he won't be able to um make me look the other way or he won't be able to control my narrative. He won't be able to get me. And every single time I've been to your shows in London, New York, they're all just I leave in silence. I'm like, "How the did Because you're right, that like misdirection where you've got me thinking this thing and then I go, "What the hell?" Like it's this constant like disappointment in with myself that I'm not as smart as I think I am. Oh, that's so nice. That's so Well, I always It's always like what can I There's, you know, 2,000 people trapped in a room with me. What can I What can I do with them? It's always a It's a lovely feeling to start with. And that the the section on when you have the the painting, I don't want to give anything away. The painting. Is this in the show that you saw in New York? I believe it was New York. I I've seen I've been to two, London and New York. One with my family in London, which was many years ago, about four probably I'd say four five maybe five years ago. And then the one in New York I think was Was it It wasn't pre-pandemic. It couldn't have been. Yeah, it was just before the pandemic. So, I'm painting a picture that someone comes up and thinks of a famous person and then I start to do a painting and then it's upside down and I flip it round at the end. Is that what you're thinking of? Or is it And the thing that I think stuns me the most is how unbelievable you are as a painter. Thank you very much. Something to fall back on. And the fact you could do that upside down. You can paint such an incredible image upside down is also stunning. Um but that clearly is describing what you've described there where you've pulled in a love of painting. Yeah. I I think it's Yeah, I think all that's really uh Otherwise what's left, you know, just it's just Hey, look at me. Aren't I clever? And that's just not you know, that might be interesting for audiences for a little bit. Maybe once and then that's that's kind of it. So I I Yeah, I bring what I can to it. And I just make I make sure the shows are about something else. You know, Showman is about how the things in life that are difficult are actually the very things that we share which weirdly was written just before It was all due to go out before lockdown started and it um was going to go out the first week of lockdown and was a show about how the things in life that isolate us are actually the things that we all sort of tend to have in common which then gets played out literally for 2 years during lockdown. Um So I've always tried to make them about something else, something of value. Um And I don't think I I I love magic obviously, but I don't think in and of itself it has tremendous value. It's a childish way of impressing people. So it's what you What can you bring to it that will give it value? And then I think you then you're into a much more interesting worthwhile area. In your books about happiness um Happy and A Little Happier, one of the things that surprises a lot of people is that you're not a fan of goal setting. And having spoken to you now I can kind of under- understand cuz you have a much more today, this week, do my best approach to life. But what's wrong with goal setting in your point of view? I don't I don't think there's anything wrong with goal setting for short-term goals. So there's obviously you know, it can be very useful. It's It's the long-term stuff. I think we just get a bit hung up on it as a way of as a way of life, you know, a friend of mine um was a bit of a always been a workaholic. Um and uh he certainly by his own account when he was younger was made to feel that kind of needed to achieve stuff in order to feel valued, you know, which obviously is what most workaholics will say. So, he decided he was going to build up a company and and sell it and become a multi-millionaire and that was sort of the goal and then did spent and all the time that I knew him he was building up a company and sold it relatively young and had a huge amount of money and then she didn't know what to do with his life. He was miserable. Um, and actually found himself going to a support group with a bunch of similar millionaires that had all made the same mistake and he sort of missed the fact that actually it was the it was the building up of the company that was is what gave him meaning in his life. That was that was what was important. And it's that whole thing, isn't it? If you know, the you know, the arrival at the end of the journey is just it might just be taking your coat off and putting your bag down. That might be all it is. It's not necessarily the destination, you know, it's the you know, it's the old thing, isn't it? Of the journey being what was important. But that was certainly he realized that. Um, and that really changed his life actually realizing what he thought was going to be important wasn't important. Um, plus how do we know what's going to make us happy that so many years before, you know, we're so terrible at gauging that. Um, we lose flexibility depending how we set those goals, but we become too rigid in them. And it's like playing It's like playing a game of chess. Schopenhauer talks about this. That was a really good analogy that it's like starting a game of chess deciding how you're going to play and the strategy you're going to use and your how you're going to maneuver from the start. There is this other thing playing which is, you know, life, fortune, stuff that's going to throw get thrown back at you. So, how can how can you decide those things? Why do we want goals? Do you think it's it gives a sense of certainty? Well, we need it's about it's about moving forward, isn't it? We need to it's important cuz we need to navigate through life. And in the first half of life, I think it is it's it's really important. If you didn't have that optimistic sense that you can chase the castle in the air and somehow get it just by setting those goals, I think life would be very difficult. I think actually it's in I think it's important. I think it I'm sure it has evolutionary value. I think like it's part of our impetus. So, it's not a bad thing really. But like all those things, you just need to check it and just see its limitations, I think. A story I I see the goals that I had as a story that gave my life meaning when I was Yeah. younger, the meaning was kind of misunderstood. It was I thought if I got the Lamborghini, then I'd be happy and important and worthy and my shame would be alleviated. But as I as that failed me, I realized that um I was going to have to set about pursuing something else, which was the two problems. You either get the goal Yeah. You succeed in it and then what? Or you don't and you've failed. I mean, you're you're sort of And the very thing that's giving you pleasure, the very thing that's giving your life meaning, which is moving towards you know, building up the company or whatever it is, you're doing yourself out of. You're you're you're purposely and intentionally moving to the point where you can remove that meaning from your life. Have you developed any coping mechanisms for adversity? Chapter 3 in your book, A Book of Secrets, is about the role friction has, the relationship it has with with happiness. And you've we've talked a few times about adversity, but is there any any sort of tools that you've learned that you might be able to impart that have helped you to deal with when life throws at you? Well, the big Stoic thing of how can this thing be fine? And it's not I don't exactly put it in that language, but that's the language I found. How could this thing be fine? So, first of all, is what's happened. Which side of the line is it is it within my control is it my thoughts and actions or is it out of my control is it something out in the world of course it's always the latter it's always something out in the world in which case how could it be fine how could it how could that how could it be okay that this thing is like that and not just to go oh it's fine it's fine it's not just about saying it but to actually let that thought sort of you know drip into the soul I find that very helpful that's also partly just my personality my my partner's has a much more um sort of anxious personality than I have and that stuff doesn't help him at all um but it certainly helps uh me um another thing there's a great book by David Destino called uh emotional success um and I thought it was great he was talking about motivation and um how a lot of our tools for motivation are very sort of top-down in the sense that you know well if you do this for 10,000 hours or you put in an hour a day for a whatever um and I got a lot of kind of work to change one habit and he's talking about a bottom-up approach of there are certain emotions that if you get them into place they naturally create a more motivational state and he he's a psychologist and he's when he talks about motivation that the way he's tested this he's talking about where you value your future self and your future self needs more than what you need in the moment right so if you take the example of are you going to study for your exam or you going to go out and party well the person that is going to not party and study for the exam is valuing the needs of that future self that's done well in the exam more than the current self that's sat there and would like to go out right so he's taking that as the sort of the world of motivation we're talking so he sets up various um experiments to see what can you do to maximize people's uh, you know, the value they place on that future self. And the three emotions, um, again and again which help, compassion, gratitude, and having the right sort of pride about what you do. It a good pride for the stuff that you do well. Not the bad sort of pride where you go, well, I'm good at this, therefore I'm great at everything, but just having a a good sort of comfortable pride in the stuff that you do well. Um, so he would, you know, experiments would be something happens outside the room before the person comes into the experiment that makes them feel grateful about something, and then they come in and they have to do a task that's impossible. But how long do they spend trying to do it? And they'll spend 40% longer than somebody that wasn't primed to feel grateful before they came in. And the gratitude has nothing to do with experiment. It's a seemingly completely independent thing. Something happens that make you makes you feel compassion. Um, and then you come in and you have to do some task, and you do it better or for longer or whatever these sort of skills are that the motivated person has more of. Um, one of the questions was, uh, uh, how many, it's always dollars, but how many dollars, like if you could have $100 a year from now or X amount now, what would that X amount be that would balance it out? And it's normally $17, like it really makes no fiscal sense at all, but most people would say, okay, I'll take 17 now rather than 100, right, a year from now. That seems to be the number that people go for. But if you're primed to feel grateful, if you're if you're asked the same question when you're in a state of gratitude for something, again, totally unrelated, um, it goes up to $31. That was his That was a great sort of, by the way, finding when they did the experiment. It averaged out at 31. In other words, people were valuing the future needs more than the needs now, if that makes sense. It could actually be shown with something as simple as that. I'm gone. Uh, well, I I read a bit of chapter 12 of your book. Was on exactly that. And I actually said before you arrived, I sent it to my friends. I sent that one paragraph in your book about that that instant gratification delay graph. Cuz like it When I say it makes sense, it it makes absolutely no sense in the sense of like I can't understand how gratitude, how making someone feel grateful with a completely unrelated incident would make them choose to have um more money well, will make them delay their gratification in life as it relates to money. exactly. And I think the reason why there's no kind of rational link because it's a it's sort of it's like an emotional basis. He's talking about an emotional heart that then kind of so spirals upwards. Cuz if you if you if you find yourself acting more compassionately which which say just sometimes happens anyway, right? You might just be feeling compassionate. You might be feeling very grateful to somebody. That then affects that person's behavior and then that feeds back and affects yours. And there's a certain kind of upward spiral thing that happens that definitely puts us in I think a more just a better kind of state than say when we're feeling the opposite of those things, feeling hateful and resentful. Um Does that mean do get it. I I Sorry, go on. Does it Does that mean that people that are lower in gratitude are more short-termist in their decision making? They probably binge foods that they probably shouldn't have. They probably make other kind of reckless decisions they probably shouldn't make because of their own state of emotions and gratefulness and compassion. Perhaps. I mean, it sounds like you'd have to ask him. I don't I don't know. I don't think he says that in his book. But I can certainly imagine that again, so if you're going through your life feeling generally resentful I can't imagine that person being very motivated. It's so interesting. It answers actually a lot of questions that I've had with like friends of mine where I've wondered why they make such short-termist decisions. But I think there's an emotional question that I should really be asking which is like, how do you feel? Mhm. And we don't we don't often pause to ask that. We kind of assume that their character is they are lazy or just Mhm. stupid at like bad at decisions. Whereas really like go to work on the emotions and you can change that, which is It's an It's a I thought it was a very Yeah, very compelling way round of looking at it rather than the the normal top-down approach we come across. Love. Uh-huh. You described yourself as a bit of an introvert and someone that likes their own company. Yeah. Um sounds a little bit like me. What's your journey been like with understanding love? And then at 35 you came out. Um What's that journey been like? Well, I've had two long relationships and then um a few little bits in between. Um and I think there's definitely a lot of learning in the first one that I think I've now brought to the second one. Of course, that's what we do, isn't it? It's next you have another relationship, you bring all those lessons that you can't You can't change them when you're in one, but you can You get to start afresh the next time. Um We're quite different as well. It's not like we're We're not similar people at all. I'm I have that sort of a bit of emotional detachment that I can easily go to. He is very um engaged and as as uh people that are a little bit on the anxious side tend to be very sort of hyper-vigilant about stuff. So, you know, packing to come to London to do this show is two very very different worlds. Always leads to argument. I'm kind of travel light and he's No, no, no, but we might need this. We might need this. We might need this. Bags and bags and bags. So, uh we see each other sometimes, you know, as caricatures of ourselves because because we're quite different in those in those ways. My kind of stoic uh whatever will seem to him just sometimes just to be laziness or not really um not engaging with something, not that thing not being not taking it seriously. And for me his his uh what I see as uh anxiety or impatience to him is a strong sense of justice. He has a real strong sense of justice. If something's not right, he'll want to go and sort that thing out and fix it. Um uh And I think love for me is allowing that other person to be another person. We probably start off our relationships just projecting everything we need onto a person. And we barely do them the service of, you know, allowing them to exist as as an independent creature. We sort of we just want them to be the thing that we want them to be. Um and I think if relationships are going to have any longevity, at some point that has to shift into actually this person is a mystery and I might spend the rest of my life trying to get to know this person. That that's I think that's okay. And I think that's also the same within ourselves and the parts of ourselves that we're we're um alienated from. Again, the things that we just put outside of the story. Um the the that sense of what the other is, of the great mystery, you know, it's there in magic, it's there in within ourselves, the sides of us that you know, we need to live more comfortably with and in our relationships as well. Here is a a great mystery that we sit down with every day and have breakfast with and talk to and misunderstand and disappoint and occasionally delight at each other and and it's it's uh you know, it's kind of wonderful and sometimes it's hard work and and uh but I think seeing your partner as somebody you could spend a lifetime getting to know uh and as a source of wonder and mystery I think is a uh is a very helpful thing. One of the messages that I took from is about expectations and being really conscious that you keep your expectations in check because when you don't, frustration and unhappiness um might prevail and I think about this a lot with my partner who's the complete opposite. I consider myself to be like very logical. I need to I need to understand everything. I'm very um maybe scientific in my viewpoint. Whatever the opposite of that is, she is. And so you can find yourself in conversations where the basis of reality you're conversating from is completely different. She she will believe that a that a rock has energy and that and I will obviously not believe that, but we're completely opposites, but that's also why it works because there's not an expectation that we become the other person. She will tell me something she knows I don't believe. And at the end of her saying it, she will not wait for me to nod and agree because she knows I don't believe and that's fine. And vice versa. And it's that's what when you're saying accept that we're two different people. Actually being able to do that and her not trying to change me into like a spiritual whatever, me not trying to turn her into a scientist allows for the upside of that difference which is like I can marvel at the world she lives in and go oh that's interesting. I might try that. You know what I mean? And also I think a big allied to that is the thing of not which is such a a guy thing to do, isn't it? Is not fixing. Yeah. Not um Most of our frustrations come from the fact we just haven't really been heard or seen or understood during the day. So we've been bashing our heads against some wall. We come home Against hers. Yeah, exactly so we they come home and then just offload this stuff. And when because I I know I do it when my partner does this to me, but he sort of offloads all this frustration. And I'm sure you do it too. It sounds like you do. Is to go into this mode where we're saying, "Oh, it's okay. It's probably just this and why don't we think about it in this different way?" And we're just doing exactly the same thing they've had all day. We're just not hearing um uh But it's just not it's not an intuitive thing, is it? You sort of that is such a such an easy mode to go into. Um Dara, are you happy? That was the name of your book. I think so. Yeah, I think I think as I've got older happiness is it was easy to say I remember being asked that when I was single for a while. Um by Hugh Grant of all people. We were sat opposite to each other at dinner and talking about happiness. Maybe I was writing the book at the time, I don't know. And um he said, "Are you Are you happy though?" And it was he was said it in a sort of a mood of like no one's really no one's really happy, are they? Um and maybe it's just the way he asked it, but I said yes and and said it very confidently and felt it very confidently. And he didn't think he didn't know what to make of that. Uh or maybe he just didn't believe it. And now when you ask I still feel it's yes, but I think I think things are more complicated. I think there's a more complicated in relationships. I've got older. Um I'm 51 and I think I think that's a good sort of um you know, I said things things just change. The currents of life shift a little bit. So I am, but I uh uh I think it's it's a I don't think it's about happiness first of all. I think it's about meaning and it's about, you know, things in life that are bigger than you and what you put how you throw yourselves into those things, which is what gives religion its meaning, you know, that that need for transcendence or finding the thing that's bigger than you. We all need it somewhere. Cuz if you don't have meaning in your life, that's that's when you have problems. Not really happiness is sort of um a very difficult thing to pin down, but uh and we can be unhappy, but it's when we when we feel meaningless that it's that it things get bad. Um It's a bit of a question, isn't it? Are you happy? In many respects Yeah, it sort of is. And it's also hard to, you know, what is it, you know, that used to used to mean the story of a life. It was something you couldn't say about anybody until they were dying and look back over their whole life, you know, it's meant our relationship with God. We weren't even supposed to be happy on this earth because of you know, because it was something that we could only have through a union with with God. It's meant so many things over the ages, but now it does just sort of mean a mood. Um uh which is uh is what is it makes it sort of a difficult one to answer. But I I think uh I think life is life is good. It's just interesting and sometimes difficult, but you know, ultimately good way. I think life is full of questions and I in some respects it's like a form of misdirection. The fact that I Yeah. we never supposed to reflective questions are actually valid cuz if I'd said, what number is fork? Mhm. You it mean you would say that's not a valid question. But but because are you happy or questions like have you found your passion? There's an assumption in there that there's one of them. passion. You have to go searching for it. All in loaded into the question. And nobody nobody when you ask those questions pauses to think of whether the question's valid. And then the the the frustration we encounter when we can't properly fit into a invalid question. I see I see that causing so many young people so much pain because culture pops up these like questions you've got to is it love? Yeah. Well, I love peanut butter. right for me is another is another really unhelpful. Well, is it love mean alludes to a yes or no answer. And then I have to know that your definition of love. Yeah. What you mean by that cuz as I was saying like I love peanut butter, I love my dog, I love my mom. And it's all very unhelpful. Like this is why I love going back to what we said at the start like how do you feel? Nice open question which allows for a bit more maneuvering. Yeah. I think people are tormented by these invalid questions, yeah. Yeah. Your show. There's nothing like it that exists in in the event space really on TV. I mean I prefer doing it seeing it in person because obviously cameras can create certain dimensions which are But seeing it in person just bends the the mind because it makes almost anything seem possible in life. I'm talking about sales and ambition and creativity and imagination. If that's possible, then anything can become possible and I think that's a cause of great inspiration. Mhm. Um So, I would just employ anyone that's listening to this, if you're looking for a once-in-a-lifetime very unique experience that you can't get anywhere else, they've got to go and see the show. They've got I really mean that. I'm not just saying You didn't tell me to say this. I really mean that. No, yeah, yeah. You'll never know. But thank you. But I really, really mean that. It's There's nothing like it. So, great date idea, great family idea. So, I'm definitely going to come. What can I expect that's different from the other shows that I've been to? Well, it is it's got a real heart to it, this one. You get all the feels, as some people say. Um it's uh it's It's also got I mean, it's got the best if this is if this is all right to say, the best reviews of anything I've ever done in 20 odd years, which is nice to know because it is such a personal show. So, that's a That's a lovely thing that it's been received so well. Um I do swear the old the audience to secrecy. Um so, it's hard to go into details. Um other than yeah, it is about the things that connect us as people and then how the difficult things in life are the things that join us up. It's also show based on audience participation like like they all are. And I should say I I would hate the idea of being dragged up on stage. So, I throw out Frisbees to choose people, which means it's the easiest thing to hand to the person next to you if you, you know, if it lands on your lap and you don't want to get involved. So, there's no pressure to get involved at all, but it is a it's a big show of audience participation. And it's it's more than more than people expect, I hope. We always try and make the show properly over-deliver, give you give you more than you thought it would. I'm so excited. I genuinely am. Really, really excited. Thank you so much for your time. We we have a closing tradition this podcast where the last guest asks a question for the next guest and they don't know who they're leaving it the question for. Oh, fantastic. I get to see it when I open the book. So, excuse me if I take a while while to read the handwriting. Um oh, this is for me, right? Yes, great. Oh god. Okay. Top or bottom? Imagine Imagine if that was the question. If you could only speak with, call, see, touch four people for the next four years, who would they be? I feel this is quite a yeah, boring answer, but it's honest. So, my mom, uh my partner, probably my two really good friends, Sharky and Steven. I'd have to include Jenny in there somewhere, so maybe they could alternate weekends or something. Um Yeah, friendship's really meaning a lot to me now as I get as I get older. Not old, but you know, getting older. Really I think it happens something like on your 50th birthday or something. Suddenly, your friendships really mean a huge amount to um And they didn't before? They always did, but just not in such a conscious What What changed? Why I don't know. It's just a real real sentimental like valuing of them. Nostalgia as well, like really um I just find myself just those kind of yeah, sentimental sort of uh leanings. Um and my friends just suddenly they've all obviously always meant a lot to me cuz they've been my friends, but suddenly even more so. I love meeting up with people I haven't seen for years now. I love doing that much more than I used to. Um so yeah, I'm That's it. Mom, partner, and a couple of really good friends. Um uh that doesn't include my dog. s I forgot I had I I forget I had two dogs, but I have a clear favorite, which is unfortunate for the for the other one. I was only thinking of Doodle and I forgot about Humbug. It's okay. I said people, so it's Yeah. So, sorry, that's not a very clear answer, but a lovely question. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you for the inspiration. Thank you for coming and doing this. You're someone that I've been honestly quite obsessed with ever since for the last 10 years watching on TV, watching on Channel 4, coming to your shows and stuff. So, it's feels like a real honor to get to speak with you and as I said, I read your book in the jungle. It was very much the basis of the In the jungle? You didn't say that. Yeah, so I took it took a brief I took a suitcase out to the jungle and I was I wanted books on happiness and yours was on the shelf, so I took it. Was it that one or was it Happy? It was the yellow one. Yeah. Happy. And I'll be honest, I this is sounds like a really cuz I bought it not knowing it was you. Interestingly. And then when I saw I got to the jungle and I saw the name on it, I couldn't I had to Google to check it was you cuz I couldn't believe you'd written a book on happiness. You get this a lot, don't you? Yeah, I do. A while back I got a The only time I've ever dropped my own name trying to get a restaurant table in Soho and I did and I got the table. Suddenly, I felt I pulled that off, went in and then at the end of the meal, the waiter said, "Oh, would you mind signing one of your books?" So, yeah, of course. And he came back with Angels and Demons. Oh, It's fantastic. Thank you so much, Dan. Thank you so much for having me. What what a joy. Thank you. Quick one. As you might know, Crafted are one of the sponsors of this podcast and Crafted are a jewelry brand and they make really meaningful pieces of jewelry. And this piece by Crafted, when I put it on, for me it represents courage. It represents ambition. It represents being calm and loving and respectful and nurturing while also being the antithesis of that, seemingly the antithesis of that, which is sometimes a little bit aggressive with my goals and determined and courageous and brave. The really wonderful thing about Crafted jewelry is it's super affordable. It looks amazing. The pieces hold tremendous meaning and they are really well-made.