Mailbag #172
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Your recent offer feels like it's going to force a conclusion to the Unnamed Magician story, and I'm a little bummed about that. Even if you're over writing about it, I've been genuinely hooked. Any word from him, or from the magician who allegedly picked up his trick?—NU
I had a slightly different perspective on the Speed Kills idea.
Just recently I was writing up a routine where you deal four hands of poker. It's a fair deal but you are pretending to be bottom dealing, so you want people to think you are doing something suspicious.
I said that all you have to do to make your fair deal look suspicious is just do it a little faster than usual. That will immediately make people suspicious.
I think most magicians would agree with me. But somehow they never made the next step, which is that all fast movements look suspicious.—PM
Yes, good point. Anyone reading your advice on how to make a move look suspicious would immediately understand what you're suggesting. But many of those same magicians will do move after move quickly without giving a second thought to how that appears when they're not trying to look suspicious.
This is true even for our most celebrated sleight-of-hand performers.
I remember watching the performances from a Darwin Ortiz video with a friend of mine 20 years ago and he said, "I don't know what he's doing, but you can always tell when he's doing it."
That worked for Darwin’s character—which was essentially a master of sleight-of-hand. But if you don’t want people attributing what they’re seeing to pure physical dexterity, you need to slow down. Speed comes off as unmotivated effort, and that’s what’s at the heart of suspicion.
So if I’m reading [last Friday’s] post correctly, I could hire you for a 200 hour freelance contract to write a 200-page book of my material? —SH
Technically, yes. But it wouldn’t get done in a month, because I couldn’t make it my only priority. And you might want to ask ChatGPT: “I’m thinking of asking the author of The Jerx magic blog to write a book of my material based on my notes. What type of hourly rate would you estimate for such a project?” It’s undoubtedly more than you’d want to pay.
Just wanted to say I really love the Charismatic Magic post. Spot on as you often are. I think I would add flirting in there too but it’s gotta be done right and without deeper motives (most of the time). I think people love to flirt, we’ve just all become terrified to do so. Understanding and navigating the person in front of you and finding the right nuanced approach for that individual is magical in and of itself. Curious what your thoughts on flirting as it relates to charisma are? Flirting can be often be more complicated than people think but eliminating it feels like tossing out the baby with the bath water.
Obviously some of your posts have some sexual tones so I suspect you’d agree but you’re often tongue in cheek about things like this or maybe more feast or famine.—SK
Yes, there’s definitely an overlap between Charismatic Magic and good flirting. They both work when you're bringing something extra to the interaction, but in a way that doesn't feel self-serving or agenda-driven. They succeed when the underlying message is clear: I’m doing this for you, and for the energy between us. That’s really the whole point of the Charismatic Path.
Actually, the way men bungle flirting maps almost perfectly onto the way magicians bungle magic. Bad flirting is just over-the-top flattery—piling on compliments, trying to impress the person, bringing flowers to the stripper at the strip club. Bad magic is the same thing: piling on impossibility, trying to floor someone with the most mind-blowing effect. Both fail for the same reason: you're performing at someone rather than playing with them. Good flirting is teasing, toying, a little push-pull. Charismatic social magic is that too.
“Without deeper motives" is actually central to why it works in the first place. The moment flirting becomes an agenda, it stops being charming and starts being creepy. Which, not coincidentally, is exactly the same reason magician-centric magic fails—the second the spectator senses the performance is for you rather than for them, the spell breaks.
What you're describing as "navigating the person in front of you"—reading them, calibrating your approach, finding the right register for that specific individual—that's just good charisma. It works for flirting, magic, and most anything else worth doing.