Episode Transcript
Okay, so we're recording. Hopefully everything is going to be great. I have so much faith in us. If there are two of the most capable people on this entire green and blue, God's lovely planet Earth, it would be us. Yeah, 100%. I would choose us for the Hunger Games. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Mostly because we're so good at the killing. I mean, I wouldn't put it past us. I'm not saying I've done it before. The question is, at the very end, would we team up or kill each other? I don't like how long you're taking. Hey, everyone. It's Antonia back with another episode of QuestionAble Strategy. And the conversation you just heard was with a dear friend of mine, Jason Suran. It was so playful and so fun to chat with Jason, whom I've known for over eight years now. And when we're together, we obviously don't take ourselves too seriously. This is one of the most illuminating conversations I've had, partly just because Jason is a lovely person, but also because he's got a really special and mystifying job. He is a mentalist. In his performances in New York and around the world, he does everything from card tricks to full on mind reading, which involves A lot of asking questions. And I've always wondered how he uses questions to, it feels like he reaches into our brains and reads our secrets. And what he has to share today on the podcast is fascinating. So they say a magician never reveals his secrets, but we've got a few for you right here. This is how a mentalist asks questions with Jason Suran. Jason, welcome to QuestionAble Strategy. I am really looking forward to our conversation today. Me too. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you for agreeing to be here. You are one of the coolest people that I know, and so I'm thrilled to get inside your head for once and learn a couple of your secrets, since you're constantly trying to figure out mine. Question number one is, who inspired you to be curious? Ooh, who inspired me to be curious? That's such a good question. I feel like there's a lot of people that could fit that mold. But the truth is, I think I was just, to a degree, I just always remember coming out that way. You know what I mean? Like, I was somebody that always had to like look behind the locked door. I was somebody that always, had a million questions after the first answer. I was a "but why" kid? No matter what, no matter how far down the rabbit hole we got, like, "why is the sky blue?" Because of refraction." "But why?" No matter how far down the rabbit hole I got, I always wanted to know what was underneath that layer. But, my mom's a very smart, curious person. I think that had a lot to do with it. Sometimes I wonder if it's just my ADHD, which I've had since I was a kid, was, this non stop curiosity of always wanting to learn new things and then peel back another layer and learn more about a thing and, until eventually, you get bored and you move on to the next thing. Would you say that you were an especially observant kid? I think I was, I think I was a very, it's weird to say aware because in a lot of ways I wasn't aware, like I was not very physically aware of like myself in space, I'm still not, like I'm still a very clumsy person. But I think I was a very emotionally aware kid, like I think I was always aware of how people felt in a room, even if I didn't always know what to do with that information. I think I was always very hyper aware of people's moods and attention and what they were paying attention to and what they were prioritizing in a moment or what they were feeling in a moment. I think I was always tuned into that. That's interesting that you say that just cause from knowing you, I know that you have a very high EQ, and it's really important in your line of work to be extremely observant and attuned to how people are feeling. Can you say more about how that plays into your work as a mentalist? Yeah, for sure. I think it's the same as any performance, but particularly because mentalism and magic are such interactive art forms, you have to sort of be really, really finely tuned into, what somebody on stage is experiencing. And what the people outside the stage are experiencing watching them, because it's an empathetic experience, right? If the person on stage is uncomfortable or hesitant, the audience is going to feel that way, too. So you're constantly trying to curate this emotional experience for them, as well as this aesthetic one. And that's not even before getting into the ways in which sort of emotional observation plays into the tricks themselves, which is almost never where people think it's happening. It's almost never watching somebody's pupils to see if they go up, because that means they're thinking red, which is of course, pseudo scientific, babble, but there is this element when you're performing mind reading as entertainment, where you're trying to lock into somebody and just get a sense of whether they're responding positively or negatively to what you're saying. In the sense like, is what I'm saying hitting or is it missing? Is it resonating or is it not resonating? And you see, like psychics do this all the time. Other kinds of performers, right? Fortune tellers utilize that, too. It's sort of what we call cold reading or fishing or pumping. That's really important for me to hear as an audience member that, even in a performance setting, it's a two way street. So there's energy coming to you from the audience and then from you to the audience. But just for all the listeners out there who don't know you as well as I do, you're adamant about the fact that you're not a psychic. So can you explain what exactly a mentalist is? So a mentalist is essentially a magician, who does tricks with information instead of with objects. That's the way I always describe It to people. I am very adamant that I'm not a psychic. I try to be equally adamant that I'm not a psychologist or anything like that. To me, there's misleading implications on both ends of that spectrum if you're not clear about those kinds of things. But a mentalist is essentially somebody who performs mind reading or sort of psychological magic stunts, or things that appear to be psychological magic stunts. You'll see a lot more crossover today than you would have 30, 40 years ago when they were very much separate art forms. But I think that probably paints a pretty clear picture, I hope at least. So how would you describe your understanding of psychology? Rudimentary at best. I took the class in college. Yeah, I'm not a, I'm not a psychological guru. I'm not a human lie detector. I think the thing that I'm good at, that's enabled me to build a career off of this particularly weird, slightly esoteric performance art is that I'm good at reading a room. I'm good at telling what it is somebody wants to hear and then finding a way to deliver that back to them, right? Which is all that it really is. If you watch the people who do this kind of thing sort of duplicitously, But very effectively, like mediums, faith healers, psychics, the kind of people who really need their audience to believe in what they're selling hook, line, and sinker, the thing you'll see time and time again is that what they're often doing is regurgitating back to the person or back to the audience member or back to the client what's sort of already been told to them. And I think I have a knack for the sort of performance of the art, which is where it all comes down to. Got it. So you're known for being able to guess something in another person's mind just by telling them to focus on that thing and answer a couple basic questions. What function does asking questions serve in your work? I think the secret in this business is being able to ask questions while appearing to give answers. So if you looked at my scripts closely, or if you watched footage of me performing really closely, I think you'd realize that a lot of the time where I'm apparently giving information or apparently delivering a finite or declarative statement, I'm actually kind of eliciting responses. And there's all sorts of different kind of like little verbal judo techniques for that you know, and I can give examples, but I think that's the sort of crux of the whole thing. I would love an example. For example there is a technique different people have different terms for it. I call it the "Double Negative Principle," and you'll see this all the time, too. But basically, you make a statement that covers both possible outcomes of the statement, and it's vague enough that the person hearing it can hear what they want out of it. So for example, your mother didn't pass away from something with the heart, right? And you'll hear that all the time with mediums. Your father didn't pass away of a heart attack or something in the chest area, did he? And what they've actually said is this didn't happen, did it? Which can sound like, a statement in either direction. What they're actually doing is pumping you to sort of confirm which way it should go, because it can mean either thing, right? like, play the conversation out. Your father didn't pass away of, of some kind of heart condition, did he? No, I didn't think so, because it feels more like something with his, brain or his muscles, right? Or your father didn't pass away from something concerning his heart or his chest area, did he? Yes, because that's very much what I'm getting. I'm getting like a heart attack or something like that, right? You, the sentence can go either way. It's not X, is it, right? And whatever X is moot, because the person hearing the statement is going to finish it for you anyway. That's so interesting, because if the answer is yes, then the person asking the question seems like a genius, and if the answer is no, then they were asking all along, so it's fine. Not even that. It doesn't even come out like a question. It actually comes out like a statement either way. So like we can even play out a version of this right now. So Antonia, I'm gonna ask you a question, or rather I'm gonna make a statement, and I want you to say yes the first time and no the second time I say it. Can you do that for me? Got it. Yes. Can you just focus on sort of your body in space and focus on kind of the ground beneath you? Can you do that for me? Yep. This is gonna sound strange, but your floor isn't like hardwood is it? Yeah, it is. Yeah, beacuse it feels stiff, and it feels like cold under your feet right now. Yeah, that's What I was getting. Let's try again. Ready? Antonia, your floor is not like hard wood, is it? No, it's not. Yeah, because it feels soft like carpeting. Am I right? Yeah, Do you see how the statement can go either way? It doesn't even come off as a question in either direction because I've used a double negative to make sure that I'm gonna be right no matter what. I really like that. I don't, I don't know exactly how I'll use that in my day to day, but I will, I'm gonna try because that's such a sneaky little trick. a little verbal judo trick. yeah, I noticed though in, in some of your tricks that, for instance, when you're trying to guess the hand that somebody's holding a coin in, you'll throw out a bunch of seemingly random questions like, "Are you right handed or left handed?" "Do you prefer blondes or brunettes?" And "cats and dogs?" That has nothing That's actually my exact script. I'm surprised you remember the exact words of that script, but yes. Jason, I do so much research for this podcast. I'm shocked that you would be shocked. What function do those types of random questions serve? Mostly, They serve to distract you from what I'm actually going to be looking for in, a second. They're meant to be building a rhythm. I'm getting you used to just, answering questions and I'm getting you used to a certain pace and a certain rhythm so that when I make my guess, it seems confident. Because the first trick I use, I do it different ways. Usually when I guess which hand somebody is holding money in, in my show, I do it like three times in a row, sometimes four. And part of the reason it works is because I use a different technique each time I do it. Like Each phase, I use a different little trick to find it, but the first time I do it, I actually use that double negative trick. And I think the reason I ask all those sort of seemingly random questions about, whatever it is, ice cream or blondes and brunettes or whatever it is Is so my guess comes off confident because that double negative trick only works if they're expecting you to be right. You have to prime the person to really think you're going to be right, so that they hear the sort of vague, ambiguous statement as a correct guess so they hear it the way it should sound to them based on what's true. But that only works if they're primed to hear it that way. What I'm really doing is I'm just building sort of bullshit credibility, right? I'm asking these questions that they think are gonna be relevant, so that when I finally do make that sort of vague, ambiguous statement, they think I must know, because I've asked them all these questions, and those questions must be relevant somehow, and clearly they've given it away. One of the things I say in my show is once you've convinced somebody that you already know everything about them, they'll tell you anything you want to know. And I do think there's a lot of truth to that. Oh, I love that so much. That's so scary. Something that I think is important to emphasize here with what you were just saying is you kind of bend over backwards throughout your act to make sure that you address any questions or doubts that the audience may have about what you're doing in front of them. Can you talk more about how important that is? I think it's incredibly important again, you're playing chess with them, to a degree. Magic is an adversarial art form. You tell yourself, "oh, I'm so good that they don't even think about how it's done." But I think that's always BS. I think we go to magic shows and mystery shows, whether it's mentalism or magic or whatever, because on some level, we like the puzzle aspect of it. We like the fact that despite our best efforts, we can't figure it out. But that does mean giving it our best effort, right? Some people don't. There are people who come to shows like that and sort of go, "I don't even want to think about how it's done. I don't care how it's done. I just like being along for the ride." But I think their brain, whether they realize it or not, is still working in the background, trying to solve the puzzle. Just maybe not as hard as somebody else's or not as actively as somebody else's. So it becomes this, this cat and mouse game of getting ahead of their theories. You don't want them ideally to have to even ask the question out loud. You don't want them to go, how do I know it's not a magnet?" Or "how do I know it's not a string?" Or "how do I know this?" So you've got to anticipate. You've got to, you've got to look at what you're doing up there as objectively as possible, and say to yourself, "what would the smartest guy in the room, or gal in the room, or person in the room think?" Forget the 99%. Who cares? I'm thinking about that one person. I wanna know what that 1% of smartest people in the room think I'm doing, how they think I'm getting away with it. And then I wanna blow that up. I wanna make sure that even the smartest person in the room can't walk away that night with a good theory. Little do they know. Little do those skeptical 1 percent super super smart questioners know. All you need to do is invite you onto their podcast, and you'll tell them everything that they want to know, Dammit, you got me! Podcast interviews, my one weakness! Damn! Well, Now you're stuck here. There's no running away. When you're guessing something, in someone's head, what types of questions are the most effective to glean the most useful information from them? I think that entirely depends on what you're gonna be guessing or what you're talking about. There's still tricks involved. I still have a million and one sort of magical or technical or practical methods at my disposal, the same kinds of magician would use. But it becomes about, but even if I, have those methods, even if I have techniques to get a particular part of the information, there's a world of difference between just telling you a city you wrote down and sealed in an envelope and being able to tell you a city you wrote down sealed in an envelope, the last time you were in that city, who you went to that city with, and the memory you're thinking of in that city, which was, getting absolutely plastered and puking in the back of a police car in Rome, Or what, my what, How did you know? That was my first trick. No, yes because this happened to, who hasn't it happened to, Antonia? thank god. I'm not alone and so that's where, That's where all those skills come together, right? Whether it's the technical practical methods, the sort of psychological methods, the statistical methods, sort of just knowing what's going to be true for most people and then layering on what you're observing in their reactions onto the information you somehow stole via some sort of magical methodology. And being able to weave in and out of those methods in a way that they can't follow. So whenever they think you're watching their pupils, you're doing something else. Whenever they think you're doing something else, that's when you're watching their face, right? And then it becomes a layered mystery. Then it means that no one explanation that they come up with is going to suffice. So I don't know that it comes down to like, any particular questions. I will say that just conversationally, when I'm talking to people, I find open ended questions tend to elicit pretty shockingly interesting results. I read a book once on, there was a point where I got very interested in interrogation theory because I figured there's nobody on earth who has thought more about asking questions than people who conduct interrogations or interviews for a living. Particularly people who operate polygraphs. And there, there was a book I read called Spy the Lie that had a really interesting thing about how every time he would end an interview, because he was the guy who operated the polygraphs for the CIA when they would interview employees, which was, constantly, and at the end of the interview, he would always just ask, "is there anything else that you want to tell me? Is there anything else I should know? Anything else you can think of that might be relevant or might matter?" And invariably that's where he got the most interesting information and the most useful information out of people. And the other thing I took away from sort of that school of thought is just being quiet. Doesn't really matter what question you ask. If you ask it and then you're just quiet, even after they've answered. And you just wait longer than you normally would to respond. You'd be shocked how often they just start talking again and they just start giving you more and more information. Wow. Lots of layers there. Yeah. People become very uncomfortable with, with silence. That's a really important questioning tool. Because a lot of people think that a question is just the thing that comes out of their mouth that ends in a question mark, but silence is a really powerful question. It's almost tell me more," or, oh, really?" And then people start explaining themselves even more. So if you're looking for all of these different layers of cues, can you give me one particular example of a cue that you look for when you're reading somebody's mind? So there is a lot of thought on this and there's a lot of literature on this from Paul Ekman's work on micro expressions and things like that. A lot of that stuff I don't think is conversationally useful. A lot of that has to do with infants' relationships to their parental figures. It's stuff that's been appropriated into sort of pop culture science, and pop science, but doesn't have as much utility as I think we'd like to think it does. All that stuff about, oh, they look up and to the left, they're thinking, red, and vice versa, isn't really that useful or reliable. But what I do think is useful and immediately applicable is binary code. I'm a big believer that you can reduce any sort of human reaction to binary: to yes or no. Is what I'm saying resonating or is it not? Because that's the only thing I can tell for sure. If I say to you, for example, and this is like another trick I use with the "which hand?" thing, where I'm guessing which hand the money's in. I'll say, are you right handed or left handed? Do you prefer cats or dogs?" This is a different technique than the double negative one, which I also use, but I'll ask three more questions, right? "Do you prefer iPhone or Android?" and I go, "that's really interesting because most people who answer that way always start with the money in the right hand." And then I just watch. Because while I can't read their mind and there's no like eye movement that's gonna tell me is it in the right hand or left hand, what I can tell is am I right or wrong, right? I can see immediately if they're happy or sad. I can see if they're smiling and Oh, he got me." Or if they're like biting their lip and cringing a little because they want me to get it right. So they're waiting for me to be right still, which means if what I'm saying is wrong, they're showing it to me all over their face. It's not a micro expression. It's a, giant macro expression. And then my job becomes to talk faster than they can pivot or rather talk faster than they can say no. Because I never said it was in their hand. I said, "most people who answer that way start with the money in the right hand." And if I start to see a no on their face, if I start to see them pause or wait, or just not smile or not react, I'm gonna pivot faster than they can tell me I'm wrong. And I'll say, but you don't seem like most people, which is why I think it's in the left hand." oh my god. You can't see my face, but I am aghast. I'm loving hearing all of this. It makes perfect sense. I'm just thinking back to the times that I've watched you in action and do this trick, and that's absolutely right. You do this, and it's so smart, and it's just a matter of seeing whether people are happy because they've been rooting for you the whole time, and they do want to be shocked and awed, and they want you to guess it right, versus if they're bummed out that you got it wrong. Are there sociopaths that you've done this with who are extra excited, their happiness at you getting it wrong seems like the same tell. Of course, there's no, 100 percent accurate method for any of this, but what I will say is, when I'm working with somebody like that, I can usually tell ahead of time. I can tell they're going to be combative, but it doesn't make a difference. They might not be happy that I got it right, but they'll still react faster than if I get it wrong, because what I'm trying to do is elicit a response, right? Let's say I'm dealing with somebody who really wants me to get it wrong. Well Then, I just reverse the system a little bit. If I make a guess, because most people like you start with it in the right hand, And I see that grin coming. I know it's gonna be in the left, I know they're screwing with me, because I've already baselined them before we started and I already know that they're rooting against the trick. But, a lot of it comes down to picking the right people for these kinds of things, too. I get to control who I'm doing that with and I have a whole 15 minutes of my show before that moment to see who's been reacting and smiling and laughing every time I win. Every time I get something right. I'm not going to set myself up to fail or them up to fail by picking somebody who's a curmudgeon. That's brilliant. I never really thought about that that much. You do get to screen people. Besides laughing and demonstrably being on your side, what other components make a good audience participant? It depends. It depends on what you're doing. I don't want to, I don't use the same kind of person for everything I do. So it depends on what you're doing. Are you doing something that's going to require really closely following directions? Are you doing something that really just, you just need a certain size reaction? But I would say generally you're looking for focus and reaction because you don't want somebody who's reacting so big constantly throughout the show that you know that they're not even gonna be able to follow your directions because it's just the them show. There's a level of enthusiasm that is disruptive sometimes. But that doesn't mean I wouldn't use them for anything. It just means I'm not going to use them for a very long piece or a a very involved exercise. I'm going to use them for something else. What's the difference for you between trying to guess a name or a place, like something that can be spelled, versus an experience or an image in somebody's mind? Oh negligible. There is no real difference. I mean, I suppose there's a difference based on what method I'm using. But the methods I'm using are pretty consistent across the board for different things. And like I said, anything I can't guess about you from just throwing spaghetti at the wall and seeing what sticks and pivoting, I have a million and one sleight of hand methods or, magical methods for acquiring information too. If I want to know something, if there's a piece of information I want, I have a way to get it. And if, the sort of verbal judo fails, there's always, all the other judos, including regular judo. I can simply back, I can, I will hip throw you onto the floor and then, make you tell me. Oh I believe this. I believe this. so much, that's why I don't mess with you. you know, it just, it just becomes a martial arts demonstration eventually. Now, um, loves that as well. yeah, bit of blood. yeah, this conversation's gone wildly off the rails, but yes. I guess my point is just that, when you're doing this as a performance, you have to have five methods for everything you're going to do because you can't rely on any one of them. Like you said, you could always find a psychopath. You could always just have somebody who's just not, in the sort of bell curve of how people react to certain things, or respond to certain things. So you always have to have five methods for sort of anything you want to execute. I like that advice just for life. As a An anxious person myself, it's good to know that other people try and be overly prepared for a thousand things that could go wrong. And magic's always on the verge of going wrong, Penn Jillette once said, magic is literally always hanging by a thread. Every trick is literally always hanging by sometimes literally a thread. And I think there's a lot of truth to that. If you knew the methods I was using, you'd be shocked that I trust them. I believe you. But I trust them because I've got three parachutes, I think that's very wise. What's the one thing that throws you off the most when trying to read someone? Drugs or alcohol, if they're kind of screwed up at all. That makes perfect sense. They just, they stop responding like a human. Like, I won't, do mentalism on people who are like inebriated. Even if I'm being paid to, I will find other more visual classic magic stuff to do for them, where they don't have to do anything or follow anything. It's just flashy sort of pop magic. Or I'll focus on other people in the audience, but but yeah, I think somebody who can't follow a train of thought because they're three aperol spritzes in... what a weirdly specific drink choice, but you get the idea. It's obviously happened to you. yeah. I think I might be that person. You've been burned. You've been burned before by three Aperol spritzes. yeah, for sure. I can't follow my own tricks after three aperol spritzes, but yes, that'd be the main one. I can definitely see how that would change somebody's behavior and make them act really weird. You've done shows virtually, on big stages, on little stages, corporate events, dinner parties. Is there one audience that you've performed for that you will never forget? Is there one audience I've performed for that I'll never forget? It's weird, I actually, despite having a pretty poor memory in general, which is why I've learned a lot of memory systems and techniques to compensate for that, I tend to remember all my audiences. It's just it's such a heightened experience when you're on the stage, and your adrenaline is pumping so hard that, it's weird. My brain kind of records like every minute of it. Wow. It's so that's very hard to answer there's I wish there was some way we could narrow the question because there's just so many different audiences and so many different reasons that I've remembered all of them So I don't even know how to begin to narrow that down to one. Which audience allowed you to be the most creative? Ooh! There's a nightclub here in New York And I don't perform in a lot of nightclubs anymore really just because of that all those reasons I just said. It tends to be a very like disruptive audience, chaotic audience, highly inebriated audience. And they're often not there to see art. They're there to, to dance and party. And the best Acts in those environments tend to be just completely visual acts that don't ask them to do anything. I have a friend who does a dove act, and it's amazing. He produces doves, but it's great because they don't have to do anything. And it, and it's so clear. There's no logic they have to follow in that act, except: no bird, bird. The drunkest human on earth understands bird from nowhere. you know, and it's a silent act. There's no engagement with the audience, which is what you need in those environments. So I don't tend to perform at a lot of nightclubs for that reason, but there's one in New York called House of Yes. That's in Bushwick, and it's a very artsy crowd and it's very like Burning Man vibes, you know, but mixed with psychedelic sort of circus stuff. And there's, aerialists and a lot of circus performers, and all the acts tend to be really edgy, but thoughtfully edgy. And it's the only nightclub I've ever worked in my life. Where every single time I'm there, I feel like I have the audience's full attention. Whether I'm strolling around the club, just performing, small stuff for people, or if I'm on the stage and trying to hold everybody's attention for 10 minutes, there's it's really interesting, even when there's drugs and booze involved this crowd is just so hyped for art. And they, tend to have come with a bit of a respect for like, artists and art, that they really do give you their full focus, even when they're in a K hole, so to speak, you know, That they, uh, And if your audience doesn't know what that is, they just learned something from a podcast. That's great. That's what we're here for. They can go look it up. They can ask Chat GPT. It's all about asking questions. I wonder if Chat GPT will answer I'm sure chat GPT will answer, but I really like that because it just goes to show how meaningful it is to have an engaged, committed, appreciative audience. Yeah. it's a two way street. The performer has to be there with their heart fully open and out, and the audience has to be there willing to kind of receive it. And that's, the most gratifying moment when those two things kind of line up or are in sync. I will say the other most gratifying kinds of moments is when they're not in sync and then you make them in sync. Like when you start out in a room where you've just got nobody, right? Like they're just all doing something different. They're all talking to each other. They're all distracted. They don't, they couldn't give two shits about what you're up there doing. And then by the end, you've got them eating out of the palm of your hand. That's also pretty, pretty gratifying. That's the challenge. That's a satisfying challenge to win. Oh, but it's amazing when you get, when you get it, it's amazing. Trust me, I've seen you do this. I've seen you work your magic literally, and I know exactly how enthralled people are by watching you do your thing. I want you to think about the trick that you're proudest of. What makes you so proud of it? The trick I'm proudest of, You know, It's funny. They're all very personal to me. Like, it's all, like, it's, anything you make tends to mean a lot to you. But I think one of the pieces that I'm most proud of in my of material is this piece that I do in my In my stage show where I'm trying to figure out how to talk about this without giving away Cause that's not fun for me, at least. Might be fun for you, but nice try, Antonia. No, No, I'm not, I'm, Jason, I would never try and back you into a corner. It's not fun for me. I like watching you, do this stuff. I just want to know what makes you proud of it. I know I'm trying to think about how to explain it without talking too much about the methods. There, there's a piece I do in my stage show, where I ask everybody to think of a person they miss, and I talk about how psychics and mediums and charlatans can take a giant audience of people, of people they've never met, and seemingly know the name of the person that passed away in their life, right? Or whatever. And it's this thing that's really effective, and it's careers are built on being able to do that kind of thing. Industries are built on being able to do that kind of thing convincingly. And people end up spending a lot of money on charlatans and soothsayers because those techniques are so confusing. And so I do a piece in my show where I ask everybody to go along with this and pretend we're sort of in one of those environments, one of those sort of big TV medium kind of things. And everybody thinks of a name of somebody they miss in their life that they wish were still here. And I ask anybody who thought of a pet to stand up and I end up doing this very tongue in cheek sort of impression, kind of a composite impression of like, the Long Island Medium and John Edward and Peter Popov and all these sort of charismatic con artists, in my opinion, at least. Ooh. But I go around then guessing all of those pets names you know, and talking a little bit about, the pets that these people have lost and that they're thinking of, and then there's this sort of big reveal that doesn't matter right now. But what I'm proud of that routine is that I'm able to do three things at once that mean a lot to me, and that's a very hard thing to do. The first is talk about ideas that matter to me. And those are ideas that matter a lot to me, the ways in which we're sort of misled or taken advantage of and being able to put out a counter argument to those things that hopefully, somebody might take with them going forward. And somebody who might have been on the fence about whether that kind of thing is real or not, or whether or not to spend money on that kind of thing might walk away from my show going, "I don't know, but that guy made some really good points about how it's just Flim flam." So being able to promote and talk about ideas that are interesting to me is really important. While also getting to do this very over the top sort of character work and schticky kind of entertainment and doing the thing that I really am up there to do, which is entertain people first and foremost. So the idea that I get to do both of those at once. And then thirdly, which is resonate with people because I, at the end of that routine, I am talking about something that's very personal and meaningful to people, which is their pets. Like I have a dog and she's my baby I've had dogs my whole life and I know what it's like to lose a pet. And being able to handle that in a way that feels sensitive, and that I hope is sensitive, and I'm always, constantly striving to make sensitive, while also doing this thing that's entertaining, while also talking about these ideas that matter to me. It's it's a very fine balancing act, and I'm proud of it, simply because I think most of the time I manage to kind of stick that landing and do all those things, at least to some degree. I think that's so powerful. And it's really nice to hear you say that as opposed to, look, I learned this one particular trick and it took me a long time to nail it. And now that I've nailed it, I'm really proud of it." It's really cool to hear you say that being able to resonate with the audience and also accomplish certain things for yourself is what makes you proud your act. And I think that does make you special. My second to last question is, what is the mentalist community like? Oh, God. I mean, it's, frankly, it's small. There's not a lot of people who are dedicated to that art form. 30, 40 years ago, like I, said, it was a, it was its own thing, and now almost every magician says magician and mentalist on their website. You know, and what they really mean by that is they do one trick in the show where they bring out a book, and they say, "think of a word in the book," and then they guess the word or something like that. They do a mind reading trick in their show or whatever. But there's, very few, performers who are really focused in the way that I am on just performing this kind of material. So it's a, it's a small community, but it's a supportive community. I think it's a community that has always struggled with defining itself. And every performer who does this kind of thing has to end up drawing very personal lines in the sand for what they're willing and not willing to do or talk about. There's performers who go full shut eye and end up getting really hooked on that moment where. They realize "Oh, the audience really believes I can do this. What if I just start letting them? And what if I start letting them believe whatever they want to believe in? What if I started maybe encouraging that belief a little bit?" And all of a sudden, you're charging $50 an hour to talk to someone's dead aunt. At that point, you're no longer, in my opinion, doing art or entertainment, you're just taking advantage of people. Then there's people who, who say "well, I'm not a psychic, I'm an intuitive," but they're still using the same tricks. Everybody ends up having to draw their own line for what they want their audience to walk away with. And then there's artists who go, I don't care at all what they think, I'm just going to do the thing I do and whatever they think," you know, but I think those people don't tend to have much to say then. If you don't come with a point of view, then what is your art about? Then you're just juggling. You're just, not to say jugglers don't have a point of view, but you know what? It becomes simply a demonstration of "look at the thing I can do." And the thing you can do is never the thing you can actually do because you're using secret methods. So I think this constant internal struggle to, to articulate what this art form is and what its place in people's belief systems and zeitgeist should be, because it can be very powerful. I think that's incredible, and I don't think that most people give mentalists and magicians and all these types of performers enough credit for the thoughtfulness that goes into their acts. The final question that I have is a question that I ask everybody, which is, what is one question that you like to work into a conversation, whether it's at work or in a social setting, that really helps you get to know someone? I, I have a question that I ask people once I know them a little bit, and it's a very personal question, but it tends to break through the bullshit pretty quickly. And it's not, a thing I'd ask in the first place. 10 minutes of meeting somebody, but it tends to be something I ask within the first 30 minutes of talking to somebody. Like once we have a little bit of a conversation going and a little bit of rapport, I like to ask people what kind of crazy they are. I love that. Okay! I find it saves you months and months of having to dig for it. I just like to be like, "what kind of crazy are you?" And then they're always like what do you mean? And I'm like, like, I'm a sort of neurotic, anxious, lunatic and I'm terrified of conflict. And so I'm, that, that's the kind crazy I like, what kind of crazy, I don't know what kind of, you tell me what it means. But everyone's crazy. Everyone on earth is absolutely batshit crazy. What kind of crazy are you? What's the crazy that will only be clear to me after six months of knowing you? Oh my god, I love that so much and I can't wait to go and use it. Everyone's crazy, let's just figure out how. What kind of crazy are you, Antonia? What kind of crazy am I? I think that I am the kind of crazy that's always moving, even to my detriment. I have to do something. If I have it in my head, if I have a little bit of time, I have to do it. That's one of the reasons why I'm chronically late. I'm always thinking that I can fit things in when I actually can't. It's one of the reasons why I've taken up improv and why I do gymnastics because I like to push my body to the physical limit, even if that's unsafe. So yeah, I guess for me, it really comes down to challenges. I can't resist a challenge, and I think that makes me a little bit crazy. I love it. Jason, this has been an absolute delight. You are one of a kind. You are such a pure, amazing, intelligent, magical soul. And I really appreciate you coming on QuestionAble Strategy today. My pleasure. Talk to you soon. That was such a special conversation. I adore Jason so much. I think that he's incredibly talented. He's so funny, but he's so thoughtful and smart about everything he does. I mean he kind of has to be. Everything about his acts is calculated and the risk is minimized. I loved what he said about how if audiences think that he's got one way of doing things, he has always got a bunch of backups up his sleeve in case things go wrong. I Think a question that is certainly really important for mentalists to think about is what could go wrong? And not necessarily in a negative or pessimistic way. You just have to account for everything when you're doing things live. So I have so much respect for Jason and I'm just honored that he'd come on to the podcast and share some of his techniques with us. But what I really want to talk about is the question, "what kind of crazy are you?" I want to preface this by saying that I actually found it really difficult to use this question, but when I did, I had Probably the most riveting, wild conversation of my life. So why was it so difficult? I found it hard to find a place to use this because I felt like in most situations it would come across as flirtatious. And I'm personally very conscious of that. Not saying that that's a bad thing in the right settings, but I just didn't want to give somebody the wrong idea. So there were several times when I thought, uh, maybe I could bring it up in conversation just for the experiment for the podcast. But in the end kind of chickened out because it didn't seem right. Cut to a couple of days ago. I was doing some work in a cafe and my phone started glitching out and I needed some help. So I approached this guy sitting across from me whom I've seen a million times. He does work in the cafe as well, but we've just never spoken to each other for some reason. I approached him and asked him for some help with my phone and he was so nice. Couldn't have been nicer. And while we're waiting for the phone to come back on, I sit down next to him, and we start chatting. We talk about who we are, what we do, what we're interested in, places that we've traveled to, things that we've done, And then, I'm not even sure how we got there, but he mentions to me that his brother works in the podcasting space. And I said, no way. I actually have a podcast." And I told him about QuestionAble Strategy. Inevitably, he asked me a question that I get asked all the time, which I love, Which is, "are there any standout questions that you've heard that are really incredible?" And that's when I said to him, "look, there's this one question that I love, that I've been meaning to ask, I just haven't found the right context. So, if you'd entertain this, I'd love to try it out with you. What kind of crazy are you?" And he leaned back and he said, "I love that question." His eyes lit up and he started telling me about this tattoo that he has on his wrist of dice. And he said, "it reminds me all the time to take risks." He continues to give me a tour of the rest of the tattoos on his arm until he gets to this one tattoo, which he tells me he shares the same exact tattoo with three of his buddies because they're quote unquote bonded for life." And I said, that's nice. We love a long term friendship." he said to me, "No, no, no, no, you don't understand. We are bonded for life. We have been through some shit together." I said, okay. And he proceeds to tell me that he and his friends years ago were international drug dealers who sent weed from the U. S. to the UK, where they'd sell it. Now, I want to be very clear, when I tell this story, I am in no way condoning selling drugs illegally or trafficking drugs illegally. I just felt like this story was too crazy not to share. So, my new friend, sells this weed in the UK until one day he gets caught and ends up in jail for six months. He then gets out and continues to deal drugs with a part time job on the side working for a major shipping company. And that's when he meets a whole load of people within the shipping company who've got more complicated jobs than he does on paper, but he's far better at all of their jobs than they are. Because he's got this complex experience dealing drugs. But of course, he can't tell anybody about that. So he gets promoted several times within this company. And then during COVID, he decides to build his own shipping logistics business, but he needs capital to get the vans required for the deliveries. So who does he contact? Well, he calls his cousin, who was also a drug dealer, who had too much cash that he didn't know what to do with. So they took that cash and they bought up a ton of vans from all over the UK. They also needed drivers. So what did they do? They flew in drivers from other countries in the EU because there was so much demand during COVID for shipping. But this got him into a little bit of trouble sometimes because these drivers would occasionally band together into an angry mob and come after him and his cousin to kill them. So in order to keep everyone in line And keep the business functioning, they would sometimes have to call the biggest crime boss in the area For reinforcements to break up the angry mobs. As you can imagine, I was absolutely gripped by everything this man said. I went over to talk to him just because my phone was broken. And I ended up talking with him for upwards of two hours because I just couldn't stop listening to his stories. It sounds fake, but it's not. I got to know him so well in such a concentrated period of time, just because I opened Pandora's Box with the question, what kind of crazy are you? And by the way, I cannot reiterate this enough. He's not a creepy guy. He's incredibly nice. In fact, he's no longer at all involved in drugs. Ironically, he's building a health and wellness business now. And he told me all of these stories with the biggest smile on his face. We were laughing for hours. So my takeaway is that this question, what kind of crazy are you?" Is a high risk, high reward question. It's not appropriate for all settings. You need to make sure that if you're going to ask it, you feel really comfortable, but if you ask it to the right person at the right time, you can unlock some really, really rich stories and get to know somebody. incredibly well in a very short period of time. And This may sound like a shameless plug, but it's what really helped me. If you're out and about talking about the QuestionAble Strategy podcast, and somebody asks you, Oh, what have you learned from the QuestionAble Strategy podcast?" You can say, well, "there's actually this question that I've been meaning to try out, but I haven't necessarily found the right context. Can I try it with you?" Maybe that's a good in to use this question. It worked for me, so it might work for you. Good luck. This has been an episode of QuestionAble Strategy. I'm your host, Antonia Hellman, and if you like what you just heard, go back. We've got some great episodes already up with practical tips that you can apply to asking questions in your everyday life. And in fact, here's a question that you can go and ask your friends: Have you listened to QuestionAble Strategy?" And if their answer is no, just send them the link. And while you're at it, follow, like, subscribe, leave a review. It all helps. Let me know what you're interested in hearing about and who you're interested in hearing from. Where there's a will, there's a way, and we can get them on the podcast. Till then I'm Antonia Hellman, and I will see you next time.
