For a couple of years, perhaps more, I've been really fascinated by the possible overlap between what we tend to think of as deception and trickery, on one hand, and 'real' magic, on the other.
It's wild to think these two areas can be kept apart. And yet, being 'schooled' by sleight of hand magic, as well as a largely Western-secular upbringing, my tendency has generally been to approach any claims to 'real' magic with deep suspicion: for instance, I see someone like Uri Geller, who effectively conned scientists into believing he was 'really' using telepathic powers to bend metal spoons, as some engaged in deeply unethical practices.
But, here's the rub.
Most people have had experiences that in some way touch on the unexplainable, the 'mystical', or even just the surprising and amazing. We understand and codify our world through language and conventions, and we tend to leave out, or even erase, any framework that doesn't fit with the dominant models. And there are areas of life where we get the sense that we're tuning into something other, something that words fail to capture, or scientific models can't quite grasp. What if that is what we mean by magic? And what if the magic of magicians and illusionists could more closely align itself with that, as opposed to always choosing the sceptical approach? (some magicians do of course work and think in this way...but that's for another post)
All this was recently on my mind (aptly) playing an apparently very simple game called 'The Mind' (it's tagline 'Let's become one').
Each player receives a number on a card, and doesn't show it to the other players: for example, with four players, one might receive 12, another 29, another 4, and another 50. Without disclosing your number, the idea is to 'tune' into the group, and, in silence, to lay cards down, openly, and in the correct sequence. You win, as a group, if you correctly unveil the cards in sequence: for instance, 4, 12, 29, and 50. If you win, you then move up a level, each player receiving two cards, then three, etc.
The game is played without talking, and before you start each round, all players place their hand on the table, as though communing, or tuning. Then, it starts... If someone's card is very low, a 3 for example, it's safe to say that person will feel emboldened to begin, by placing their card down first, and without hesitation. But if no one has such a low card, then the game starts with... nothing happening. Or rather, with the players simply sitting, waiting, trying to 'sense' how their number might fit with the others', or to get a general feel of the group, based on very little 'information' (unconscious body language, for example). When I played, there was no 'signaling' allowed (raised eyebrows etc). The idea is, therefore, to experiment with an almost telepathic group tuning, as though we were trying to learn how to be animals, or birds: like the starlings when they perform their murmurations, or an ant colony focused on a task requiring a special sort of group intelligence.
Described like this, the game can seem like a hoax, just another delusion. But anyone who has done theatre training will likely know that warm up in which a large group of people in a studio will try, without deciding who and what number, to count up to 20, one number at a time. If two people speak over each other, you have to start from the beginning. You can, as a group, get better at this: it's not 'supernatural', I think it's more the case that you learn to attune your body to the other bodies, you start being more receptive to unconscious 'codes' and subtle patterns, you become very alert to the smallest shifts, in short you drop down to a level of being and 'communicating' that could be studied and even explained, but somehow I don't think we have the language for.
Similarly, with 'The Mind', you can as a group attain a quality of attention that is really remarkable, and out of the ordinary: because no one talks or signals anything overtly, it's all down to a more subtle sensing-feeling mode of communication, one that is, I would say, associated with words like magic.
This is the same 'sensing' that, oddly enough, I seemed to see in Las Vegas this summer, watching a man in his 70s calmly collect a pair of dice, arrange them at his fingertips according to some precise internal 'rule', then throw the dice, always aiming for the same spot on the table. It was all a private ritual. I for one don't believe his ritual really affected whatever numbers the dice happened to produce, yet the man's quality of attention was really exceptional, as though he too were micro-tuning into something larger than humself. And I wonder if that is part of the appeal of the game. In Vegas, the casinos capitalise on this type of sensing and deep attention. But it has a history as long as the planet: it has been there since vegetal and animal beings have formed, their bodies teeming with intelligence, with shifting micro-expressions, adjustments, intentions, and their 'consciousness' not just something locked inside a head but spread all around them, like branches of a tree. That's what the game allows us to be, tree-like, or a swarm of bees, intelligent, and very magical indeed.
It's wild to think these two areas can be kept apart. And yet, being 'schooled' by sleight of hand magic, as well as a largely Western-secular upbringing, my tendency has generally been to approach any claims to 'real' magic with deep suspicion: for instance, I see someone like Uri Geller, who effectively conned scientists into believing he was 'really' using telepathic powers to bend metal spoons, as some engaged in deeply unethical practices.
But, here's the rub.
Most people have had experiences that in some way touch on the unexplainable, the 'mystical', or even just the surprising and amazing. We understand and codify our world through language and conventions, and we tend to leave out, or even erase, any framework that doesn't fit with the dominant models. And there are areas of life where we get the sense that we're tuning into something other, something that words fail to capture, or scientific models can't quite grasp. What if that is what we mean by magic? And what if the magic of magicians and illusionists could more closely align itself with that, as opposed to always choosing the sceptical approach? (some magicians do of course work and think in this way...but that's for another post)
All this was recently on my mind (aptly) playing an apparently very simple game called 'The Mind' (it's tagline 'Let's become one').
Each player receives a number on a card, and doesn't show it to the other players: for example, with four players, one might receive 12, another 29, another 4, and another 50. Without disclosing your number, the idea is to 'tune' into the group, and, in silence, to lay cards down, openly, and in the correct sequence. You win, as a group, if you correctly unveil the cards in sequence: for instance, 4, 12, 29, and 50. If you win, you then move up a level, each player receiving two cards, then three, etc.
The game is played without talking, and before you start each round, all players place their hand on the table, as though communing, or tuning. Then, it starts... If someone's card is very low, a 3 for example, it's safe to say that person will feel emboldened to begin, by placing their card down first, and without hesitation. But if no one has such a low card, then the game starts with... nothing happening. Or rather, with the players simply sitting, waiting, trying to 'sense' how their number might fit with the others', or to get a general feel of the group, based on very little 'information' (unconscious body language, for example). When I played, there was no 'signaling' allowed (raised eyebrows etc). The idea is, therefore, to experiment with an almost telepathic group tuning, as though we were trying to learn how to be animals, or birds: like the starlings when they perform their murmurations, or an ant colony focused on a task requiring a special sort of group intelligence.
Described like this, the game can seem like a hoax, just another delusion. But anyone who has done theatre training will likely know that warm up in which a large group of people in a studio will try, without deciding who and what number, to count up to 20, one number at a time. If two people speak over each other, you have to start from the beginning. You can, as a group, get better at this: it's not 'supernatural', I think it's more the case that you learn to attune your body to the other bodies, you start being more receptive to unconscious 'codes' and subtle patterns, you become very alert to the smallest shifts, in short you drop down to a level of being and 'communicating' that could be studied and even explained, but somehow I don't think we have the language for.
Similarly, with 'The Mind', you can as a group attain a quality of attention that is really remarkable, and out of the ordinary: because no one talks or signals anything overtly, it's all down to a more subtle sensing-feeling mode of communication, one that is, I would say, associated with words like magic.
This is the same 'sensing' that, oddly enough, I seemed to see in Las Vegas this summer, watching a man in his 70s calmly collect a pair of dice, arrange them at his fingertips according to some precise internal 'rule', then throw the dice, always aiming for the same spot on the table. It was all a private ritual. I for one don't believe his ritual really affected whatever numbers the dice happened to produce, yet the man's quality of attention was really exceptional, as though he too were micro-tuning into something larger than humself. And I wonder if that is part of the appeal of the game. In Vegas, the casinos capitalise on this type of sensing and deep attention. But it has a history as long as the planet: it has been there since vegetal and animal beings have formed, their bodies teeming with intelligence, with shifting micro-expressions, adjustments, intentions, and their 'consciousness' not just something locked inside a head but spread all around them, like branches of a tree. That's what the game allows us to be, tree-like, or a swarm of bees, intelligent, and very magical indeed.
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