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Speaker 1: One of my pet peeves with a lot of psychology

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Speaker 1: research is that when you read the results, you think, wow,

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Speaker 1: that's pretty obvious. No surprises are there, which is why

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Speaker 1: nearly fifteen years ago when I read a book called Quirkology,

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Speaker 1: I devoured it. It's written by psychology professor Richard Wiseman,

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Speaker 1: and as the name suggests, it's full of studies, many

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Speaker 1: of which Richard conducted himself, that are very quirky and

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Speaker 1: very surprising. Scientific American has described Richard as one of

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Speaker 1: the most interesting and innovative experimental psychologists in the world.

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Speaker 1: Richard has researched everything from how we can train ourselves

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Speaker 1: to be luckier, through to how to spot a liar

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Speaker 1: and the psychology of magic and illusion. So how does

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Speaker 1: one of the most creative psychologists in the world make decisions,

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Speaker 1: make himself luckier and use magic to improve his work

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Speaker 1: as a psychologist. My name is doctor amanthe Impact. I'm

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Speaker 1: an organizational psychologist and the founder of Behavioral science consultancy Inventium,

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Speaker 1: and this is how I work A show about how

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Speaker 1: to help you do your best work. So Richard has

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Speaker 1: learned a myriad of different strategies through his research and

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Speaker 1: quite famous experiments. I wanted to know which ones have

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Speaker 1: had the biggest impact on him.

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Speaker 2: I think with the luck work, it's probably more about

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Speaker 2: being open to opportunities and being flexible. And I think

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Speaker 2: that's easy to say and quite hard to do in practice.

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Speaker 2: So I worked with about five hundred very lucky people,

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Speaker 2: and they were very, very flexible thinkers. They had an

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Speaker 2: end goal, they knew where they were going, but they

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Speaker 2: also knew that the world changed and you needed to

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Speaker 2: sort of set your sale to make the most of

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Speaker 2: the wind, as it were. And I think in my

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Speaker 2: own life I've done something very similar. So you've got

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Speaker 2: an end point and then you think, well, how I'm

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Speaker 2: going to get there. It's not quite clear to me.

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Speaker 2: And sometimes you have a chance conversation with somebody and

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Speaker 2: you go, actually, that's where I can gallop off on

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Speaker 2: that project or something like that. And so I think

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Speaker 2: there's no such thing as a bad idea. There's just

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Speaker 2: an idea whose time hasn't come. Who If an idea

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Speaker 2: feels too hard, then I'll stop trying to pursue it,

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Speaker 2: and I'll just try something else that feels easier at

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Speaker 2: this moment. Knowing that I might go back to that

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Speaker 2: other idea, that other project at some point. And I

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Speaker 2: think it's that inherent flexibility I find very helpful. The

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Speaker 2: other thing which my team will scream at me for

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Speaker 2: and have done for twenty five years, is that often

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Speaker 2: I'll say, Okay, this is the experiment we're going to do.

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Speaker 2: This is how we're going to do it, and we

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Speaker 2: all start to plan for that, and it might take

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Speaker 2: a month or two months to get it ready, and

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Speaker 2: then week seven or indeed ten minutes before we start,

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Speaker 2: I might go, you know what, there's a better way

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Speaker 2: of doing this, And at that point there's no point

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Speaker 2: in arguing with me. We're all switching and it doesn't

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Speaker 2: matter how much resources you put into to what you've

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Speaker 2: done to get to that point. If there's a better plan,

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Speaker 2: a better idea, it wins. So I always think parking

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Speaker 2: your ego, parking your plans, parking your preparation, and just

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Speaker 2: going best idea wins. It is quite a successful strategy.

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Speaker 2: But it's the thing that always feels, you know, I've

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Speaker 2: set so many of those emails where I kind of go,

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Speaker 2: I know we're all geared up. I know we're all

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Speaker 2: geared up to do this, but last night, I realized

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Speaker 2: that it's better to do this now, so let's all change,

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Speaker 2: and thank goodness, I work with a group of people

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Speaker 2: that are very happy to change overnight, and sometimes we

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Speaker 2: do live shows. It can be ten minutes before we start.

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Speaker 2: Is that we'll all go. You know what, for this audience,

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Speaker 2: there's a better way. I've just spoken to somebody, it's

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Speaker 2: better to do this, and off we'll go. And I

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Speaker 2: think that's what makes it interesting. So I think that flexibility,

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Speaker 2: to get back to your question, is key to what

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Speaker 2: I do.

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Speaker 1: How do you make those decisions, because I imagine in

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Speaker 1: the moment they're quite hard decisions to make, where you're

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Speaker 1: directing a team to go in a completely different direction

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Speaker 1: and probably causing a bit of stress, like is it

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Speaker 1: a gut feel or is it something else?

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Speaker 2: No, I think it's so I don't tend to make

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Speaker 2: decisions on my own. I think I'm quite a poor

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Speaker 2: decision maker in that sense. What I'm quite good at

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Speaker 2: is coming up with options and talking to people and

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Speaker 2: they make the decisions for me. So I think making

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Speaker 2: the decision is fairly straightforward. What's hard is implementing it,

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Speaker 2: And you mustn't cause people stress that's not my job.

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Speaker 2: That's not my role. So my role is always to

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Speaker 2: keep the team buoyant. And if people are not having

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Speaker 2: a good time, quite frankly, they're not going to work

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Speaker 2: with me, and they certainly won't work with me again.

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Speaker 2: And we all live in very small worlds, and so

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Speaker 2: reputation is the number one thing. If you can't go

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Speaker 2: back to somebody, if the last time they worked with

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Speaker 2: you as an absolute disaster and they had a terrible time,

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Speaker 2: they're not want to work with you again. So reputation

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Speaker 2: really matters. I always want to have people to have

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Speaker 2: fun with those changes and with those switches, and if

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Speaker 2: it stresses somebody out, then I simply wouldn't go with it.

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Speaker 2: Under those circumstances. Sometimes you have to manage disappointment, but

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Speaker 2: that's a different thing. If somebody's put a great deal

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Speaker 2: of time into something, then you might go, look, I

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Speaker 2: really appreciate that, and we will use all of that

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Speaker 2: at some point, just not today. So but the decisions

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Speaker 2: are very easy because you just know it. You know

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Speaker 2: when it's a better idea, you can feel it in bones,

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Speaker 2: and everyone sort of has to agree with you. Otherwise

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Speaker 2: you can't carry the team along. It would just be

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Speaker 2: me of being a bit odd at the helm throwing

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Speaker 2: the ship from one side to the other, and you

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Speaker 2: don't want that. You need to be able to say

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Speaker 2: to people, this is why it's a better idea. What

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Speaker 2: do you think if they agree, then how can we

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Speaker 2: make this happen next week, tomorrow or whatever.

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Speaker 1: We've talked about openness to opportunities. What are some other

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Speaker 1: strategies that you've learned through your research that you've found

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Speaker 1: really useful in applying in your own life.

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Speaker 2: I don't know through the research through own experience, so

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Speaker 2: I have the worst decision making heuristic in the world,

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Speaker 2: which I don't recommend to anyone, but it saved my

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Speaker 2: bacon many many times. Which is so often I have

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Speaker 2: to go into a room and come up with an

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Speaker 2: idea for an experiment or a campaign or a research

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Speaker 2: or whatever a show, and I will think quite a

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Speaker 2: lot about different angles. So there's nothing as dangerous as

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Speaker 2: a person with one idea. So you have this idea

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Speaker 2: and you think that's great, and then you go right

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Speaker 2: forget that. Let's come up with a different angle and

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Speaker 2: then you Otherwise what you get is buying on a

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Speaker 2: single idea and you fall in love with this idea

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Speaker 2: and you decide that's the only way forward. So I

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Speaker 2: come up with an idea, jettison it, come up with

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Speaker 2: another jetson. I don't really work them through very much,

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Speaker 2: and I don't decide where I'm going to go with

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Speaker 2: a pitch until I walk into the room. I only

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Speaker 2: decide that as I walk into that room and sit down,

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Speaker 2: and you see the team you're pitching to, and at

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Speaker 2: that point, because you haven't got a kind of you

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Speaker 2: haven't got an approach in mind. It feels very live

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Speaker 2: and very real, and what you don't try and do

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Speaker 2: is sell them something that they don't really want. It's

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Speaker 2: they're there in front of you can see what sort

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Speaker 2: of people are they are, and they tell you so much,

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Speaker 2: and that's at that point I hope to have a

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Speaker 2: good idea. And that has worked for me for about

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Speaker 2: thirty years. So an example of it was a National

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Speaker 2: Science a year over in this country quite a few

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Speaker 2: years ago, and they wanted an experiment to run throughout

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Speaker 2: the whole year to engage with families with children with

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Speaker 2: adults that would have little bits the media could report

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Speaker 2: on throughout the year and be nice if everyone's involved.

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Speaker 2: Blah blah blah, blah blah blah. Quite a hard pitch,

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Speaker 2: actually quite a hard thing, so I thought various topics,

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Speaker 2: didn't settle on anything. I walked into the room, sat

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Speaker 2: down and spoke to them for a few minutes and said,

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Speaker 2: we're going to search for the world's funniest joke. And

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Speaker 2: that was the full extent of that pitch. It was

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Speaker 2: literally one sentence and they just went perfect and that

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Speaker 2: was the end of it. And the idea that framing.

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Speaker 2: I thought of doing something on humor, but the framing

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Speaker 2: of searching for the world's funniest joke, which sharpens it

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Speaker 2: all up, came to me as I walked from the

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Speaker 2: door to the chair. And that's happened to me a

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Speaker 2: lot where that where you feel it's a hard thing

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Speaker 2: to do because we like to walk into pictures really prepared,

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Speaker 2: and I think there's something about the liveness, maybe because

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Speaker 2: someone a sort of live performer that I like that

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Speaker 2: kind of let's live in the moment, so you're prepared,

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Speaker 2: but you haven't quite got it all sharpened up until

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Speaker 2: you're sitting there.

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Speaker 1: How did that work earlier in your career, where I

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Speaker 1: imagine you you know, maybe didn't have the confidence and

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Speaker 1: you certainly didn't have the experience that you have now.

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Speaker 1: Because that sounds terrifying.

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Speaker 2: I don't think it is, because you think, well, the

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Speaker 2: worst that can happen is I don't have a very

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Speaker 2: good idea, in which case I just leave and there'll

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Speaker 2: be other pictures, there'll be other opportunities. Let's just let

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Speaker 2: this one go to somebody who's got a better idea

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Speaker 2: than me. I don't find it terrifying. What I find

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Speaker 2: terrifying is sitting in that room and sell something that

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Speaker 2: I don't believe in my heart. I find that terrifying

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Speaker 2: because I think I'm going to have to go and

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Speaker 2: deliver this now, and it's going to be a lot

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Speaker 2: of work. I'm going to try and get people involved,

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Speaker 2: and I don't feel it. I don't feel it. So

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Speaker 2: if I don't feel it, let it go. Let it go,

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Speaker 2: Let it go to somebody who can get it right.

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Speaker 2: So I don't find it terrifying, and I've sort of

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Speaker 2: always done it, but I don't I'm not recommending it

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Speaker 2: for others. It just kind of works works quite well

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Speaker 2: for me of living in the moment and changing your

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Speaker 2: mind when the better idea comes along. I love it.

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Speaker 1: I don't think I've had a guest talk about that approach.

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Speaker 2: To Well, I'm sure they're more successful than I have,

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Speaker 2: so yeah.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so I yes, Look, I would expect nothing less

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Speaker 1: from the person that wrote Quocology, which remains one of

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Speaker 1: my favorite psychology books.

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Speaker 2: I must say, oh, thank you.

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Speaker 1: What else do you do Richard? That in your own

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Speaker 1: approach to work that makes people go, oh my gosh,

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Speaker 1: you do that?

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Speaker 2: I think I listen to. I think it's really easy

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Speaker 2: to have a sort of mental set perspective where you go,

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Speaker 2: this is what I'm trying to do, and because of that,

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Speaker 2: you don't see the simple solution outside of that. And

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Speaker 2: each of the books has been like that. So originally

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Speaker 2: I did about ten years work on the paranormal. We

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Speaker 2: try and sell a book on the paranormal, the skeptical

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Speaker 2: of scientific book. No one's interested because there's no real

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Speaker 2: audience for that, and it would have been easy to

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Speaker 2: have gone. When I got my thirtieth rejection letter from

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Speaker 2: a publisher, well that's the end of that then, and

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Speaker 2: I went to see my agent and he said, what

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Speaker 2: else are you working on? And at the time it

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Speaker 2: was the wedest thing. I had a conversation with somebody

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Speaker 2: who said, I don't believe in all this paranormal stuff.

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Speaker 2: I'm not psychic. I'll tell you what, though, I'm really lucky.

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Speaker 2: Everything's it, And they're very similar when you think about it,

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Speaker 2: you know, they're actually conceptionally quite similar. But luck is

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Speaker 2: an interesting word. And so I said to my agent,

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Speaker 2: while I'm doing some stuff on psychology of luck, and

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Speaker 2: he said, that's a very interesting topic. And it never

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Speaker 2: occurred to me to have done a book on that.

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Speaker 2: I wrote that book and that became the first one,

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Speaker 2: and it's sold all over the world. That was lovely.

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Speaker 2: Quacology happened because of the word freakonomics. That was a

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Speaker 2: huge book. Someone at an airport. I was chatting to

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Speaker 2: somebody an airport and they said, all freakonomics is a

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Speaker 2: bit like your stuff, and I said, no, it's not really.

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Speaker 2: I'm not an economist at all. They said what do

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Speaker 2: you do and I said, I do sort of quirky psychology.

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Speaker 2: And they said, well, what would that be and I

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Speaker 2: said that's quacology. Now, that would have been a really

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Speaker 2: easy thing to just got out as a silly word

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Speaker 2: and walked away, and then you go, hold on a second,

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Speaker 2: that's a good word.

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Speaker 1: What is that?

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Speaker 2: I owned that word now, and so that became the

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Speaker 2: second book. Fifty nine seconds was astonishing. I went to

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Speaker 2: see a friend of mine who's CEO quite a big company.

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Speaker 2: We've had coffee. She wasn't very happy. She said, what

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Speaker 2: can I do to change my happiness? I started to

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Speaker 2: talk about theories of happiness. She said, can you get

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Speaker 2: on with it? I'm a bit busy, and I said,

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Speaker 2: how long have you got? She said about a minute.

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Speaker 2: And I suddenly thought there's quite a lot of psychology

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Speaker 2: that you can deliver in a minute. And that was

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Speaker 2: the beginning of fifty nine seconds. And I was giving

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Speaker 2: a talk, and the talk of the book was originally

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Speaker 2: going to be called sixty seconds. I said, this is

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Speaker 2: things you can learn in less than a minute. Or

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Speaker 2: somebody in the audience said it should be called fifty

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Speaker 2: nine seconds. Then I thought it was a better title.

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Speaker 2: I think all these things are in front of us,

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Speaker 2: But it'd been so easy to have gone y En.

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Speaker 2: I'm interested in the paranormal and not interested in a

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Speaker 2: luck book. You know, I'm not interested in doing a

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Speaker 2: thing like free ekonomics. I'm not interested in doing a

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Speaker 2: short book, I think, but these opportunities are there, and

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Speaker 2: it's the openness to listening, I think, and changing course.

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Speaker 2: Each one of them is a better idea than the

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Speaker 2: idea I was pursuing at the time.

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Speaker 1: Now, Richard, you are the second psychologist that I've had

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Speaker 1: on this podcast that is also a magician.

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Speaker 2: Oh, who's the other one, Adam Grant.

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Speaker 1: So I've had Adam on a couple of times, and

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Speaker 1: I'd love to know how you got into magic in

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Speaker 1: the first place.

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Speaker 2: I got his magic very young, when I was about

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Speaker 2: eight or nine, I think, which is when a lot

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Speaker 2: of people get into magic. There's something quite special about

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Speaker 2: that age through my grandfather, who showed me a very

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Speaker 2: good magic trick and he wouldn't tell me how it

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Speaker 2: was done. I used to go and visit him every

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Speaker 2: weekend and he pretty much did the same every weekend.

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Speaker 2: But he's very white. So I've had difficulties reading. In fact,

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Speaker 2: it's turned out dyslexic, which I didn't realize until the

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Speaker 2: pandemic when I had assessment. Is a bit more time

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Speaker 2: on my hands, so but I did have reading difficulties.

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Speaker 2: So he said the answer. The solution to the trick

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Speaker 2: is in a book, and the book is in the

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Speaker 2: public library, and it was just his way getting me

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Speaker 2: to go and read some stuff and it absolutely works.

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Speaker 2: So I read all the magic books, thought that this

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Speaker 2: was a wonderful, wonderful world, and then yeah, joined my

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Speaker 2: local club and join then the magic Circle in London.

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Speaker 2: But that was the roots of it. It was my grandfather.

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Speaker 2: He wasn't a magician. He only knew one trick which

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Speaker 2: I think he picked up during the war, but it's

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Speaker 2: a good trick and sent me to the library. So

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Speaker 2: that was my origin story.

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Speaker 1: So how does your knowledge of magic make you better

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Speaker 1: at what you do now? In terms of psychology and

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Speaker 1: all the research and experiments that you do.

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Speaker 2: I think magic's quite unique because the solutions to tricks

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Speaker 2: are normally brilliantly elegant and simple, and normally for any

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Speaker 2: what magician would call an effect, like a levitation for example,

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Speaker 2: that's an effect. Then you have method, which is how

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Speaker 2: it's done. There's always another way. You learn, there's always

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Speaker 2: another way, and that magic evolves. So the way magicians

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Speaker 2: float people now is not the same as it was

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Speaker 2: thirty years ago. Certainly not the same as it was

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Speaker 2: one hundred years ago, so you'd learn there's always another way,

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Speaker 2: and that if you can find that way, then you

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Speaker 2: can perform the trick in a new kind of new

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Speaker 2: new way. So I think that's important obviously that most

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Speaker 2: of the solutions are lateral. You know, there is a

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Speaker 2: reason why audiences don't think of them is because they're

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Speaker 2: a bit like those lateral thinking puzzles where you've made

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Speaker 2: assumptions and trapped yourself in a in a little box.

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Speaker 2: I think that's helpful. So I think those are the

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Speaker 2: the sort of obvious strategic ones. There is also with magic.

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Speaker 2: If you perform a lot, you have to keep an

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Speaker 2: audience with you, and I think that skill obviously for

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Speaker 2: live is useful. But even writing wise, you just think

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Speaker 2: how can I make how can I keep an audience

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Speaker 2: with me? And certainly when I'm writing lay books of

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Speaker 2: non technical books, how do you keep an audience with you?

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Speaker 2: So I always remember the first time I wrote I

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Speaker 2: think it was one of the drafts of The Luck Factor.

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Speaker 2: I'd written something like I don't know. One of my

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Speaker 2: studies showed that lucky people miss opportunities. Sorry, lucky people

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Speaker 2: spot opportunities. We brought them into the lab. We got

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Speaker 2: them to do this, and my editor said, you've just

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Speaker 2: given away the good too. Sotain that first line. You've

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Speaker 2: told us what the experiment was all about, right, instead

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Speaker 2: of that. Right, We did an experiment to discover if

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Speaker 2: lucky people tended to spot opportunities, and the results were astonishing.

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Speaker 2: Now you're hooked. Now you're like, oh, what did you do?

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Speaker 2: And it's a very simple thing, but you suddenly realize

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Speaker 2: that often as writers or speakers, we tell people the

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Speaker 2: answer and then we explain the answer, and you think

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Speaker 2: it's way better to hook people, and magicians are good

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Speaker 2: at that kind of thinking.

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Speaker 1: We'll be back soon with Richard talking about some other

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Speaker 1: ways he uses magic to improve his work as a psychologist.

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Speaker 1: If you're looking for more tips to improve the way

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Speaker 1: that you work, I write a short fortnightly newsletter that

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Speaker 1: contains three cool things that I've discovered that helped me

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Speaker 1: work better, ranging from software and gadgets that I'm loving

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Speaker 1: through the interesting research findings. You can sign up for

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Speaker 1: that at Howiwork dot code. That's how I Work dot co.

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Speaker 1: What are some other principles that you've learned as a

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Speaker 1: magician and mastered as a magician that you've found have

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Speaker 1: been really useful in making your other work, your main work,

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Speaker 1: more engaging.

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Speaker 2: I mean some it's tactical because I do work on

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Speaker 2: the psychology of magic, so obviously you have to know

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Speaker 2: magic to do that, and so they've had that. One

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Speaker 2: of the most successful things, which is the Quacology YouTube channel,

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Speaker 2: which started really early within two years of YouTube being

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Speaker 2: out there, and we did it just because it was

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Speaker 2: a fun way of sharing content, but certainly weren't doing

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Speaker 2: it for money. And that's another big driver on this

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Speaker 2: is I always think you can tell passion projects from

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Speaker 2: projects the person's getting paid for and doesn't really want

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Speaker 2: to do it. It has a flavor and you can tell,

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Speaker 2: you know with it. I don't know what it is,

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Speaker 2: but within seconds of somebody starting to give a talk,

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Speaker 2: you can tell where they want to be there or not.

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Speaker 2: And if they don't want to be there, you start

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Speaker 2: to think, well, I'd rather it wasn't as well, so

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Speaker 2: because it's hard when you're giving the same talk again

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Speaker 2: and again and again and again. And so one of

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Speaker 2: the tips actually actually comes from magician. I shouldn't read

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Speaker 2: a very famous magician, but I won't say who that.

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Speaker 2: The problem you've got as a speaker is you're going

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Speaker 2: to walk out and give this talk. In fact, what

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Speaker 2: I'm doing at the weekend doing the Lucky Talk, I've

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Speaker 2: been doing that talk for twenty something years. You have

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Speaker 2: to walk out and it has to feel to that

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Speaker 2: audience like this is the first time you've given it,

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Speaker 2: and you're giving it for them. And I said to

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Speaker 2: my friend, his magician, how do you cultivate that actor?

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Speaker 2: You're doing your act twice a day, and they said,

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Speaker 2: it's really straightforward. I stand in the wings and I

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Speaker 2: tell myself the truth, and the truth is that one

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Speaker 2: day I won't be doing this. I'll be too old,

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Speaker 2: or the audience won't turn up, or I'll have an

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Speaker 2: accident or whatever it is, I won't want it. One

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Speaker 2: day I will not be doing this. And he said,

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Speaker 2: I let the sadness of that go into my bones,

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Speaker 2: and then I think it's not today, though, and I

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Speaker 2: walk out and that I do that now. I do

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Speaker 2: it because you, and that keeps you in that moment,

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Speaker 2: because you won't be anything you do with it's writing books,

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Speaker 2: making videos where I will not be doing it forever.

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Speaker 2: There will come a day when I'm not doing it,

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Speaker 2: and we all assume these things are going to continue.

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Speaker 2: They won't. They won't. So live in the moment and

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Speaker 2: enjoy at that moment and for a live event that

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Speaker 2: I think carries. So I think those are all kind

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Speaker 2: of magicianythinking things. Magicians tend to be quite a thoughtful lot.

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Speaker 1: I love that advice from that other magician. It's quite stoic. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: are there any other things that you do? Because I

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Speaker 1: feel like I can absolutely relate to that challenge. There's

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Speaker 1: a particular keynote that I don't know. I've probably delivered

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Speaker 1: over a hundred times in the last couple of years,

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Speaker 1: and there are definitely days where I wake up and

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Speaker 1: I'm like, oh gosh, I have to deliver this again

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Speaker 1: and I'm not feeling it. What else do you do?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so a few things I do. One is I

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Speaker 2: never ever ever use a single note ever. I never

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Speaker 2: ever ever have a single note in terms of any

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Speaker 2: kind of structure or script. It's on the power I

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Speaker 2: use PowerPoint slides a lot, but then they're chunked, so

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Speaker 2: I've got sort of ten minute chunks of material and

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Speaker 2: often I change it during the actual talk, depending on

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Speaker 2: what the audience is like. Some audiences are faster, some

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Speaker 2: are slower. Some you sort of think, oh okay, And

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Speaker 2: so I changed the talk a little bit. In these chunks.

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Speaker 2: I never have a note because I hate the idea

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Speaker 2: of looking down, so I always look looking down at

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Speaker 2: electorn or a table. I am astonished how quickly ten

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Speaker 2: one hundred thousand and three thousand people become one person.

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Speaker 2: It's astonishing. So when I'm in the wings and maybe

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Speaker 2: it's a big gig and it's a thousand people say

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Speaker 2: you think, oh my good, it's a thousand people. I

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Speaker 2: don't think that. I think they're going to become one person,

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Speaker 2: and it's my job to bring them together and just

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Speaker 2: to talk to that one person, to find out who

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Speaker 2: I'm speaking to, and then to talk to them, because

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Speaker 2: that's how conversation because otherwise you got a thousand people,

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Speaker 2: you couldn't possibly do it. But they gel, they become

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Speaker 2: one person. But I don't know who that person is yet,

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Speaker 2: and they probably don't know either until we've started that conversation.

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Speaker 2: So hopefully they're going to gel into a lovely, fun person,

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Speaker 2: but sometimes they don't. But either way, it's one person

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Speaker 2: for me. In my head. My other thing which I do,

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Speaker 2: should I learned years ago WHI should do is slide

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Speaker 2: PowerPoint slides a lot. My first three PowerPoint slides are

431
00:24:04,040 --> 00:24:07,840
Speaker 2: all identical except for a tiny colored dot in the corner,

432
00:24:08,640 --> 00:24:10,920
Speaker 2: which I only really I'm looking at. So as I'm

433
00:24:10,920 --> 00:24:14,040
Speaker 2: doing my opening bit, I'm moving through those slides and

434
00:24:14,080 --> 00:24:16,880
Speaker 2: I can see that color dot changing. That way, I

435
00:24:17,040 --> 00:24:22,399
Speaker 2: know the slides are working, because my nightmare is to

436
00:24:22,520 --> 00:24:26,320
Speaker 2: set up for the talk, press the button and nothing happens.

437
00:24:27,720 --> 00:24:31,119
Speaker 2: I know that's all magic thinking. It's all the secret stuff,

438
00:24:31,359 --> 00:24:34,280
Speaker 2: so it's smooth. If those slides aren't changing, then at

439
00:24:34,359 --> 00:24:36,199
Speaker 2: least I can talk to the audience and say to

440
00:24:36,200 --> 00:24:37,920
Speaker 2: the tech people, I don't know the slides are changing.

441
00:24:38,000 --> 00:24:40,240
Speaker 2: I haven't set up for the start of the thing.

442
00:24:41,160 --> 00:24:45,960
Speaker 1: Now. I've often had goals to learn magic tricks, and

443
00:24:46,000 --> 00:24:48,399
Speaker 1: I remember the last time I had Adam Grant on

444
00:24:48,440 --> 00:24:50,879
Speaker 1: the show, I actually tried to get some advice from

445
00:24:50,960 --> 00:24:53,359
Speaker 1: him because I'd set this goal where I was going

446
00:24:53,400 --> 00:24:56,720
Speaker 1: to spend eight weeks and learn a new trick every

447
00:24:57,080 --> 00:25:00,240
Speaker 1: week for eight weeks, and I didn't meet that, and

448
00:25:00,800 --> 00:25:03,520
Speaker 1: Adam said to me, I remember, he said, I think

449
00:25:03,560 --> 00:25:05,240
Speaker 1: you've got it wrong. I think you want to maybe

450
00:25:05,359 --> 00:25:08,320
Speaker 1: learn a new skill every week, and that way you

451
00:25:08,320 --> 00:25:11,399
Speaker 1: can actually unlock hundreds of tricks. And I thought that

452
00:25:11,440 --> 00:25:16,160
Speaker 1: was great advice, but I didn't apply it. So I'm wondering, Richard,

453
00:25:16,200 --> 00:25:18,320
Speaker 1: can you give me some advice? And also for any

454
00:25:18,359 --> 00:25:21,920
Speaker 1: listeners that are listening to I guess like the power

455
00:25:21,960 --> 00:25:24,640
Speaker 1: of magic and how it's really made you think differently

456
00:25:24,760 --> 00:25:28,679
Speaker 1: around your work, like for someone that doesn't even know

457
00:25:28,720 --> 00:25:30,959
Speaker 1: what sleight of hand is, Like, where do you start

458
00:25:31,040 --> 00:25:32,320
Speaker 1: if you want to learn some magic?

459
00:25:32,520 --> 00:25:34,680
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, there's loads of beginner's books out there. Now

460
00:25:34,720 --> 00:25:38,119
Speaker 2: there's loads of stuff on YouTube, so it's much easier

461
00:25:38,119 --> 00:25:41,360
Speaker 2: than it was in my day. The problem you will

462
00:25:41,440 --> 00:25:44,280
Speaker 2: run up against is that if let's suppose you learn

463
00:25:44,680 --> 00:25:47,560
Speaker 2: a very simple card trick, which might be your easiest thing,

464
00:25:49,119 --> 00:25:54,560
Speaker 2: I cannot perform for friends. I do not understand what

465
00:25:54,600 --> 00:25:58,640
Speaker 2: that contract is. I like my friends. I'm honest with

466
00:25:58,680 --> 00:26:01,879
Speaker 2: my friends. If I show them something and they go,

467
00:26:01,960 --> 00:26:04,040
Speaker 2: that's great, how did you do it? And I go,

468
00:26:04,119 --> 00:26:10,280
Speaker 2: I can't tell you. I do not know what space

469
00:26:10,359 --> 00:26:13,440
Speaker 2: I'm in, what world I'm in with my friend, so

470
00:26:13,560 --> 00:26:18,480
Speaker 2: I just go, well, thanks, then great, love it, so

471
00:26:20,840 --> 00:26:24,600
Speaker 2: I find it very difficult to perform for friends on stage.

472
00:26:24,600 --> 00:26:26,840
Speaker 2: It's fine because the whole contract is different. I don't

473
00:26:26,880 --> 00:26:31,919
Speaker 2: know those people. That's all fine. So then it comes

474
00:26:32,000 --> 00:26:35,480
Speaker 2: down to what are you giving people? Are you just

475
00:26:35,520 --> 00:26:39,120
Speaker 2: giving them a puzzle they can't solve or one magician

476
00:26:39,160 --> 00:26:42,919
Speaker 2: famously referred to a stone in their shoe, which is

477
00:26:42,960 --> 00:26:44,359
Speaker 2: that the more they think about it, the more it

478
00:26:44,400 --> 00:26:47,640
Speaker 2: annoys them because they can't figure out how it's done. Well,

479
00:26:47,680 --> 00:26:51,040
Speaker 2: that's not a great gift. Or are you giving them

480
00:26:51,119 --> 00:26:54,439
Speaker 2: this moment of magic where something impossible appears to happen,

481
00:26:54,920 --> 00:26:57,000
Speaker 2: and why would you want them to have that experience?

482
00:26:57,560 --> 00:27:00,560
Speaker 2: And then you get into what magic is actually about,

483
00:27:00,560 --> 00:27:06,720
Speaker 2: which is those experiences not I interviewed a very very

484
00:27:06,760 --> 00:27:12,199
Speaker 2: experienced magician many many years ago, and he came up

485
00:27:12,200 --> 00:27:15,880
Speaker 2: with this picture of him doing his first show at

486
00:27:15,920 --> 00:27:18,040
Speaker 2: age about seven or eight, and I said, is this

487
00:27:18,160 --> 00:27:20,560
Speaker 2: your first performance? And he went, oh, no, no, no,

488
00:27:20,600 --> 00:27:24,400
Speaker 2: that's not a performance. I was just showing off. I said,

489
00:27:24,400 --> 00:27:27,919
Speaker 2: what's the difference. He said, Performers show off for their

490
00:27:27,920 --> 00:27:33,080
Speaker 2: own ego. So everyone goes, you're wonderful. A performance is

491
00:27:33,119 --> 00:27:37,440
Speaker 2: about the audience, and I'm a friend of mine, Richmond Dougal,

492
00:27:37,680 --> 00:27:40,800
Speaker 2: has got this lovely thing about what do you want

493
00:27:40,800 --> 00:27:44,560
Speaker 2: an audience to say to you after the show? And

494
00:27:44,560 --> 00:27:46,919
Speaker 2: he said, most performers, magicians want people to go, you

495
00:27:46,960 --> 00:27:49,840
Speaker 2: were great. And he said, that's the worst thing that

496
00:27:49,880 --> 00:27:52,480
Speaker 2: someone can say. What they should what you should aim

497
00:27:52,560 --> 00:27:54,520
Speaker 2: for is the person coming up to you and saying

498
00:27:54,920 --> 00:27:59,359
Speaker 2: thank you, you gave me something. And again that's magic

499
00:27:59,400 --> 00:28:01,920
Speaker 2: thinking as how, And the same year, when we give talks,

500
00:28:02,240 --> 00:28:04,000
Speaker 2: an audience should be not be coming up and going

501
00:28:04,000 --> 00:28:05,520
Speaker 2: you were great. They should be coming up and going

502
00:28:05,560 --> 00:28:08,200
Speaker 2: thank you. And in which case, how do you structure

503
00:28:08,200 --> 00:28:11,800
Speaker 2: a talk so you're giving people something not all about you?

504
00:28:13,160 --> 00:28:16,119
Speaker 2: And these are I think helpful things for speakers.

505
00:28:16,880 --> 00:28:19,680
Speaker 1: Now, this next question might be, you know the equivalent

506
00:28:19,720 --> 00:28:23,960
Speaker 1: of who's your favorite child? But is there a favorite

507
00:28:24,000 --> 00:28:29,600
Speaker 1: experiment that you've done in your career? I feel like

508
00:28:29,600 --> 00:28:33,360
Speaker 1: you've done so many. And there are so many brilliant ones.

509
00:28:33,840 --> 00:28:36,800
Speaker 2: Looking through the lucky people, unlucky people looking through the

510
00:28:36,800 --> 00:28:40,040
Speaker 2: newspaper and not seeing the half page ads the opportunities

511
00:28:40,040 --> 00:28:42,040
Speaker 2: in there. So the lucky ones spotted and the unlucky

512
00:28:42,040 --> 00:28:45,080
Speaker 2: ones didn't you know I did that in I think

513
00:28:45,120 --> 00:28:48,520
Speaker 2: two thousand, that's twenty three years, twenty two years ago.

514
00:28:49,320 --> 00:28:51,960
Speaker 2: I'm still talking about it. So it's hard not to

515
00:28:52,000 --> 00:28:55,040
Speaker 2: think that Sir Search the World's Funniest Joke was so

516
00:28:55,200 --> 00:28:58,200
Speaker 2: enjoyable because it was completely insane and got us into

517
00:28:58,240 --> 00:29:03,960
Speaker 2: so many ridiculous situations, the ghost hunting stuff. You know,

518
00:29:04,000 --> 00:29:08,560
Speaker 2: we got to to stay at royal palaces and look

519
00:29:08,600 --> 00:29:12,120
Speaker 2: for ghosts of why people like ghostly experiences, and that

520
00:29:12,240 --> 00:29:16,440
Speaker 2: still comes up all the time, so I think, and

521
00:29:16,520 --> 00:29:21,400
Speaker 2: I think it's got a memory associated with it. But

522
00:29:21,480 --> 00:29:24,240
Speaker 2: what's funny about all those experiments when I talk about

523
00:29:24,280 --> 00:29:28,440
Speaker 2: them so I just did, is that they become whatever

524
00:29:28,440 --> 00:29:32,960
Speaker 2: that was twenty seconds where the actual experiments were, you know,

525
00:29:33,120 --> 00:29:36,000
Speaker 2: three or four months on any of them. So normally

526
00:29:36,000 --> 00:29:38,880
Speaker 2: the actual doing is not that much fun, but the

527
00:29:39,200 --> 00:29:43,760
Speaker 2: looking back and summarizing them is you sort of we

528
00:29:43,840 --> 00:29:45,680
Speaker 2: know that what you do when you go on holiday

529
00:29:46,160 --> 00:29:48,400
Speaker 2: is you, you know, have terrible delays at the airport,

530
00:29:48,600 --> 00:29:50,560
Speaker 2: But actually when you look back on the holiday, you

531
00:29:50,720 --> 00:29:52,840
Speaker 2: edit all that out and you just concentrate on the

532
00:29:52,840 --> 00:29:56,320
Speaker 2: positive stuff. And I think I do that with the experiments.

533
00:29:56,600 --> 00:30:01,800
Speaker 2: So I think those ones like ideas, I'm not that

534
00:30:02,080 --> 00:30:05,640
Speaker 2: keen actually running the experiments. I love ideas and where

535
00:30:05,680 --> 00:30:10,880
Speaker 2: ideas come from. So often it's just the joy of thinking, oh, yeah,

536
00:30:10,920 --> 00:30:13,920
Speaker 2: we could do that. The actual doing of it is

537
00:30:13,920 --> 00:30:15,840
Speaker 2: a bit like the delay at the airport for me.

538
00:30:17,840 --> 00:30:20,600
Speaker 1: And finally, Richard, for people that want to consume more

539
00:30:20,920 --> 00:30:23,680
Speaker 1: of the great work that you are putting out into

540
00:30:23,720 --> 00:30:25,640
Speaker 1: the world, what is the best way for people to

541
00:30:25,680 --> 00:30:25,960
Speaker 1: do that?

542
00:30:28,080 --> 00:30:30,960
Speaker 2: A lot of it's online, so the Quacology YouTube channel

543
00:30:30,960 --> 00:30:34,080
Speaker 2: has got all the videos on. I'm on Twitter at

544
00:30:34,160 --> 00:30:36,520
Speaker 2: Richard Wiseman. I've got a website with links to some

545
00:30:36,560 --> 00:30:41,640
Speaker 2: of the work and so on. I still think fundamentally

546
00:30:43,080 --> 00:30:45,280
Speaker 2: just come and listen to one of the talks. It's

547
00:30:45,320 --> 00:30:49,960
Speaker 2: the liveness that I enjoy more than anything else, and

548
00:30:50,000 --> 00:30:52,000
Speaker 2: that's when it can kind of get quite silly and

549
00:30:52,040 --> 00:30:54,360
Speaker 2: fun and so on. But the stuff is online and

550
00:30:55,400 --> 00:30:58,440
Speaker 2: people who are very kind sort of supporting that work

551
00:30:58,520 --> 00:31:03,040
Speaker 2: over twenty thirty years now, and so thank you. If

552
00:31:03,080 --> 00:31:06,160
Speaker 2: you have sort of listened or watched or bought a

553
00:31:06,160 --> 00:31:08,640
Speaker 2: book or anything, thank you very much. It's very very

554
00:31:08,720 --> 00:31:10,120
Speaker 2: kind of you. It's very much appreciated.

555
00:31:10,680 --> 00:31:13,000
Speaker 1: Do you have any plans to come to Australia. And

556
00:31:13,040 --> 00:31:14,080
Speaker 1: do a talk over here.

557
00:31:14,560 --> 00:31:17,560
Speaker 2: I've been there a couple of times and had fun.

558
00:31:18,480 --> 00:31:23,520
Speaker 2: Not at the moment, but it's a great place. And

559
00:31:24,000 --> 00:31:25,960
Speaker 2: when I go I went. I went all over for

560
00:31:25,960 --> 00:31:28,960
Speaker 2: a book tour, and then last time I was in Sydney,

561
00:31:29,600 --> 00:31:32,840
Speaker 2: which was lots of fun. And I've just teamed up

562
00:31:32,880 --> 00:31:34,800
Speaker 2: with a friend of mine. We did some magic shows

563
00:31:35,320 --> 00:31:37,920
Speaker 2: in Melbourne. I wasn't there, they did the shows, but

564
00:31:37,960 --> 00:31:41,959
Speaker 2: we put them together. So yeah, no, I'm more than

565
00:31:42,040 --> 00:31:45,440
Speaker 2: up for it. I will. I'll probably go by boat,

566
00:31:51,320 --> 00:31:54,800
Speaker 2: but just because I then arrived with a lot of

567
00:31:54,840 --> 00:31:59,000
Speaker 2: stories a lot of very fed up passengers as well,

568
00:31:59,120 --> 00:32:01,920
Speaker 2: which is you stop showing us magic tricks. It's been

569
00:32:01,920 --> 00:32:02,959
Speaker 2: a long vote.

570
00:32:03,800 --> 00:32:06,680
Speaker 1: I would definitely want to be on that boat. Well, Richard,

571
00:32:06,760 --> 00:32:09,640
Speaker 1: it's been such a delight to talk to you after

572
00:32:10,960 --> 00:32:15,160
Speaker 1: reading your work for I don't know, easily over a decade.

573
00:32:15,680 --> 00:32:18,400
Speaker 1: It's just been such a joy to connect and hear

574
00:32:18,440 --> 00:32:22,480
Speaker 1: about how you approach your work and the quirky things

575
00:32:22,520 --> 00:32:25,040
Speaker 1: that you think about. So thank you so much for

576
00:32:25,080 --> 00:32:25,760
Speaker 1: your time.

577
00:32:26,240 --> 00:32:28,040
Speaker 2: My pleasure. Thank you very much for inviting me on.

578
00:32:29,000 --> 00:32:31,800
Speaker 1: So you know, the thing that stuck with me most

579
00:32:31,960 --> 00:32:36,200
Speaker 1: from this interview with Richard is what he was saying

580
00:32:36,920 --> 00:32:40,760
Speaker 1: about his magician friend and what he thinks about when

581
00:32:40,800 --> 00:32:43,000
Speaker 1: he's designing a show, and what he wants people to

582
00:32:43,040 --> 00:32:45,600
Speaker 1: say to him at the end. So I've been deep

583
00:32:45,680 --> 00:32:50,040
Speaker 1: in the design of a new keynote speech and that

584
00:32:50,280 --> 00:32:53,880
Speaker 1: is exactly where I started. I took Richard's advice and

585
00:32:54,160 --> 00:32:57,000
Speaker 1: I thought, what do I want people to come up

586
00:32:57,040 --> 00:32:59,640
Speaker 1: and say to me at the end. And that has

587
00:32:59,720 --> 00:33:04,800
Speaker 1: proved so helpful in just keeping me laser focused with

588
00:33:05,240 --> 00:33:07,440
Speaker 1: what needs to go in the keynote to achieve that

589
00:33:07,520 --> 00:33:10,960
Speaker 1: outcome and what can be left on the cutting room floor.

590
00:33:11,800 --> 00:33:14,680
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for listening to today's show. I

591
00:33:14,760 --> 00:33:17,760
Speaker 1: hope that you found it helpful and got at least

592
00:33:17,760 --> 00:33:20,920
Speaker 1: one strategy that you might try applying in your life,

593
00:33:20,920 --> 00:33:22,200
Speaker 1: maybe today or maybe in the.

594
00:33:22,120 --> 00:33:24,160
Speaker 2: Next few weeks. And if you're.

595
00:33:24,080 --> 00:33:28,760
Speaker 1: Enjoying how I work, I would be so grateful if

596
00:33:28,800 --> 00:33:31,160
Speaker 1: you could take the five or ten seconds it will

597
00:33:31,160 --> 00:33:34,400
Speaker 1: probably take to leave a review wherever you're listening to

598
00:33:34,440 --> 00:33:36,880
Speaker 1: this podcast from That might be a star rating or

599
00:33:36,920 --> 00:33:41,120
Speaker 1: writing a few words, but I read every single one

600
00:33:41,120 --> 00:33:43,720
Speaker 1: of the reviews that comes through, and I am so

601
00:33:43,840 --> 00:33:47,400
Speaker 1: deeply grateful for everybody that takes the time to do so,

602
00:33:47,400 --> 00:33:51,640
Speaker 1: so thank you. How I Work is produced by Inventing

603
00:33:51,800 --> 00:33:55,040
Speaker 1: with production support from Dead Set Studios. The producer for

604
00:33:55,080 --> 00:33:58,080
Speaker 1: this episode was Liam Riordan, and thank you to Matt

605
00:33:58,200 --> 00:34:01,080
Speaker 1: Nimba who does the audio mix for every episode and

606
00:34:01,160 --> 00:34:04,160
Speaker 1: makes everything sound so much better than it would have otherwise.

607
00:34:04,720 --> 00:34:05,560
Speaker 1: See you next time.