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I was booked to provide the entertainment at an outdoor event on Saturday night. My wife was the photographer for the event over 3 days I was to perform on Saturday night.

Upon arrival on Thursday night I was unpacking when I realised a bag was missing, checked and rechecked the car and caravan only to start pulling my hair out because my bag was missing. I eventually managed to stop running around in circles and stop looking in the same places again and again. Only to find the missing items not to have mysteriously appeared when my back was turned.. I must perfect that illusion in case this ever happens again.

I have been working on a new mentalism routine, but have not really thought about performing it yet. A quick trip to a stationary shop and I had got everything I needed to perform this routine. For under a tenner I has everything I needed to perform that night and many others.

Back to the point. I spoke to the organiser and explained that a bag had gone missing but I could perform, but it would not be what I planned. After explaining what I would be doing he was more excited than he was with what he originally booked me for.

I have never been as nervous and would not recommend anyone to do this for any booking. I had practiced most of the routine and thought I had most of the it sorted. I did the necessary pre-show work on the friday and performed on the Saturday. It was well received and most worked out very well. I learned a lot about how to improve the routine and found a few problems that needed to be sorted. The bottom line is it was a success owd I loved it. I can see myself performing with cards etc less and less not I am bitten by the mentalism bug.

One group of people I performed to had everything go wrong that could. But that was when I remembered what Bannachek says on the PSI videos about magicians worrying about outs and mentalists creating none events when thing do not work out perfectly. I had already explained at the beginning that reading minds and performing readings was not an exact science. So when I made a mistake I did not panick I stayed calm and said that these thing happen. The mistakes made the performance stronger because it helped show the magic/mentalism as real. At the end of the show two things had happened. and they are two interesting points that I am sure most of you will have encountered.

1. Several people believed I had a "gift" that I was psychic. At the time I remained on the fence and used did not confirm or deny anything just that I did not speak to "dead people" I had not thought about how I would deal with this because I did not expect to be performing the routine yet and at the time I had to think on my feet and my first thought was I do not have the right to take apart the beliefs of these people. They were happy with there beliefs and all seemed well.

2. I had spoken to one lady on Friday and explained what I was doing on Friday and that I needed some volunteers to think of and remember certain items and that they should write it down on a piece of paper whilst I was not looking then wrap it up an put it safe in their pocket. They were happy when I explained that I got them to write it down so that they would not forget the information on the night if I was to use them. This went down well with every one and the full explanation was accepted without question at the time or during the performance. Then during the performance I started to speak to on of these people who had seen a couple of effects I had performed with others I had spoken to previously. One of those being one that believed I was "gifted". This lady as soon as I spoke to her hit the roof. She started to say I should not speak and that she did not want to be part of what I was "Involved in" I said I accepted her wishes and moved on.

When I started the routine I was talking to everyone and explained what I would be doing and that people see being psychic in many different ways, power of the mind, intuition and some believe it is talking to dead people. I then said I do not talk to dead people and I believe that being psychic is using your intuition effectively. I then rounded it off by saying that we all can have different beliefs about what being psychic is but there are some unexplained phenomena when peoples senses are being used and it is that that is often called being psychic and that night we would be looking at various experiments/demonstrations about being psychic and to keep an open mind and enjoy themselves.

How do other people deal with these situations without upsetting peoples beliefs. I know we cant keep everyone happy all the time. I am interested in your views and opinions.

The bottom line is I enjoyed my first professional mentalist performance and will be doing more in the future.

Nic Castle wrote:The bottom line is I enjoyed my first professional mentalist performance and will be doing more in the future.

Hurrah! It sounds like you had a baptism of fire. The difference between success and failure is the ability to think convincingly on your feet.

Well done Nic, sounds like you did fantastically.

Well done!

Thats amazing - I love the fact that you freaked people in the audience out and have now been bitten and want to do it again

Let us know how it goes

Dan

You handled it well - fair play to you.

I love it when I forget my show. It puts me under pressure. I have forgotten my kids show a few times, an adult cabaret for a pub once, and my competition show once at a convention. All great learning experiences.

Mentalism is ideal for the forgetful like that.

I wasn't planning on using the mentalism show yet, but it was a great experience. I can't wait until I am performing more mentalism, I still enjoy cards/close-up but the experience of the mentalism show was one that I am sure is addictive.

Nic