talkmagic.co.uk

The problem with common sense is that it isn't as common as we'd like it to be! OK, some of the stuff referred to is blindingly obvious once you've read it but was it so obvious before? If not then the books have done their job.

I think the insights offered by Kenton are fairly obvious to any reasonably proficient reader after a very short bit of experience. Nothing he has brought out has overly impressed me, and some has left me furious that I wasted my money (Kentonism, for instance). I guess I might take him a bit more seriously if he was a performer, but I don't believe he is. Perhaps I am wrong there. I get the impression that he thinks about things a lot, but doesn't put them into practice so much.

Mandrake was right on one thing. I, too, am a skeptic. But doing it for real works. It is definitely the way to go.

And on the subject of 'doing it for real', which I appreciate isn't the resources the OP was asking for , you can't go far wrong with Paul Voodini's Cathy Shadows publications.

I did look at his original post and it seems that he wants to use it in a mental act. In other words to help him do tricks. Richard Webster has written a book precisely for this purpose. I may have the title wrong but I think it is called "Cold Reading for Magicians". It tells you how to incorporate this stuff into your magic.

I personally want nothing to do with cold reading when performing. It would give me a headache with psychic overload.