I consider this to be the heaviest of all of the deceptions

contained in this manuscript. For me, this is the single

demonstration within these pages that carries with it the biggest
ethical concern for the performer. I believe this is due to the
fact that this experience is as real as it is fake. It happens
entirely in the mind of the participant and due to this for them
it is without any doubt real.

It is best suited for a one on one performance. I have

used this presentational concept in many different ways, both
onstage and in less heavy routines. However after exploring it
for several years, I firmly believe it is at its most potent and
powerful in the form that follows. Use with caution.

Sitting with a participant in an intimate setting the

miracle worker begins:

“Have you ever felt a thought? I mean really experienced what a

thought feels like inside your head?”

The participant responds that they have not. The performer

continues:
“Not many people have. I have an ability to allow you to actually feel the
thoughts inside your head. It is not something meany people can do, at least
I have never met anyone else who can do it. I hope one day I will but for
now I can do this if and only if you are ready and willing to accept the
experience. If you are…”

The performer pauses and places his left hand to his chest,
seemingly feeling his heart beating after a moment he
continues:

“Place your left hand, your psychic hand, onto your chest so
you can feel your heart beating. Once you feel your heart
beating say out loud; ‘I am ready and willing to accept this
experience’…”

The performer allows the participant the time they need to first
feel their own heart beating inside their chest and then for them
to say aloud ‘I am ready and willing to accept this experience.’
Once they have done so the performer continues:

“Then it will be yours… I want you to begin by thinking about the sound
of your mothers voice. Inside your head hear your mother telling you she
loves you. Hear her voice telling you that.”

The performer allows the spectator a moment to really enter

into this process and gives them the time they need to imagine
their mothers voice inside their head. The performer then
continues:
“O.K stop that for a moment… Right now that thought is only imagined.
It has no form. You can not feel it but to give form to this thought all you
need to do is reach out and take my hand…”

The performer extends his right hand and the participant

reaches for it. Once they are in contact with the performer
once again places his left hand to his chest. He seems to be
feeling his heart beating. He closes his eyes and pauses for a
moment. After a moment he opens his eyes, looking directly
into the participants and continues:

“I have made your thoughts tangible… again hear the sound of your
mothers voice inside your head. Really hear it. Hear her saying ‘I love you’
inside your head now…close your eyes and hear that inside your head.
When you can hear it… and only when you can really hear it open your
eyes…”

The performer allows the participant to do this. Once they

open their eyes the performer continues:

“This is very strange but do not be alarmed. Right now pay attention to
the thought inside your head… where is it coming from. Literally right
inside your head… where is that thought. Now I have allowed you to feel
it inside your mind… use your finger and point to where that thought is…”

The participant takes a moment and amazingly points to a spot

on their head. Indicating the place that they can feel the
thought inside their head. The perform continues:
“It is strange isn’t it. You have never felt your own thoughts before but now
it feels like it has always been this way. You can feel it inside your mind
correct?”

The participant confirms that they can indeed feel the thought
inside their head. The performer continues;

“The most interesting thing… different thoughts live in different places in

your head… take a moment to remember a sunset. Try to remember a time
in your life that you saw the sun in the sky beginning to set… it doesn’t
have to be an entire sunset from light to dark… just a time when the sun
was in the sky beginning to set… really see it inside your mind… close your
eyes and easily visualise that…when you can see it open your eyes…”

The participant does so. They close their eyes and remember a
sunset. They open their eyes and the performer continues:

“Now pay attention to where that thought is coming from. Use your finger
to point to the exact place you can feel that thought inside your head…”

Once again the spectator points to a spot on their head. This

time it is a different place to the first time. The performer
continues:

“That thought lives in a different place than the other. Interestingly it also
feels different. I do not know which one of the two thoughts was soft and
which was hard for you… its different for different people but this thought
of the sunset is it soft inside your head or is it hard… pay attention to it…
how does it feel?”

The participant explains how it feels to them and the performer

continues:

“You are feeling a thought! Your thoughts have real form inside your own
experience of thinking. It is remarkable…”

The performer then pauses for a moment. After enough time

to build tension he continues:

“Now the thoughts inside your mind have form. We can move them. We
can even remove them entirely. Literally we can take them from the inside
and pull them out into the world on the outside… but only if you are ready
and will to expand this experience further… are you?”

The participant agrees and the performer reaches for their

hand. He once again places his left hand to his chest,
seemingly feeling his own heart beating and continues:

“I want you to bring to mind a thought that is negative. Something about

yourself that comes into your mind when you do not want it to. A
troubling, intrusive thought. We all have them, things that bother us. Do
not think of something that will really upset you here and now… we are in
public and I do not want you to be that vulnerable but pick a thought you
wish you could remove from your mind… really bring it to your
consciousness… close your eyes and notice how the thought makes you feel
and also notice how the thought itself feels inside your head… when you
have found it… and remember it might be harder to find that the thoughts
before… you see the negative thoughts are better at hiding from us than the
positive ones, that is why they are so hard to eliminate… but when you
have found it open your eyes and point to where it is inside your head…”

The participant does as the performer requests. They close

their eyes and bring a negative thought into their mind. They
locate it inside their own head and point to it and open their
eyes. The performer then continues:

“Notice how that thought feels inside your head. It is not like the others we
have been thinking about. It feels different. It hides in a different place. It
feels like heat. The more you think about how that thought feels inside your
head the more clearly you feel it. Now you have found where it is hiding it
will do everything it can to run from you… do not let it. Really feel it
inside your mind… it is hot correct? You feel that?”

The participant confirms they feel heat inside their head. The
performer continues:

“I can remove that thought from where it is hiding but only if you allow me
to remove it from you. You have to be ready to let go of it, to allow it to
leave, and I can do the rest. Are you will to let that feeling, that thought
go?”

The participant confirms they are willing to allow the thought

to go and the performer places his finger onto their head, at the
spot they are pointing to. He has them remove their own finger
and place their hands into their lap. He continues:

“In a moment I am going to take that thought from the inside and bring it
to the outside. It will not leave any long lasting effects but in the moment
you might experience a short term pain. Negative thoughts are full of
pain… thats how they stay hidden bringing them to light causes pain so we
stop looking for them… so you might feel a moment of pain but inside your
mind and your body but it will pass very quickly and once the pain is gone,
the thought is gone… are you ready for that?”

The performer mimes pulling an invisible string from the

participants head. The participant reacts as if they have
experienced a short but real sensation of pain. Holding the
invisible thread between two hands the performer continues
looking at it:

“I can see this thought has been a problem for you for a long time. Now the
pain has gone, the thought has gone. It doesn’t have form anymore. When
you think about it, it won’t feel like it used to. It will not longer have a
place inside your head. It is nothing… hold out your hands…”

The spectator holds their hands like a bowl. The performer

mimes dropping the invisible thread into their hands as he
concludes:

“No weight, no form, no function, no reality. Nothing. No.. thing. It has

gone…”
The performer reaches out and touches the spectators hands
and smiles.

The Method
This demonstration is a genuinely powerful experience
for the participant providing they genuinely follow the
instructions and requests that are made of them during the
process. If the participant does not truly engage with the
process and is not really focusing their mind on the various
thoughts, memories and sensations during the process it will
have very little effect or impact.

I mention this at the very start of our examination

because it has become the deciding factor for me as to when
where and with who I use this demonstration. Obviously it is
not well suited to a very loud setting in which the participant
can not easily hear me. Equally it is not all that well suited to a
large scale theatre stage setting where the participant might
find themselves feeling to vulnerable to engage fully. I feel it is
best suited for one on one use and also for small platform work,
only after a sense of trust and rapport has been built with the
group so the participant can relax and engage with the process
with the required level of intensity to bring about genuine
impact. There is one other, very suitable setting and one I have
used extensively with this demonstration that I will detail at the
end of this section. For me, this special use is pure dynamite
and one that I think you will instantly see the incredible value
and power of.
This demonstration highlights that real magic can be
built simply from the words we speak. This sequence is 99%
reliant on the script. It does however incorporate some more
traditional mechanisms of deception into the script that in
combination create a super strong construction. We will
examine the script, in depth in the next section but for the
moment we will look at the two simple mechanisms at work in
addition to the script.

The first is a quirk of psychology. Right now, imagine
inside your head the voice of someone you love, telling you that
they love you. Really do this. Imagine the voice in your head,
now take a moment to find where you feel that thought inside
your own head. Stop reading and do this now.

Welcome back! Its really, really strange isn’t it! Once

we give something attention, the thing we have given attention
to becomes real. This quirk of psychology goes further. Now
think of a beautiful sea view. Imagine yourself on the beach.
Really visualise that scene inside your own mind and once you
have it point to the spot inside your own head that you feel that
thought is coming from.

Again! How strange that you felt this thought was

coming from a different place than the first!
This works. It always works and honestly I do not know
why it works. I do not need to know why it works. I am sure
many people smarter than me, could explain the process inside
the mind that makes this work. However, I am not smarter
than me, so I can not. All I know is, the experience works and
it is enough to build an entire concept around. I first
encountered this strange psychological quirk during a
meditation lesson in which this concept of giving attention was
highlighted to our thoughts by locating a thought inside my
own mind. From here I expanded it further and used it in the
context of the demonstration as I have detailed. I think its
remarkable. I have been holding back on sharing this idea for
some time.

The second and final mechanism is present in the
closing part of the process in which the spectator ‘feels’ a
thought being pulled from the inside of their head to the
outside. To achieve this, I actually touch their scalp, and pinch
between my fingers a hair or two from their head. I then apply
downward pressure onto their scalp for a few seconds, and then
immediately release all pressure but retain the hair trapped
between my fingernails of the right thumb and first finger. I
now sharply and quickly move upwards still gripping the
strands of hair, since I do not hold onto a ‘clump’ of hair, but
rather literally one or two strands of hair, this is not visible to
anyone who might be watching. I then sharply pull the hair
upwards and then release it from my grasp. It all happens in a
matter of seconds and does not cause any real harm or pain to
the participant however the sensation has been, at this point,
framed so it completes the illusion properly.
These two things, first the quirk in thinking that allows
us when giving attention to a thought, to perceive it as
something with form inside our minds and the combination of
applying pressure, releasing pressure and pulling on a strand or
two of hair together are more than enough to produce
remarkable results when used in conjunction with a carefully
prepared and thoughtfully delivered script.

The script used in performance for this sequence really

is 99% of its secret. I suggest you rewrite this script to better
suit your own style of speech, intonation and vocabulary but do
use this as a model to work from. I will break down the script,
highlighting what I feel are the important aspects to retain and
keep in mind when constructing your own performance script.

The Magic Words…

The stage directions have been removed from the script below,
with the assumption that now toy have familiarised yourself
with the process they are superfluous to our need in examining
what is being said and the function of it.

“Have you ever felt a thought? I mean really experienced what a

thought feels like inside your head?”
This opening moment is important. I believe that in order to
maximise the engagement with the process of thought that will
follow you need to hook the participant into the experience
from the very start. This simple single line has proven highly
effective in this goal and one I suggest you retain even if
constructing your own script. Once the spectator is effectively
intrigued, engagement is the next logical step for them.

“Not many people have. I have an ability to allow you to actually feel the
thoughts inside your head. It is not something meany people can do, at least
I have never met anyone else who can do it. I hope one day I will but for
now I can do this if and only if you are ready and willing to accept the
experience. If you are…”

In my experience the need to make the claim of an ability here

is not pivotal to the success of the process. The claim can
easily be removed and the impact remains in tact. However
keeping the goal of true engagement at the forefront of the
scripting in use, the invitation for the spectator to accept the
experience is needed. It sets the tone well, adds a sense of
ritual and reverence to the process and also increases their
engagement once more sending them further into the process.
At each step along the way the goal is to increase their level of
engagement so they will continue to engage with the next steps
in the process.
“Place your left hand, your psychic hand, onto your chest so you can feel
your heart beating. Once you feel your heart beating say out loud; ‘I am
ready and willing to accept this experience’…”

It is important to allow the participant enough time to

actually follow the instructions. So often in the performance
of magic and mentalism the performer will ask someone to do
something and then hurriedly rush to the next part of the
script. Without the time to truly do what is asked of them, the
participant can not engage with the process. Do not rush this
part. Instead allow it to settle and be truly acted upon by the
participant.

“Then it will be yours… I want you to begin by thinking about the sound
of your mothers voice. Inside your head hear your mother telling you she
loves you. Hear her voice telling you that.”

Once again the single most important factor to this is to allow

the participant enough time to truly engage and follow the
instructions. Do not rush. Allow the participant to really do
this.

“O.K stop that for a moment… Right now that thought is only imagined.
It has no form. You can not feel it but to give form to this thought all you
need to do is reach out and take my hand…”

This is pure theatre. We are simply providing the participant

with a ‘magic moment’ an apparent before and after that
connects the phenomena that will follow with the perfumers
apparent ability or claim. Without this moment, there is no
change of state and therefor nothing magical or mysterious to
observe. We need to set the base line of ‘normal’ in order to
demonstrate our ‘remarkable’ effect and impact on the
spectator. Since you do not ask them to locate the thought
inside their mind at this moment they will naturally assume it
does not have a sensation of form inside their mind. No one I
have encountered has ever thought anything other than this,
since the process of giving a thought a sensation of form inside
the mind is not something people naturally do. Since they do
not give thoughts the attention or definition of occupying a
sensation of form, all we will need to do is draw their attention
to this sensation and we appear to be the source of the
mysterious experience.

“I have made your thoughts tangible… again hear the sound of your
mothers voice inside your head. Really hear it. Hear her saying ‘I love you’
inside your head now…close your eyes and hear that inside your head.
When you can hear it… and only when you can really hear it open your
eyes…”

Here we provide the participant with a literal claim to connect

the phenomena that will follow with our mysterious, strange
power. Next we need, once again to truly allow the spectator
to follow the instruction and once again hear the sound of their
mothers voice inside their own mind. The choice of the
‘mothers voice’ is one you will need to pay attention to. I use
this most of the time. However sometimes I use a more vague
request and ask that they hear the voice of a ‘loved one’
meaning that if their mother is no longer living or if they did
not know their mother, there is no resistance to the experience
itself. When performing this routine for a mass audience I
always use this instruction over the mothers voice, since it
allows me to move into the next part without the worry that
someone is sitting resisting the process due to a recent
bereavement or loss. When working this process in a one on
one setting you will probably know which of these instructions
is needed and indeed which is better. When possible use the
mothers voice since specificity in the instructions will produce a
stronger engagement. Using the final language of having the
spectator open their eyes only when they are experiencing
something inside their head will be a linguistic ploy that is
returned to throughout the rest of the demonstration. It allows
me to know where the participant is in the process without the
need for me to continually verbally confirm things with them. It
also serves as something of a ‘double bind’ as hypnotists like to
call it.

“This is very strange but do not be alarmed. Right now pay attention to
the thought inside your head… where is it coming from. Literally right
inside your head… where is that thought. Now I have allowed you to feel
it inside your mind… use your finger and point to where that thought is…”

Here I begin to increase the pace of my speech and the

intensity. I want them to experience the thought inside their
head with intensity as it serves to intensity the experience itself
in a larger way. This is always a wonderful moment. I believe
this will always work, simply due to the strange quirk in the way
we think that means as soon as we give something attention,
that something becomes real. By defining something we create
it. Here is a good example of this basic rule of suggestion
technique but also remember that this strange experience
always works. Enjoy it!

“It is strange isn’t it. You have never felt your own thoughts before but now
it feels like it has always been this way. You can feel it inside your mind
correct?”

Here I am simply allowing the spectator to verbally confirm the

strange nature of the experience and to say aloud that it has
worked. Much in the same way that when we give something
attention that thing becomes real, when we say something
aloud that thing becomes true. Having the spectator say this
aloud confirms their experience internally. I change my tone
with this speech to be upbeat and excited. I want that feeling to
spread to the spectator and in my experience the best way to
make someone feel something is to feel it yourself and
communicate that in your attitude and mannerisms.

“The most interesting thing… different thoughts live in different places in

your head… take a moment to remember a sunset. Try to remember a time
in your life that you saw the sun in the sky beginning to set… it doesn’t
have to be an entire sunset from light to dark… just a time when the sun
was in the sky beginning to set… really see it inside your mind… close your
eyes and easily visualise that…when you can see it open your eyes…”

Here we will further the illusion. You can use any visualisation
you wish, however it is important the it not be a sound. For
whatever reason, when someone hears a sound in their head
and then locates it, even if different sounds, they tend to locate
them in the same area. By switching to a visualisation of an
image the area the spectator will locate will be in a very
different place on their own head. Once again we use the
‘double bind’ of eyes opening to avoid the need for verbal
confirmations and to continue with the true engagement and
action from the participant.

“Now pay attention to where that thought is coming from. Use your finger
to point to the exact place you can feel that thought inside your head…”

Since we have so strongly set up that this will be in a different

place, combined with the quirk of thinking we have already
explored, this will be in a different place. This is a real moment
within the sequence. Something really strange is happening.
For the first time the participant is feeling a thought and now
different thoughts ate being felt in different places inside their
mind. I try to celebrate this with my tone, body language and
inner dialogue to share that feeling with the spectator.

“That thought lives in a different place than the other. Interestingly it also
feels different. I do not know which one of the two thoughts was soft and
which was hard for you… its different for different people but this thought
of the sunset is it soft inside your head or is it hard… pay attention to it…
how does it feel… is it soft or hard?”

At this point I have used the strange nature of the previously

located thought being in a different place as a jumping off
point to use some simple suggestive language to bring about a
further developed sense of form to the thought itself. Notice
that the final choice given to the spectator means that they have
to pick one of these options. Again having them say this out
loud makes it real. Simply by giving it attention and allowing it
a definition it becomes real in the experience of the participant.

“You are feeling a thought! Your thoughts have real form inside your own
experience of thinking. It is remarkable…”

This is said with great happiness and excitement. Its a

remarkable situation and one that is worth pointing out to the
participant in a simple and easy to follow script. It normally
becomes the thing that they will then repeat when telling others
about the experience.

“Now the thoughts inside your mind have form. We can move them. We
can even remove them entirely. Literally we can take them from the inside
and pull them out into the world on the outside… but only if you are ready
and will to expand this experience further… are you?”
Once again we will increase the level of engagement in the
participant by having them confirm their willingness.

“I want you to bring to mind a thought that is negative. Something about

yourself that comes into your mind when you do not want it to. A
troubling, intrusive thought. We all have them, things that bother us. Do
not think of something that will really upset you here and now… we are in
public and I do not want you to be that vulnerable but pick a thought you
wish you could remove from your mind… really bring it to your
consciousness… close your eyes and notice how the thought makes you feel
and also notice how the thought itself feels inside your head… when you
have found it… and remember it might be harder to find that the thoughts
before… you see the negative thoughts are better at hiding from us than the
positive ones, that is why they are so hard to eliminate… but when you
have found it open your eyes and point to where it is inside your head…”

Much is happening in this part of the script. First it ensures

that the spectator does not think of something that will bring to
their mind crippling emotional pain that will snap them out of
the engagement and reduce them to an emotional wreck.
Second it once again forces the spectator to give a thought
attention and thereby locate it inside their own mind.

“Notice how that thought feels inside your head. It is not like the others we
have been thinking about. It feels different. It hides in a different place. It
feels like heat. The more you think about how that thought feels inside your
head the more clearly you feel it. Now you have found where it is hiding it
will do everything it can to run from you… do not let it. Really feel it
inside your mind… it is hot correct? You feel that?”

Once again a simple piece of suggestion language is employed

to further develop the idea that thoughts have form. Here we
begin to move the concept into a reality in which the negative
thought has its own behavioural patterns and we begin to frame
it as thou it were an adversary that the participant will outwit
and concur. By moving the language into this direction the
engagement level will remain high and the process will remain
powerful and intriguing.

“I can remove that thought from where it is hiding but only if you allow me
to remove it from you. You have to be ready to let go of it, to allow it to
leave, and I can do the rest. Are you will to let that feeling, that thought
go?”

In truth this single piece of scripting has been what we have

been building up to. In order for the participant to feel the
thought has left their mind, all they need to do it allow it to
leave their mind. However, without the build up this would not
work as well. Once again it is about ensuring the spectator is
fully engaged with the process and cloaking the simple truth
that if they wish to let the thought go, and if they accept that,
then the thought will go. You are not claiming the ability to
cause people to ‘forget’ something. Instead the apparent
demonstration is one in which the negative thought will no
longer trouble them. Keep this clear in your mind. If you
attempt to use this framework for a demonstration of amnesia
it will fail. That is not the goal here. Nor would it be as useful
as the goal. Simple having the participant no longer feel such a
bond to the negative thought is honestly a more useful and
helpful outcome.

“In a moment I am going to take that thought from the inside and bring it
to the outside. It will not leave any long lasting effects but in the moment
you might experience a short term pain. Negative thoughts are full of
pain… thats how they stay hidden bringing them to light causes pain so we
stop looking for them… so you might feel a moment of pain but inside your
mind and your body but it will pass very quickly and once the pain is gone,
the thought is gone… are you ready for that?”

Here we are setting the participant up to expect a real

sensation. By position the sensation in this way it means that
when they do experience this all the other things we connected
to it are accepted as true and as truly having happened.

“I can see this thought has been a problem for you for a long time. Now the
pain has gone, the thought has gone. It doesn’t have form anymore. When
you think about it, it won’t feel like it used to. It will not longer have a
place inside your head. It is nothing… hold out your hands…”

Now we conclude the demonstration by making something that

is invisible vanish. Its the easiest thing in the world. We simply
choose not to give it any attention anymore.
“No weight, no form, no function, no reality. Nothing. No.. thing. It has
gone…”

Now wait and allow the participant to really process the

experience they have just had.

The Very Special Setting…

I mentioned during the beginning of the examination of this

remarkable sequence one performance setting that I feel is the
very best for this. Counter intuitively it is in platform and stage
work. However, it is not performed to one person at a time.
Instead the entire audience are engaged with the process all at
once. Obviously this negates the use of the final moment in
which you apply pressure to the head of the participant,
however instead I simply have the audience press on their own
scalps and ‘dig the thought out.’ I then have them look at their
empty hand and ‘throw the negative thought away.’ I present
the entire process with some music in the background and with
all stage light and house light off. The audience sit in the dark
and experience the entire process like this, with the light
returning only at the final moments before they ‘throw away’
the negative thought.
Performing this sequence with an entire audience at one
time is as close to real magic as I have experienced. It is
something very special. It does require some adjustments in the
script, which you will need to make to ensure the language feels
natural and authentic from your own mouth but I promise you,
your effort will be rewarded ten fold with the impact it can
create on even the biggest audience , all with nothing but
the real magic of words.