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Optimal minimal.
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At this altitude, I can run flat out for a half mile before my hands start shaking.
0:05
Can I ask you a personal question?
0:07
No, I was sitting at home at the time.
0:10
What if I did the opposite?
0:10
I'm a cybernetic organism, living tissue over a metal endoskeleton.
0:23
This episode is brought to you by EXO protein.
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That's EXO like the exoskeleton in Aliens, and they make the only bars, meal replacement bars, or pre-workout bars in my case that I have in my house.
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You can hear the crinkling of coconut, which I'm going to get back to.
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And many of the CrossFit mutants and high performers out there are eating these.
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And I bet they taste better than any protein bar you've ever had. And why is that?
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Just one of the benefits, well, they are exceptionally high in complete protein.
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2:41
This podcast is brought to you by Four Sigmatic.
2:43
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3:00
It's very strong and lights you up like a Christmas tree in the best way possible.
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I try to force this on all of my house guests. It is a hell of a thing.
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If I have employees or people come over who are working on projects with me, I always try to feed it to them because I'm going to get the Limitless effect and get a lot more out of them.
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3:38
And the coffee tastes like coffee.
3:38
It uh takes just seconds to prepare with hot water, and oddly enough, only includes 40 mg of caffeine.
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So, it has less than half of what you'd get in a regular cup of coffee.
3:51
I don't get any jitters, acid reflux, or any stomach burn, any of that.
3:53
It's very unusual and very, very cool.
3:56
So, if you don't want caffeine, they also offer very strong but caffeine-free mushroom elixirs, which I will sometimes have in the evening.
4:05
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4:43
Why, hello, boys and girls.
4:43
This is Tim Ferriss, and welcome to another episode of The Tim Ferriss Show, where it is my job to deconstruct world-class performers, whether they are entertainers like Jamie Fox, military like General Stan McChrystal or Jocko Willink, chess prodigies like Josh Waitzkin, or everybody and anyone in between who is the best at what they do.
5:03
And this episode is no different. It is a bit of a hybrid.
5:07
I am interviewing the master illusionist and endurance artist you've asked for for years, David Blaine.
5:13
And it is a really fun conversation, at least I had a blast, and it is composed of outtakes. What does that mean?
5:22
Well, these are bits and pieces, I'd say about 90% of it, is from a TV show that I filmed, and we filmed for 3 hours, and it got cut down to an hour-long TV episode, and you can see this episode on a TV show called Fearless.
5:41
And you can see the entire episode, which does not really overlap with this audio, at att. net/fearless.
5:52
And I highly recommend that you check it out.
5:53
People have been really buzzing about it. And this is all extras.
5:55
So, you will hear all sorts of stories and bonus bits that didn't make it in.
6:02
We jump around quite a lot to various conversations, stories, and lessons with David.
6:09
And the very first conversation begins with the two of us talking about my second book, The 4-Hour Body, and learning to hold my breath, which he taught me at the TEDMED conference ages ago, and I went from a max breath hold of 45 seconds to 3 minutes and 30 seconds or slightly longer.
6:28
So, I am going to try to keep this somewhat short, but two things.
6:33
Number one, I would love for you to check out the TV show.
6:34
The entire season is filmed, and you can find out where you can see all of the episodes at tim. blog/fearless. That's tim. blog/fearless.
6:46
It has trailers, all the guests, everything else.
6:48
And if you want to see the entire first episode, at least for a short period of time, with David Blaine, just go to att. net/fearless.
6:57
And there are some issues, it seems, viewing it with Chrome, Safari, or Firefox, or something else. And that is it.
7:03
So, I hope you enjoy this conversation and experience as much as I did.
7:08
Please say hi to David on the socials.
7:10
He's easy to find, Blaine, b l a i n e. He does not disappoint. Thank you. Welcome to Fearless.
7:21
I'm your host, Tim Ferriss.
7:23
And on this stage, we'll be deconstructing world-class performers of all different types to uncover the specific tactics and strategies they've used to overcome doubt, tackle their hardest decisions, and ultimately succeed on their own terms.
7:34
So, let's take a look at my guest by the numbers.
7:38
17 minutes, 4 seconds, his world-record-setting breath hold, if you can believe that. It's true.
7:42
44 days, how long he survived without food in a plexiglass box.
7:46
63 hours, 42 minutes, and 15 seconds, the amount of time he spent encased in a block of ice.
7:51
For nearly 20 years, he has risked his life for your entertainment.
7:56
Please welcome to the stage world-renowned illusionist and endurance artist, David Blaine. Thank you, sir. How's it going, Tim? Good. Watch your step.
8:17
You wrote about it in your book, which I was super excited about.
8:19
In the second edition, you had to pull it. I had to pull it.
8:23
Okay, so let me explain what happened.
8:26
It turns out that, I guess, if you have an audience of x number of people, let's say it's a million people, one out of every thousand is not going to read directions, it turns out.
8:34
So, I had people who just weren't reading the warnings.
8:38
But, what made me want to put it in the book so badly is that it takes this impossible, I can't do x, and just obliterates Yeah.
8:46
Then I remember, I think it was the very next time that I met you after that, and I paid a lot of attention to your performances, but then I started tracking you a lot more closely, not in like a stalker-y, creepy way, but in a very uh diligent fan way.
9:00
And we met at, I don't even remember where it was.
9:03
Might have been at uh one of these summit events in DC, but I sat down, I noticed you had a tattoo on the Is it on the inside of your forearm? Yeah.
9:14
So, you have some numbers here. What are those numbers?
9:16
It's Primo Levi's Holocaust numbers, and he's he's one of my favorite writers because even though he went through such a terrible and horrific experience, he wrote about it without any bias, actually.
9:28
It's almost like he recorded it with a video camera and just documented what he went through in the concentration camp.
9:34
And because he was a chemist, he didn't look at, you know, you are different than me, or this Nazi is different than this Jew.
9:41
He looked at everybody as biological compositions of molecule, you know, so so everything is just a part of life.
9:49
So, therefore, he just studied humanity at its its one of its most atrocious incidents.
9:53
And he would say thing He would write things that you would And by the way, he started to write this book as soon as he got out and his arm was working, he immediately, you know, he was able to write, he immediately began to write.
10:05
And people didn't believe him and you know, because a lot of people thought the Holocaust was still made up at that time.
10:10
And he would say things that because he was a chemist, so before he went to Auschwitz, he was a great chemist in a paint factory is where he worked, but he would observe what certain people did to survive.
10:21
So, he explained like you had to sleep with your head here, your feet here, your head here, your foot you know, packed like sardines basically.
10:29
And he would explain that somebody that might survive would be the the guy laying in the bunk at night that could listen to the level of the latrines.
10:38
The latrines were being, you know, were the toilets in the middle of the bunk.
10:42
And when you would hear the latrine was filled to the top, if you were able to sleep just enough but stay awake enough that you could listen.
10:50
When it was full to the top, you'd say to the two people to your side, if you have to go to the bathroom, don't go now.
10:59
And he would say that because he would listen to the level of the latrines, know how full it was.
11:02
And then if they would have to go to the bathroom, then they'd have to go empty it 2 mi away.
11:09
And while walking, they would spill the urine and the crap all over their feet.
11:13
And so when they came back and and you had to sleep with your head next to it, you'd get sick.
11:17
And when you get sick in a camp, you're killed. You're done.
11:20
So, it was like he he would explain things that you'd never think about.
11:23
And then when he became a very respected writer like Philip Roth and Italo Calvino, all these guys say he's one of the most important non-fiction writers of all time, but he went back to working in the paint factory.
11:34
He never moved out of the apartment in Torino, Italy that he grew up on.
11:38
He never traveled for luxury.
11:40
He was a really impressive and interesting person.
11:42
Well, I remember asking you what you learned from the book because I noticed the tattoo, then you mentioned the book and I said, "What did you learn?"
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And he said, "Everything."
11:51
And I was like, "Well, I think I need to buy a book."
11:54
So, I went out and I bought If This Is a Man and The Truce.
11:58
That's yeah, that's amazing.
12:00
have to tell you guys, you want to talk about beautiful insightful writing?
12:03
I think the highlights in that book alone are the next 10 combined on my shelf.
12:07
I still have it facing out on my bookshelf in my living room. Yeah, it's amazing.
12:12
And after you read it, when you open your refrigerator, you're you're never going to think about food or anything the same way because you're going to be Wow, I'm so lucky.
12:19
It's kind of like the Stoic philosophers like Marcus Aurelius, all these people, it they they use negative visualization.
12:25
And what they do with that is they imagine the worst possible scenario.
12:29
So, let's say somebody has a daughter, he's going to imagine that tomorrow his daughter might die and he might not see her ever again.
12:37
So, therefore the time that he's with his daughter, he's going to be very connected to her.
12:40
He's not going to be looking through his iPhone or watching TV, he's going to be paying full attention to her, which is I think an amazing point of view.
12:48
Whereas the father that assumes, "Oh, my daughter's going to outlive me and she'll be here forever."
12:52
when they're together, he might be sitting there staring at the TV or reading the newspaper and not really giving her the full attention. Mhm.
12:58
So, and it's also the same the way he thinks about like a glass of water.
13:02
So, he'd think like instead of saying like, "Oh, this glass is half empty."
13:06
he'd be like, "Wow, I'm lucky that I have water.
13:08
Not just my lucky to have water, but I have it in a glass that actually will hold it.
13:13
And I'm not going to get lead poisoning from this glass and it's going to be clean and it's going to taste good."
13:18
So, it's like that's that's kind of what I learned from Primo Levi.
13:22
And I mean, on top of that, you just mentioned Stoics, which is one of my favorite topics.
13:25
I'll not talk about for the next like 17 hours to save you guys, but the fact that they viewed it as practice, it was it was trainable. Mhm.
13:33
So, it was a regular practice.
13:39
I mean, you have one hell of a collection of what most people would consider pretty strange practices.
13:44
I want to talk about cold for a second.
13:46
So, I I don't know if this is Correct me if this is not accurate, but I I know Laird Hamilton and those guys.
13:53
Laird is the undisputed king of big wave surfing and he's married to Gabby Reece who's equally impressive. Yeah, they're amazing.
14:00
Killer volleyball player, amazing parents.
14:04
And they have these workouts at their house in in Southern California, so this neck of the woods.
14:09
And they have a custom pool with stairs that go down to the bottom and people do weight training underwater among other things.
14:15
And then they have an ice bath, which is a real ice bath.
14:19
You get in and you have to wedge yourself through the ice into the ice bath and then a sauna is 220° and they cycle through all three of these.
14:26
I remember one point somebody at one of these workouts said, "Oh man, you should've been here last week. Wim Hof was here."
14:31
Wim Hof, who's called the Iceman, he's this Dutch daredevil.
14:33
He has 20-something world records for He's incredible. ice exposures.
14:38
He can sit in ice bath for like 2 hours.
14:41
Climb Climb Everest barefoot.
14:43
up to death altitude at Everest in boots and shorts, nothing else.
14:45
Pretty impressive guy on a lot of levels.
14:48
a record swimming under ice.
14:50
Yeah, he swam under ice until his retina froze.
14:52
I mean, not recommended by the way.
14:53
No matter how good your eyesight might seem.
14:55
So, I was told that you guys started trading ideas and then start doing all sorts of wacky stuff.
15:02
Is that what happened or like Yeah. Yeah, we had fun.
15:06
But I had actually never tried holding my breath underwater and ice, which you know, I could I could resist really cold temperatures for a pretty good good amount of time.
15:14
But I didn't I always thought, okay, so when I first tried to learn how to hold my breath, I actually read about the boy that fell under the icy river and he was trapped for 45 minutes.
15:24
He blacked out, they pulled him up and he was brought to full recovery.
15:28
So, my my initial thinking was, "Okay, if I put myself in a really in an ice bath and I drop my core temperature, then I'll be able to hold my breath long."
15:39
But it was before I really learned the technique.
15:40
So, I got in this ice bath, I was shivering, and then I tried to do the breath hold and it was, you know, it was a bust. Yeah. But that was years ago.
15:49
But then when I hung out with with Wim, he was like, "Let's Let's try it.
15:53
Let's Let's try it this way."
15:56
And I did it his way under the ice bath and it was incredible. Yeah. What was his trick?
16:00
Was it the breathing beforehand or did you do something else? You know what it is? Here's what it is.
16:05
When you see somebody else do it, it's like you suddenly realize, "Oh wait, there's a way to do this."
16:09
So, then you can push yourself to do things that you don't think are possible because you've seen somebody else do it.
16:16
Well, it's like you in the breath holding and then suddenly I'm there doing the breath holding.
16:18
And I remember at one point interviewing Robert Rodriguez, I don't know if you guys know, director, writer, everything extraordinary.
16:25
And he studies artists, he loves studying artists.
16:27
And he found this artist, I think a German artist, and he wanted to figure out how he did his technique.
16:31
So, he flew all the way over to Europe, sat down, asked the guy to give him a lesson.
16:35
So, the guy's doing this this this like a dash on the chin, a dash on the nose.
16:38
And he goes, "How do you know which one is next?"
16:40
This is what Robert asked him. And he goes, "You don't.
16:43
It's different every time."
16:44
And Robert's like, "What the hell?
16:44
I flew all the way here and this is my lesson? Are you kidding me?"
16:47
And then he sat down, he tried it, and he could do it.
16:51
Just because he saw someone do it. Wow.
16:54
And it was possible now in his subconscious mind.
16:56
He got out of his own way. So, we talked about ice.
17:00
I want to flip that and talk about fire.
17:02
So, we're going to rewind the clock.
17:06
Did you have one or multiple homes burn down?
17:09
Yeah, as as a kid, I had a three three fires in the buildings I lived in.
17:14
So, I mean, obviously we got out, but Yeah.
17:19
two of them I didn't even wake up.
17:19
My mother carried me out, ran down the stairs and I didn't see any of it.
17:25
I just found out the next day.
17:28
Did you lose your Did you lose your stuff or was that's And that's why I have so few pictures and stuff like that from my childhood is from those fires. Oh, I see.
17:36
Yeah, because we have a handful of photos, but uh I was wondering about limited collection of pho- photos.
17:41
Did you Did that affect how you relate to material possessions at all?
17:48
Or No, my mother never really placed high value on material possessions.
17:51
So, I think she taught me that.
17:53
Yeah, she taught you before the fire. Yeah.
17:57
So, we talked a little bit about potentially using cold to hold your breath for longer.
18:02
And then you mentioned fasting.
18:04
Well, wait, the cold doesn't it doesn't help you hold your breath for longer, but it's it's just an interesting concept that you can hold your breath while you're freezing. So, the fasting.
18:13
Um I also read Kafka, The Hunger Artist.
18:16
And in The Hunger Artist, the guy is a dime circus performer and nobody wants to see him.
18:23
And he does his show, but nobody ever shows up.
18:25
So, he decides he's going to sit in a little cage and he's going to go I think for a month or No, a month and a half without food.
18:31
No, 40 days I think without food.
18:33
And he gets in this little cage and and he starts fasting.
18:39
And people start to come.
18:40
And then as he starts fasting, he starts to get skinny skinny skinny and crowds start to come.
18:45
And at the end of the Kafka story, there's tons of people there, but he's gone.
18:49
He's just shriveled away to nothing.
18:51
So, nobody could see him.
18:54
But it was, you know, Kafka explains a whole curve of doing one of those things in a in a really poetic and interesting way.
18:59
So, I think that plus a curiosity plus you just love let go you kind of your brain changes because you're not thinking about you know, oh like we spend a lot of time during our day planning our next meal.
19:14
Like what am I going to eat later?
19:14
What am I going to eat now?
19:16
What am I going to eat tonight?
19:17
And when you take that away, because because we're you know, we we are able to go a long time.
19:22
I don't recommend it, but I think we can go very long time without food.
19:27
And when you take that away, it's like your brain starts to see things in a really beautiful way actually.
19:38
And we have a a mutual friend, a fantastic stand-up comedian and actor named Bryan Callen.
19:43
We'll come back to Bryan, but one of his questions was, you know, or suggested topics to explore was suffering.
19:51
Because you Correct me if I'm wrong, you grew up you had asthma. Yeah.
19:54
And And and recently I found out that I have my my right coronary artery I've never said this to anybody, but it it takes an irregular path between my aorta my aorta and my pulmonary artery.
20:10
So, it's getting stenosis 50% stenosis.
20:13
So, my heart gets basically 50% of the blood flow that you get or anybody gets.
20:19
So, it's it's very dangerous obviously, but at the same time I think that might be why I'm able to hold my breath for such an extended period of time before I started training.
20:32
If you were to describe say how you interacted with other kids, teachers or otherwise, what were you like?
20:36
I was a hyperactive little weirdo, but I I mean I that's not why we're here today.
20:40
So, I'm not going to talk about that.
20:42
But, I'm glad there was we didn't have as much medication.
20:46
I would have been drugged out of my mind. Not the No, you didn't. Leave that alone.
20:54
Not going to go down the drug rabbit hole. Continue.
20:57
Uh yeah, how were you as a kid?
20:57
I mean, I was definitely not hyperactive.
20:58
I was like I was like your polar opposite. I was very like no.
21:04
But, um I think I was kind of similar. I was very curious. I loved magic. I loved learning. I loved reading.
21:14
Um I had to build a lot of you know walls really quick. Why is that?
21:18
In Brooklyn in the late 70s it was it's a tough it was a tough environment back then.
21:23
So, I learned how to defend myself.
21:25
I would take the subway alone to school when I was five or six.
21:30
Um I was much more mature probably as a kid than now.
21:35
Um But, I was also the kid that that would get you know really good grades, but then the teacher would mark class clown parent teacher conference needed.
21:43
And my mom would come in and say, "I don't get it.
21:47
Why does he has these grades?
21:47
Why does he have to Why do you And she's like, "Well, he's he's a bit of a clown." Yeah, I was a crazy kid.
21:56
Now, I I I read, correct me if I'm wrong here, did you trade punches with kids and like walk to school in your shorts in the winter? Yeah.
22:03
Did I talk I talked about that somewhere? I guess you must have. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We Yeah.
22:11
How did you decide to do any of that? Well, no the hold on.
22:14
So, the barefoot in the snow running I had a karate teacher also called I M C named Prince.
22:21
And he's and he for some reason he just liked me.
22:24
Well, or didn't like No, but he liked me.
22:25
So, he would run barefoot through the snow and I would just do it with him.
22:29
And then I started doing things like that on my own.
22:31
And then I would go all winter with just t-shirts on and I kind of liked enduring it. You know, is yeah.
22:39
So, that's What led to that? I'm just so curious.
22:40
I mean, I I had a couple of weird things that I would do just to see if I could endure it.
22:45
I mean, I was I was a runt in school.
22:47
So, the only sport I ended up being able to play with any success was wrestling.
22:50
So, his weight class based I just got my ass kicked up until like sixth grade.
22:54
So, I did weird coping things to try to like cut down on bullying.
22:57
So, I'd like put my hand flat on I don't know I've never talked about this either.
23:00
Put my hand flat on a table. Don't do this at home.
23:04
And just let people hit the hand or I would do the alien you know like bishop move. Yeah.
23:09
And people were like, "Okay, I can kick his ass, but he's just crazy enough that I'm going to go after an easier target." Right?
23:14
So, but what led to the the enduring of the cold?
23:17
Like do you remember deciding to do that or was it just after Prince's influence?
23:24
Well, no now that I think about it technically speaking my mother got remarried when I was about 10 years old.
23:32
We moved to New Jersey and and her husband was always worried about you know sick and things like that.
23:39
So, he would always want you know layered up.
23:43
So, I think part of like my rebellion against having to follow any specific directions was to Did you do the opposite?
23:51
around all winter with a t-shirt.
23:58
We'll definitely come back to your mom because she's such a a critical and influential piece of this whole puzzle.
24:03
Uh but, did she introduce you to chess?
24:06
My mother had a boyfriend at the time who's now my godfather and he taught me chess when I was really young.
24:12
And I think my biological father might have also, but I don't know cuz I didn't see him much, but How were you drawn to magic?
24:21
And the the chess was sort of a I was thinking if you're a master of misdirection.
24:25
I mean, and we can certainly talk about that, but Chess is similar.
24:29
Did that develop there or did that come later?
24:31
Well, I I mean I you know a deck of cards has so many different you know you can shuffle a deck and the odds of shuffling it in the same order you could have a you know a trillion people shuffling cards for years and years and years and you'll never match the same order.
24:49
I mean, it's like So, I think there there's so many algorithms and mathematical features built into cards and as a magician that's that's what you use in the beginning.
25:01
So, it's like the first tricks I started doing with cards were simple mathematical tricks and my mother would go crazy.
25:07
And so, I started to really want to learn different things and and I started working on it.
25:13
And I think I think that was the love of math.
25:14
I think the love of science, logic, chess.
25:21
Yeah, I think it's all all very Yeah.
25:24
And when did it become Did it just gather steam steadily from there or are there particular inflection points for you?
25:30
No, I I think I just kept working on it and working on it.
25:34
I'm still working on it the same way.
25:35
So, it's just a non-stop learning new things and trying things and becoming obsessed and Obsession part helps. It helps you get good.
25:48
You learn a lot in that environment.
25:48
You learn so much about performance cuz you learn and I guess it's related to salesmanship almost.
25:55
Like you learn if you're too close to the people that are sitting down and you walk up to somebody and you want to do magic you're too close you're kind of like they're like oh Invading your personal space. Right.
26:04
Or but if you're too far away they kind of will throw you away very easily.
26:08
So, there's like that balance point that you learn of how close you need to be to the table, who to approach first and you do the magic then they're engaged then you have them and you know, I think there's so much psychology applied to that.
26:20
I want to ask about picking the right person at the table.
26:24
So, you walk into a restaurant figured out it's kind of the the personal space.
26:28
You figured out how to befriend the alphas in jail and then you get everybody else, right?
26:32
Like chimpanzee politics.
26:34
So, when you go to a table in a restaurant and you said picking the right person, how do you pick the right person?
26:38
I it's so hard to explain that.
26:41
It's like a spider sense?
26:41
Yeah, it's like after you do it a thousand times and you get rejected enough times you start to learn. It's it's amazing.
26:47
I heard a rumor It's not scandalous, don't worry.
26:50
That when you're working as a waiter at some point people would give you tips and you'd give the tips back and say you're not doing it for the money.
26:58
Why you did your research. Good team, too.
27:02
No, because yeah, I would do I would do magic, but just cuz I'd like to do the magic.
27:06
So, they would often leave I was working at a health food restaurant in New York, but back then in like '91 there wasn't it was the only one. It was called Souen.
27:16
And I would do magic to the people and they would leave me like 50% to a 100% double the bill in tip and I would give it back to them.
27:25
I would say just give me 20% cuz I didn't do magic for that, but just come back.
27:29
And so, they would all come back and and they became you know regulars at the restaurant.
27:34
But, yeah I I just didn't I didn't want people to think that like oh this is for this. Which it wasn't.
27:44
The book that blows me away beyond anything and it's hard to explain it Cervantes. Cervantes.
27:52
Yeah, and that guy his life So, he wrote Don Quixote and his life was the most in for writer his life was what writers dream for even though it was a horrific and terrible life.
28:01
So, Cervantes was a son of a surgeon in Spain and the he died in 1616 the same year Shakespeare.
28:10
But, back then you were very poor.
28:12
So, when he was a I think 18 or something he joined the military to fight for his country.
28:18
He got shot and was maimed on the left side.
28:21
So, he was paralyzed in his left arm, but he won the equivalent of the Purple Heart.
28:25
So, the king gave him a letter.
28:26
On their trip back home in the boat pirates basically took them captive.
28:31
He was made into a slave for five years and while they were trying to get ransom because he had this letter from the king so they thought he was so important and so wealthy which he wasn't they would just abuse and torture him.
28:43
Finally his brother got the monks to raise enough money five years later.
28:47
So, he went back home and the only job that he could get was as a tax collector, right?
28:51
The government giving him this job.
28:53
But, because that guy had such a big heart he didn't want to take taxes from a mother with five babies who couldn't feed them.
28:58
So, he wouldn't do his job the way the government wanted to.
29:03
So, they put him in prison and he spent 12 years in prison.
29:06
And while in prison he started writing Don Quixote.
29:11
He finished it when he got out and it became the number one best seller in Europe.
29:15
It was one of the most respected books.
29:17
Shakespeare wrote an entire play about one character that was burned in the fire called about Cardenio.
29:20
But, even with all of the success the publisher screwed him over.
29:25
So, he never saw a penny.
29:27
So, Cervantes died completely broke and he's one of the greatest most influential writers to this day.
29:33
But, when you read the book it makes sense because the character's about a guy that wants to make the world a better place.
29:39
He's delusional because there's no way he it's very difficult to do that.
29:43
So, he's you know fighting windmills and and All right, imitating life and life imitating, all Yeah, but yeah.
29:49
How many times have you read that book?
29:53
That was an incredible recap. Well, that's his life. That's not the book. That's a life story. Yeah. I was like, "Oh my god."
30:01
The book is even crazier.
30:04
So, I I try not to read it when I'm on an airplane cuz if there's people sitting next to me, it's like when I'm on one page, I'm like laughing hysterically and then I'm crying, then I'm laughing hysterically.
30:12
So, I seem like a real a real A sociopath.
30:17
But, it's yeah, that book is incredible.
30:21
As a kid, did you feel like a loner or lonely or did you feel something else?
30:27
And it's I mean, did it seems like you did a lot on your own. I'm just curious.
30:31
I I feel most of my friends that are that are magicians are usually not of the norm.
30:38
So, they usually don't necessarily fit in in the you know, in the in the typical way.
30:43
So, there is a lot of time spent alone, but that time spent alone is when you learn how to do these things that you would never do if you were out having fun with you know, so it's like you're working on one move repetitiously for hours on end for days and weeks and months and years.
30:57
So, yeah, there is a lot of time that you spend isolated.
30:59
So, you get into magic around five.
31:02
At what point at what age did your mom pass away?
31:06
She got sick when I was uh 17 years old and she fought for a couple of years and and and died three years later and and and it was a very ambitious fight and struggle and she tried to overcome it and did everything in her power from the macrobiotic diet to you know, acupuncture and just Chinese medicine just everything plus the normal route and the doctors gave her I believe six months to live at one point.
31:38
one point. And she did it was called Michio Kushi wrote a he was called Michio Kushi wrote a book called the macrobiotic way and basically what she did she eliminated all excess from her diet and just ate food that was rich in micronutrients and had all the things that are necessary and what
31:56
happened was a tumor started to disappear because she started to I guess when you don't have excess you know, fat you're just getting the micronutrition that you need, she started to probably digest or whatever the tumor started to just dissipate and sift out and and she actually was on the road to beating the cancer. And then
32:18
And then and then I guess when she did go into remission, she started to eat you know, the the normal foods again and then came back really fast.
32:29
And were you And she used to tell me you know, that you know, when I do this when I when I eat you know, back then kale wasn't the popular thing.
32:38
So, kale and seaweed and all these different things she's she told me that you know, the the way the Chinese do it their hair is black for a very long time.
32:46
They don't go gray and she went from gray to full color back at one point so doing all that.
32:51
So, I I saw just so many amazing changes take place in in her approach and her and her belief that you know, and I'm sure part of it is mental that she could beat it was until recently when I had a daughter, but it was like it was because that loss was so overwhelming and so like horrific that I never wanted to put myself at in that place again. Again, right?
33:17
Yeah, so it was really it was always very you know, difficult to get through.
33:20
But now I have a five-year-old and it's it's a it's the most the most amazing experience in my life and it's beyond anything that words could ever explain.
33:31
And she's doing magic, but I didn't teach her.
33:33
Just they just watch She knows she just watches.
33:37
She just watches and then she starts doing it.
33:39
I'm like, "Oh no, I don't want her to do magic cuz I don't want her to do the crazy things."
33:43
But Do as I say, not as I do. Yeah.
33:47
Daddy says, "Don't put the ice pick through your hand."
33:49
Uh Yeah, I encourage the piano the singing.
33:53
Well, you know, it's it's And she teases me.
33:54
She's like, "Well, I'm going to do things too.
33:56
I'm going to stand on bills."
33:57
I'm like, "No, you're not." No. She says, "Yeah. Yep. Yep, I am." I said, "Nope."
34:03
It's incredible how the in some cases the apple just does not fall far from the tree. just observe. They absorb everything.
34:13
wonder how much of it is just also innate.
34:15
Like you're somehow programmed towards magic.
34:16
I really wonder because I have a friend, fantastic guy.
34:18
If you if you haven't met him, you should meet him at some point. Josh Waitzkin.
34:21
So, Josh Waitzkin was the basis for Searching for Bobby Fischer, both the book and the movie.
34:28
So, he was the little kid who was the chess prodigy.
34:31
And he had a very tough time being thrown into the public light and with the movie as a 14 or 15-year-old.
34:36
It was just very challenging for him and it uh interfered with his chess career and so on and so forth.
34:42
So, he never he never pulls out of chess. Whatever. Wow.
34:46
And at one point his son just found some type of who's around the same age as uh as your daughter uh an online chess program and he just sat there for hours and hours and got better and better and better and he was just like, "Well, I guess he's going to play chess." That's crazy.
35:01
Well, well, maybe he saw maybe he was somehow cuz my daughter uses the iPad when she's allowed to she'll push the button and say she has a French accent, "Show me pictures of David Blaine."
35:14
And then like all these things. I'm like, "No."
35:18
That's not me in that globe right there in the water. No, it's not me.
35:21
But but maybe there's some sort of you know, maybe he saw something or he you know, but but who knows?
35:25
Maybe it is just intuitive.
35:30
There has to be and I know because I've seen you work a room.
35:32
Not work a room, that sounds weird, but I've seen you at a at a party, let's just say and you can navigate you can surf that space really really well.
35:42
And part of your story is so incredible because it's like, all right, he was in restaurants and they did this and then he saw this one person and did this trick to them and then it led to this and then it led to that.
35:55
And so, I want to bring up I guess two two parts of that.
35:57
So, one is do you have aside from like the spider sense?
36:02
Is there anything else that helps you to decide which people to engage with in a in a situation like that?
36:09
No, because I kind I kind of just do it to everybody. Everybody, yeah.
36:12
I'm not You're scratching off a lot of a lot of Yeah, no, I just I just love doing it.
36:15
I just like the process of doing it.
36:17
So, I just do it all the time, you know.
36:19
But you've been very good at at capitalizing on the opportunities that have presented themselves.
36:25
And so so, one of them that I I wanted to get a little bit backstory on cuz it seems like a pivotal moment and if it wasn't, I want you to tell me, but going to Saint-Tropez, I guess it was.
36:35
Yeah, I was I was hired by this amazing man.
36:41
His name was Jeffrey Steiner.
36:44
And just a very powerful self-made billionaire.
36:47
And you were young at the time. I was young.
36:49
Yeah, I was like 19 or 20 maybe.
36:52
And I was doing magic at this bar mitzvah. I did magic to this man.
36:56
He was very intrigued and he said, "Have you ever been to Saint-Tropez?" I said, "What?"
37:05
Well, like I never heard I don't even know what it is. So, I said, "No."
37:09
He said, "Here's my card. Call me."
37:11
So, you know, called him and and he asked me to he asked me to come to his office to to to meet with him.
37:22
Cuz he was going to have me you know, possibly come during the summer and work.
37:26
And I remember sitting in his office in the waiting room and it was so fancy and incredible.
37:30
And there was a security guard standing in the corner and he was reading a newspaper.
37:35
I think he had a newspaper.
37:37
He's standing there reading the paper.
37:40
And I was just sitting there waiting.
37:40
It was like five minutes, 10 minutes just waiting.
37:45
And I and I look at the security guard. I'm like, "Excuse me."
37:48
And the guy doesn't budge. I'm like, "Excuse me." He doesn't budge. So, I walk up to him.
37:54
And I and I touch him and it was one of those like Madame Tussauds wax figures.
38:00
And I didn't even know people had those types of things sitting around. either.
38:03
In their waiting room, that's kind of creepy. It was amazing. Yeah. Yeah, that's amazing.
38:06
And anyway, then then he asked me to go and and and really the the learning lesson was watching how he just the the way he deals with everybody the same.
38:18
Like he there's no judgments.
38:21
He doesn't judge me as this kid or you know, this powerful everybody's kind of treated in in a very similar way and very elegantly and very caring.
38:31
And you know, I I I kind of learned from him as well that that really all people are the same.
38:37
So, it's not like he believed that there's a divide because somebody's you know, rich or powerful or present and I quickly learned that and I was lucky to learn at that point that that all people are the same.
38:47
Not I mean, obviously there's differences between every each individual, but I learned not to judge I learned not to judge somebody for any reason cuz everybody ultimately is a human being.
39:00
So, that I mean, I learned that also from my mother, but when you see it in a different context, it's it's a very valuable lesson. Yeah. Also, it reinforces it.
39:09
So, let's talk about a yet different context. You watch Mr.
39:14
Steiner interacting with people.
39:16
And then how do you bump into Jack Nicholson?
39:21
Well, yeah, it was there and uh yeah, so he was also one of my favorites, obviously.
39:25
And I I was you know, doing magic to him.
39:31
And I ended you know, it was I remember I I was like an unknown kid at the time.
39:36
And I remember the it was in in this club there and they turned the music off to say, "Tonight we have Jack Nicholson and David Blaine."
39:44
You know, so it's like, "Whoa, that's pretty crazy."
39:45
Like suddenly I was like known in in in that Co-headlining with Jack Nicholson.
39:50
Yeah, so it's like Pretty good for a 19-year-old. Yeah.
39:53
Yeah, so when I came back when I came back to America after that, it was kind of like you know, that because I was around you know, Jack Nicholson and people like that, once again I I realized that you know, it it would be possible to to to create these things I want to do because you meet this guy Jack that you looked up to and and and he's incredible, one of the best in the world, and you realize that but he's also still just another person.
40:22
So, that it it's demystifying in a weird way, but it's also like it's incredible because you realize that there is no it's not it's like if you work hard and you pursue something, you can you can get there if you just don't quit and you're relentless. So.
40:36
Well, you put in the reps, too, right?
40:38
I mean, how many people do you think you'd approached or demonstrated magic to before you hit Nicholson?
40:43
Yeah, I I I I I I I don't know.
40:46
I was starting as a kid, so I would stand up on chairs and perform when I was five in front of people, my mother's friends, and random strangers and stuff like that.
40:56
So, yeah, just just the time put in over and over. What is the approach?
41:01
So, I'm curious I I read about uh I think you used to go out with a friend named Adam whose last name I can't pronounce. Gigbot and Gigbot.
41:12
Yeah, Adam Gigbot, godfather to his children, yeah. Adam Gigbot.
41:15
And so, you guys would Oh, yeah.
41:18
Well, he yeah, he he would That was early on he would crash into we would sneak into different, you know, cool events, you know, and Adam would just walk up and and and and act like he was best friends with everybody and say, "Oh, David's going to do magic for you."
41:37
And then I would just start doing magic to everybody.
41:39
And it was Yeah, it was like back then that you know, I think people started writing stories. There was a guy named A. J.
41:44
Benza who was with the Daily News that I met through Mickey Rourke back then.
41:49
And he he basically you know, he kind of like started putting me out there, just writing little so, "David did this to this person and that person." So.
41:58
How did did he pick up on that because you did magic to him or did he just start hearing about it through the grapevine?
42:04
I think like back then I think it was just New York scene thing. It was just a novelty. Just new on the scene.
42:13
Yeah, and then also magic wasn't not everybody It was It was rare to It was rare to come across a magician back then.
42:20
There was a little group of magicians that hung out in a deli called Reuben's on Madison Avenue in New York every Saturday.
42:26
And it was like this little dirty back room of a coffee shop.
42:33
And we would just sit there and brainstorm ideas, and the most incredible magicians from all over the world would just show up and walk in and blow everybody's minds, and then I would, you know, engage my favorite ones and convince them to teach me one thing.
42:49
And that, you know, that was a What were some of the things that you picked up from Reuben's?
42:54
Can you think back to any particular lessons or any particular moment that blew your mind?
42:58
Like I mean, there's so many.
42:59
There's so many different moments.
43:02
There was a guy named Frank Garcia who was an amazing magician. I was really young.
43:05
And he he said to me, he said, "One day all of the magicians are going to be really mad at you.
43:12
They're going to be jealous of you.
43:15
I'm going to tell you right now cuz you're going to do things that that are that are just going to drive them away."
43:21
So, when I did do that, I didn't I didn't take it personally.
43:24
You didn't get his rattle.
43:24
He He told you it was coming. Yeah, I he predicted it.
43:28
And uh no, but I I met magicians there like one of my best friends and basically my brother at this point, Bill Kalush, who was this incredible technician.
43:40
But he didn't do magic so he could impress people.
43:42
He didn't do magic to perform.
43:45
He would just sit there alone day and night and just practice moves for himself.
43:50
And he's phenomenal, like one of the best in the world.
43:53
And so I say to him, "So, what do you do?
43:58
You do the magic so and and go, 'Holy, how how did I do that?'"
44:02
But it's No, but for him it's it's almost like he says Yeah, it's like it's like a painter.
44:05
He says, "Like a painter paints cuz he needs to express something."
44:09
So, he plays with cards because he needs to express something or or just work something out.
44:17
Digital fixation or something like that.
44:21
You don't have Adam as your wingman.
44:23
You just cold approach a celebrity.
44:23
What do you How do you make it happen?
44:25
No, I think when you when you when I do magic, it's pretty much the same thing.
44:28
It's just kind of like Would you Would you just walk up and say, "I want to show you something?"
44:33
And just Well, you know, it it varies. It varies. Yeah.
44:37
Who have you been intimidated to approach? Anybody come to mind?
44:41
Or if the answer's nobody You know, speaking you know, I actually Well, uh one of the people I did speak to on the phone for the end of his life for for quite a while, I spent maybe two years on and off talking to him, was Bobby Fischer. No kidding. Yeah. How did that happen? I I pursued him.
45:05
The girl that was working for me, Denise Albert, knew somebody that tried to famous chess players of all time.
45:09
They have the movie Searching for Bobby Fischer.
45:12
And but anyway, this woman, Denise Albert, that was working for me, who's amazing at just getting through to anything or anybody, tracked him down in Iceland, found somebody that tried to get an interview with him, and somehow got him a a message I wanted to talk to him.
45:29
Somehow we started speaking, and then and then we started talking.
45:31
But and then we started talking all the time about everything.
45:38
Amazing stories and history and chess stories, and I actually have some of that I I lent a friend here one time.
45:44
But that was one of the people I was most intrigued by.
45:48
One of the Yes, you like who was who was I like the most excited to get to. He was one of them.
45:53
The other guy that I was that I would love to meet is this mathematician named Grigori Perelman. Okay. Grigori Perelman. He lives outside of St. Petersburg, I believe.
46:07
And he solved one of the most difficult conundrums of the last century.
46:09
And they offered him a million-dollar prize, which he refused because when he gave the solution, basically it took all the other mathematicians 12 years to even realize that he was right.
46:20
So, he was so disappointed in mathematicians that he was like, "Forget this."
46:24
And he quit doing math, turned the prize down, and went and moved back in with his mother.
46:31
And they said he Yeah, and he he lives in this like this little apartment they say his his mattress is on the floor.
46:38
He's almost like cockroach-infested.
46:41
And uh so, the Guardian tried to reach him and get an interview.
46:43
And when the Guardian got through, and they're like, "Why did you refuse a million dollars?"
46:49
And he said, "Please don't bother me.
46:51
I'm busy picking mushrooms." Hung up the phone.
46:55
So, that's the guy I'd love to meet. You're that kind of guy.
46:57
You slept on the floor for a while, too, I think I'd have to like stay in front of his house for a couple of weeks, and somehow I don't even know how.
47:09
There was a an old trick where, you know, you would it's called a needle through arm.
47:14
And I'd seen magicians do it where they pretend to push it through their arm and it bleeds and stuff like that.
47:22
And I started thinking, "Well, wait, there must be a way to do something similar, but in in a more magical way, but actually do it."
47:31
And then I started working on, you know, what points in the body could you do it?
47:37
The craziest one is a guy named Mirin Dajo.
47:41
And he used to take rapiers, and he'd have them pushed right through his body.
47:46
Like through his lungs and through his And then he would go jogging with those things, you know. Nobody believed him.
47:52
through the body isn't enough.
47:54
Nobody believed him, so Time Life finally covered him.
47:56
And in front of, you know, all of the doctors and scientists, which they think, "No, there's no way this could be possible because we know that when a sword or rapier goes through, you're going to die."
48:07
He was just able to do it over and over like nothing.
48:09
And he'd have it pushed through, he'd go jogging, and he would pull it out. There was nothing.
48:15
But then he started to get really cocky.
48:18
He started to think he was invincible.
48:20
So, he decided that he was going to drink swallow like one of those big sailing needles.
48:25
He swallowed this this big sailing needle, and then he was going to push it through his stomach, but he couldn't get it out.
48:31
He fell asleep, and it ruptured his aorta, and he bled out and died. Yeah.
48:41
No sailing needles, audience. All right.
48:45
What would be the one piece of advice you would give your 25-year-old self?
48:48
And if you could tell us at 25 where you are and what you're doing. Roughly.
48:54
I would say to to enjoy where you are because you're always trying to think ahead and plan ahead.
49:05
And I was I was, you know, I was young producing my first TV show and working so diligently to try to get to a place that you never ever get to because you're always trying to get to another place.
49:18
So, a good thing to do is to just sit back and and kind of, you know, breathe in and be like, "Wow, this is pretty awesome."
49:26
It's a good cuz you don't It was rare that I you ever stop and just appreciate the now.
49:31
Have you become better at that? No.
49:41
Uh I wasn't planning on going into this, but I'll tell you.
49:43
So, in college I actually went 6 days without sleep.
49:45
And I did it because I was studying neuroscience at the time, and we used uh well, there were a number of labs that used cats.
49:53
They studied cats because they sleep so often.
49:55
So, you could really look at their REM sleep cycles, and uh serotonin was one of the neurotransmitters they could look into, and I became very fascinated by We're going to get out there for a second, folks.
50:06
The similarities between, and I'd never used it at this point, but uh LSD-induced experiences and REM sleep.
50:14
And I wondered how if I completely I I wondered what would happen if I completely deprived myself of REM sleep. Hence the experiment. Uh wasn't fantastic.
50:25
I called it to a close because I was walking to class, and just effectively blacked out.
50:30
Like my mind went blank, and then I woke up about 200 steps later after I crossed a street, and I was like, "Yeah, I think I need to stop doing this right now."
50:39
But uh I am fascinated by sleep deprivation, particularly the vision quest version of that.
50:46
Did you Did you get any of those visions as well? I did.
50:48
I I did have uh not not the good kind or productive kind.
50:53
Uh what ended up happening to me is things would jump out.
50:57
I'd see flashes of rapid movement in my peripheral vision, which was really terrifying. Yeah.
51:01
Uh and that was the most common is I'd see it in jerking motion right in my peripheral vision.
51:08
So, uh haven't done too much of that recently, but I am interested in things like modafinil just studying that.
51:13
And by the way, folks, if someone says there no side effects of a given drug, that's just because they haven't found them yet. Give it time.
51:25
There's a short story by David Sedaris called Naked. Mhm. And it's hilarious.
51:30
It's No, it the book is called Naked, but the short story is called Plague of Ticks. And it's amazing.
51:36
It's about this this this kid that has all these insane ticks that he just can't stop.
51:40
And it's it's a great short story about what we're talking about.
51:44
I meant Plague of Ticks like the tick that I grew up with in Long Island.
51:49
I was like, "Oh my god, that's my nightmare."
51:52
Uh Plague of Ticks Sedaris is a fantastic book. Yeah.
51:54
This is one of my favorites.
51:58
Magic is all about capturing or diverting attention.
52:00
What are some basic tactical ways to divert someone's attention for the purpose of performing simple magic tricks?
52:06
I think just really communicating with somebody.
52:10
Cuz if you're really talking to somebody that they're going to look here.
52:12
I mean, you but then again, the magic that that I like the most is stuff that you don't need people to look away. Mhm.
52:20
So, I would work on things that doesn't matter who's looking at what for the most part.
52:28
So, if you're not trying to divert, let's just say in some of your early environments, which like you said were not ideal environments.
52:32
Loud, clubs, people yelling.
52:37
How do you What are some good ways to get someone's attention?
52:40
You have to adjust the magic to the environment.
52:42
So, Depends on the circumstance. Yeah.
52:47
What are you trying to learn?
52:47
Always learning, but what I'm currently reading is American Prometheus about Oppenheimer.
52:56
And this is one of the more fascinating men that I've read about.
53:02
He created the atomic bomb, and it was a race between Japan, Germany, and America.
53:10
So, he developed this weapon, and it basically stopped Japan or Germany from having an atomic bomb, which who knows what they would have done, I mean, to the world to this day.
53:25
And after he created it was used, he he realized he created the ultimate weapon of death. And it's horrible.
53:32
It's the worst thing that you could ever do.
53:34
And this is a guy that grew up with poetry and art and studying Picasso and and he started being very vocal about how awful this weapon of mass destruction was.
53:48
And Hoover had just become president, and Hoover was very pro-military, pro-weapons, pro-building better bombs.
53:58
And they went after him in a witch hunt and destroyed him. Destroyed Oppenheimer.
54:04
They They like Galileo like just took everything away from him, embarrassed him, shamed him, uh isolate everything that you could imagine.
54:13
But he was in court, and they asked him in court, they said, "How many people would it take to sneak an atomic bomb into New York?"
54:25
And his answer was, "Three."
54:27
Just three people that are willing to take that risk.
54:30
"Okay, how would you find that bomb?"
54:33
And he said with a screwdriver.
54:35
Cuz you have to open every single nut and bolt in the city to to detect it cuz there's no way to.
54:41
So, the idea of that, you know, that anybody could take a dirty bomb, put it in any city, and there's nothing that that could be done about that.
54:51
I think, you know, that that's something that's I think a real real it human issue.
54:58
So, anyway, that's that's what I've learned recently.
55:00
It's just that there I don't know how it relates to No, no, this This actually leads me to ask of of It seems like almost all of the books that we've or that you've talked about so far have a component of tragedy.
55:15
I mean, you look at Cervantes, you look at this, Primo Levi.
55:19
Like there's some element of tragedy or suffering in these books.
55:24
Is Is that Is that just coincidence that those are the books that came up, or do you tend to pick books that have that element?
55:33
One of my favorite books is Man's Search for Meaning.
55:35
And at the end of that book, he says, "Since Auschwitz, we know what man is capable of, and since Hiroshima, we know what's at stake."
55:47
So, I've been obsessed with the They say, you know, one of the TED Talks I love is about what happens if a dirty bomb goes off.
55:52
And he says He says it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when.
55:58
So, it's like I do think we're at a critical time where we need to really, you know, analyze why there are so many weapons of mass destruction.
56:07
Why why they're trying to make bigger ones.
56:08
Anyway, you know, it's it's so I think that's a real concern, and and I like to read about these things because yeah, I do think it's important to think about these things and then address them on some level. I guess. I don't know. Uh for sure.
56:21
I mean, also, you look at say like electromagnetic pulse weapons in like the Great Lakes area knocking out communications in Chicago.
56:31
I mean, this is also one of those questions of probably when, not if.
56:37
Really really pleasant topics to talk about.
56:39
Pleasant topics to talk about, but to to maybe focus on If you had So, you gave a fantastic TED Talk.
56:47
If you had to give a TED Talk on something that you're not known for at all, like some other obsession that you have that maybe people don't know about, what would you What would you give it on?
56:58
Wow, that's a great question.
57:02
What the hell would I talk about?
57:05
Something I don't know about. That seems so scary.
57:07
Or something you know about that people don't know about.
57:10
the reason Do you know the reason people are horrified of giving speeches in public? Why is that?
57:16
So, I was reading a book of public speaking. I forget by who.
57:20
And he said basically when you're standing on a stage with lots of eyeballs looking at you, goes back a million years.
57:26
If you were in Africa and you were living in a in a in a protected, let's say, a cave or a shelter of some sort, when you went When you went out into an open field or a plateau, and suddenly there were lots of eyes on you, you had to be worried because those were predators that were going to eat you.
57:42
So, it's like when you're standing basically exposed where everybody can see you, you're suddenly an open target.
57:48
So, your wiring of your brain is I don't want to stand up here with everybody staring at me because it's counterintuitive to what we've learned to survive over the last, you know, 1.
57:58
5 million years or even longer, whatever, you know, whatever it is. So, that's the reason.
58:02
So, anyway, if I had to give a public talk about something I didn't know about, I would talk at the TED Conference about my favorite food.
58:15
What's your favorite food?
58:15
Well, there's a pizza shop in Brooklyn.
58:16
Actually, okay, see No, no, no. It's called the Faras.
58:21
And the guy has made over a million and a half pizzas. To me, he's an artist.
58:26
And it looks like a soup kitchen.
58:28
And when you go in there, it it's like the everything is kind of like messy, nothing fancy, and there's like these things that this kid stuck on the wall, and they're like crooked and sideways.
58:40
And it's like reviews that he's gotten where the New York Times puts them on the cover and says, "This isn't pizza, this is art."
58:48
Or it's a cover of Time Out saying he's the most underrated thing in New York.
58:52
You know, so it's like all these amazing reviews.
58:53
And when you go there, the guy, he's made over a million and a half pizzas.
58:57
He's been doing it for 50 some years, and his hands look like polar bear hands cuz he's No, no, because he's reached into that oven so many times and pulled out pizzas bare bare-handed that you that you couldn't even eat for 5 minutes cuz it's too hot. Yeah.
59:13
And the guy just loves doing what he does.
59:15
He's He's a perfectionist. He won't sell out.
59:17
He won't go do it anywhere else.
59:19
He stays at this little shop.
59:20
So, so, you know, I'm fascinated with people like that, you know, people that just get so obsessed with their thing and want to do it right, and they're not in it for the profit or making money.
59:29
He's just in it for the love of making the greatest pizza.
59:31
So, it's like the reason I fluctuate, I stay away from there.
59:38
I think that'd be a good TED Talk.
59:40
Yeah, just no, but I'd like to talking about people that are so amazing what they do that just have this passion that have done that he like he basically that the mozzarella is fresh, he the the the basil is from Israel, he grows it in his garden sometimes and he has like all these incredible rich ingredients and when the when when the when the dough was out the the the shop is closed.
59:59
You don't know if it's going to be open when you get there.
1:00:03
When you do get there, there's a huge line.
1:00:05
It's a you know, the forest. It's amazing.
1:00:07
I'll be in New York soon. That's my first stop.
1:00:11
I F A R A, the Fausto's pizza.
1:00:15
I I don't know how that would be a TED Talk, but could totally do a TED Talk on that.
1:00:18
I'd listen for 20 minutes to you talking about pizza.
1:00:24
Do you have a quote you have you seem to have a very good memory for what you've read.
1:00:28
And this doesn't have to be from something you've read, but do you have a quote that you live by or think of often or any quotes?
1:00:35
You were before talking about quotes from Siddhartha.
1:00:37
He you were saying I can fast, I can but he also says love is stronger than hate, soft is stronger than hard, water is stronger than stone.
1:00:50
So, those I think that's how it goes.
1:00:50
I think that that's that's that's one of my favorite pieces of that book.
1:00:54
I like the Abraham Lincoln quote when I do good, I feel good.
1:00:59
When I do bad, I feel bad and that's my religion.
1:01:05
You know, that that quote I like. There's so many.
1:01:07
One of my favorites is Michelangelo he says beauty is the purgation of superfluities.
1:01:13
And basically when he made the David, they asked him how did he make this beautiful thing out of the slab of marble and he said well, the beauty was inside it just had to cut away all the the crap basically. Mhm.
1:01:24
So, beauty is the purgation of superfluities.
1:01:26
I remember I had to look up all the words to understand what it meant, but it's so poetic and incredible.
1:01:34
If you were say teaching a ninth-grade class or a freshman class in college and you could teach anything, what would you teach? I guess magic.
1:01:48
I that makes perfect sense. Moving on.
1:01:52
Yeah, that was all right.
1:01:54
That's that's a good that's that's the right answer.
1:01:57
Can you think if you look back on your life, your career, you can answer either of these.
1:02:02
Do you have a favorite failure of yours? Okay.
1:02:04
Or a failure that actually really sowed the seeds of a later success?
1:02:12
Well, that's the other quote that I love is the Churchill quote where he says success is the ability to move from one failure to another with enthusiasm.
1:02:21
So, I look at everything I never look at anything really as a success.
1:02:23
I always look at it as it's a work a work in progress.
1:02:27
I'm always trying to figure it out.
1:02:29
So, so I don't see it as a failure necessarily.
1:02:33
I see it as practice a work in progress, but so so therefore then everything is not right until it's right, which means it's never going to be right.
1:02:42
So, everything technically is kind of a failure on some level. But not really.
1:02:46
So, and I don't look at failure as a bad thing at all.
1:02:48
That's I'm lucky with that.
1:02:50
I think How do you how do you view it? How do you view it?
1:02:54
It's like work and then the more failures the better you become.
1:02:56
So, it's like, you know, as long as you don't die, you know, something like that killing it.
1:03:01
But but no, it's like it's all a work in progress.
1:03:02
So, I think failure is like one of the best way of building your muscles.
1:03:08
It's like reading books is the best way to build the the brain is like working out.
1:03:12
It's like the more you read, the more the brain starts to really absorb information and think about new ideas and stuff like that.
1:03:18
It seems it seems to me also when I was reading Primo Levi's books that as a chemist, he was trained to look at things in a very experimental mindset. It was just feedback.
1:03:29
It was like hypothesis test feedback and so like you were mentioning having the ear for the latrine Mhm.
1:03:34
and just picking up patterns like that.
1:03:38
I mean, it seems like I strikes me that you think about failure in the way that a scientist might think about it.
1:03:44
I mean, you're testing a lot all the time. Yeah. Yeah, probably.
1:03:47
Well, that's a good place to put an exclamation I shouldn't say an exclamation point, probably just a poetic period and um what's what's next for David Blaine?
1:04:00
That little tour that I've been telling you I'm working on.
1:04:02
So, hopefully I'll I'll I'll eventually get it to feel sort of right and then I'll start taking it out across the country and through the world and I'll try to build a a magic show that I I would actually want to see.
1:04:15
David Blaine, you're amazing.
1:04:15
Guys, give it up for David Blaine. Thank you guys.
1:04:26
All right, thank you guys.
1:04:30
Hey guys, this is Tim again.
1:04:30
Just a few more things before you take off.
1:04:32
Number one, this is Five-Bullet Friday.
1:04:34
Do you want to get a short email from me?
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Would you enjoy getting a short email from me every Friday and that provides a little morsel of fun before the weekend?
1:04:44
And Five-Bullet Friday is a very short email where I share the coolest things I've found or that I've been pondering over the week.
1:04:53
That could include favorite new albums that I've discovered.
1:04:55
It could include gizmos and gadgets and all sorts of weird [ __ ] that I've somehow dug up in the the world of the esoteric as I do.
1:05:03
It could include favorite articles that I've read and that I've shared with my close friends for instance. And it's very short.
1:05:11
It's just a little tiny bite of goodness before you head off for the weekend.
1:05:16
So, if you want to receive that, check it out.
1:05:18
Just go to fourhourworkweek. com. That's fourhourworkweek.
1:05:22
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1:05:28
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1:05:30
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