
14 years ago: the day Teller gave me the secret to my career in magic. - Sukotto
http://shwood.squarespace.com/news/2009/9/21/14-years-ago-the-day-teller-gave-me-the-secret-to-my-career.html
======
kevinalexbrown
It took me a while to appreciate it, but what I enjoyed most about this was
the letter from Brushwood to Teller. Teller's letter was awesome in all of the
general ways, and he makes great points about about doing something besides
the thing you want to excel at.

But Brushwood's email was great because it asked for advice for a _specific
problem_ , and it was a problem that Teller _had the expertise to answer_. Not
"Oh Teller! I want to be a great magician just like you!" Not "What are 10
things an aspiring magician should do?" Not "Dear Teller, would you mind
sending me information you find relevant or letting me pick your brain over
coffee?" It was "I want to develop my own style, here's what I've done to that
end. I've had some success, but here's how I struggled with taking it to the
next level. What do you suggest, as someone who's accomplished this?" Emails
like that tend to get the best kinds of responses.

~~~
jilebedev
>It was "I want to develop my own style, here's what I've done to that end.
I've had some success, but here's how I struggled with taking it to the next
level. What do you suggest, as someone who's accomplished this?"

Connecting thought from this video:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywu7Vu8Hko0>

Quote, not verbatim: "Roadblocks are there to stop people who don't want it
badly enough."

Questions like...

> "Oh Teller! I want to be a great magician just like you!"

> "What are 10 things an aspiring magician should do?"

> "Dear Teller, would you mind sending me information you find relevant or
> letting me pick your brain over coffee?"

... are indications of people who don't want it badly enough. They are
infatuated with the fabulous end product, but not infatuated enough to really
dive into it. The advice to "prod and demonstrate the failure/successes of
your prodding before asking for advice" is not a heuristic against laziness -
rather, it's meant to find out the depth of passion in the inquirer. Putting
effort into an infatuation elevates it from a passing delightful thought into
a serious, long-term passion. People who have chased life-long passions like
to help those who aim to do the same.

~~~
solutionyogi
Here's the link to the actual lecture with relevant quote.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ji5_MqicxSo&t=5m45s](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ji5_MqicxSo&t=5m45s)

~~~
thebigshane

       The brick walls are there for a reason. Right? The brick 
       walls are not there to keep us out, the brick walls are 
       there to give us a chance to show how badly we want 
       something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the 
       people who don't want it badly enough.
    
       -Randy Pausch

------
boredguy8
Is anyone else as impressed as I am that Teller remembered the name of an up-
and-coming magician they met after a show more than a year earlier? And that
he referenced the 'inside joke' with no prompting?

Also, I think folks are missing what seems to me to be the key takeaway: "And
if I'm good, it's because I should be a film editor. Bach should have written
opera or plays. But instead, he worked in eighteenth-century counterpoint."
He's taking something that's well understood in one area and bringing it to an
area where that thing is not understood. Sometimes people call that a
'distinctive'. Sometimes it's a 'paradigm shift'. Teller could have been an
average film editor, or he could take ideas from film and bring them to magic.

~~~
SoftwareMaven
I actually went back to e original letter to see if I had missed a reference.
From what I've seen of Teller, though, it isn't surprising that he would
remember or that he would reply. He's one of the few famous people I wouldn't
mind meeting.

~~~
zecho
If you'd like to meet him, even briefly, go to the Penn and Teller show at the
Rio in Vegas. After every show, they hang out in the hallway and chat with the
audience as they leave. They usually wait until everyone is gone before they
head out. (By the way, Teller's letter mentions his version of The Miser's
Dream, which is still in his act. And it's the most amazing interpretation of
it I've ever seen.)

I always joked that if college didn't work out, I'd work as a street magician.
As I've traveled around the country, I still make a point, time permitting, to
stop by magic shops. I've yet to find one that doesn't have something from
Teller written on the walls somewhere.

~~~
ars
Isaac Asimov and Piers Anthony have both written in their books that they
never suffer from writers block, and the reason both gave is that they read
and reply to letters from their audience. Isaac Asimov especially replied to
every single letter he received (I'm not sure about Piers Anthony).

Penn and Teller seem to have the same idea: Interact with every member of your
audience who wants to talk to you. And they are one of the most successful
magicians.

I think everyone should learn from this. Do you write a blog? Read every
single comment you get, and reply to as many as you can. Run a business? Read
as much customer service mail as you can. And if you are small read ALL of it.

~~~
alanfalcon
Piers Anthony had one ongoing correspondence with a fan, and he wrote so much
that he published a novel length book, Letters To Jenny, containing that
correspondence. And it's a good read, too. Obviously Peirs doesn't write so
much to everyone, and I can't answer whether he responds to everyone, but he
certainly welcomes the letters.

------
Sukotto
I think there are some great points that adapt well to the startup mindset.

* [Ship stuff]. A lot. Try stuff. Make your best stab and keep stabbing. If it's there in your heart, it will eventually find its way out. Or you will give up and have a prudent, contented life doing something else.

* We did not start as friends, but as people who respected and admired each other. Crucial, absolutely crucial for a partnership.

* Have heroes outside of [startups / technology / business]. ... You're welcome to borrow [other people's], but you must learn to love them yourself for your own reasons. Then they'll push you in the right direction.

* Love something besides [technology / startups / business]. Get inspired by a particular poet, film-maker, sculptor, composer. You will never be [ $famous_startup_personality]. But if you want to be, say, the Salvador Dali of [startups / technology / business], THERE'S an opening.

~~~
patrickyeon
I also especially liked the "be the $personality of $unrelated_domain". I
think it could work really well because you can extract "meta-qualities" (if
you'll excuse the made up term) that personality has and re-apply them to your
domain.

Musically, punk rock popped into existence in a world of disco and
polished/complex 'arena rock', bringing music back down to the essentials and
playing it loud and fast. Be the punk rocker of startups by creating products
that are lean, refuse to hide anything under a polish, and don't apologize for
it.

When you edit a video (without musical soundtrack), you can get a good pacing
for the scene by editing it to sync up with a song that evokes the emotions
you want to express, and then removing the song when you render out. In this
way you take in the qualities of pacing/emotions of the music, but don't need
to actually reference the music.

And of course, we all write our code like poets. We rewrite lines that don't
fit in well, and we refactor when functions get too long. Or we at least
recognize when we're reading something that someone has put effort into
crafting.

I'm not sure I'm supporting the argument well, so much as I'm just dumping out
thoughts that the idea triggered.

------
alanfalcon
"Here's a compositional secret. It's so obvious and simple, you'll say to
yourself, 'This man is bullshitting me.' I am not. This is one of the most
fundamental things in all theatrical movie composition and yet magicians know
nothing of it. Ready?

Surprise me.

That's it. Place 2 and 2 right in front of my nose, but make me think I'm
seeing 5. Then reveal the truth, 4!, and surprise me."

Teller absolutely means this. Watching the Penn and Teller Magic and Mystery
Tour, this was the one best scenes in that show or in anything else I watched
on Netflix last year:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgtgOs_OkTU>

Yes, Teller is speaking, but that isn't what matters at all. The takeaway for
me is that you must KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE! This is a magic trick that would not
be a magic trick at all if it weren't performed for someone like Teller, a
master of his craft. This scene from an otherwise interesting but forgettable
show blew my mind.

~~~
calloc
Thanks for letting me know that the movie is on Netflix. Going to watch it now
:-)

------
mattmaroon
Humorous story: I once got yelled at by Teller. I was in Vegas for the World
Series of Poker which was held at the Rio, the same casino where their show
runs. The previous night I had had dinner at Okada with Penn's wife, Emily,
who was a friend of the friend who put the dinner together. I also had tickets
the next day to see their show for the first time.

On a break from my tournament I stopped by Starbucks to properly caffienate
and saw Penn and Teller sitting in a corner. I went over to introduce myself,
as I would to the spouse of anyone I had just met if I somehow recognized
them. Right when I got there Teller gave me the evil eye and said something
like "Can't you see we're working here?".

Of course they were just sitting at a Starbucks talking. They didn't have any
props or anything. And probably they were hashing out details for the show or
something, but I still found it quite rude, especially since I know they greet
people outside of the show every night afterward.

But mostly I just thought it was funny to get yelled at by a guy most people
think is mute.

~~~
MengYuanLong
I wrote out a significant response about the strange segregation of being a
celebrity (of any repute) before rereading your post.

The most interesting thing to me is that within the span of 24 hours you ate
alone with one partner's wife and the next day got yelled at by the other
partner.

Did you talk to them after the show?

~~~
mattmaroon
I went up and said hi and left it at that. I didn't really think ill of Teller
for the whole thing, I can't imagine what it's like to be bothered all the
time. I more than anything thought it was funny to be yelled at by a guy who
is possibly more famous for not talking than anyone in history.

------
user24
I learned this lesson accidentally.

I was showing a friend a new card trick I'd made up, fanned the cards and
asked him to pick one, remember it and replace it into the deck. As he did
that I got confused - I thought I'd gone wrong and, apologising, asked him to
pick another card. Fanned the cards again and he looked down at them to pick
another one. In the middle of the fan, staring right back at him one card was
face up; the card he'd chosen the first time.

I hadn't gone wrong at all, the trick had gone perfectly - I was just confused
and _thought_ I'd gone wrong when I hadnt. It wasn't the plot line I'd
originally had in mind for the trick, but it blew him away because when he
went to pick a card the second time he wasn't expecting to see the card he
picked the first time. The surprise was a huge contributing factor to the
impact of the trick.

------
moreorless
Brian Brushwood is an amazing magician, but as a person, he is even more
amazing. I had the fortune of meeting him last weekend at a common friend's
house and saw him take time out to entertain a kid. If you're not familiar
with his work, he has a weekly podcast on Revision3.com
(<http://revision3.com/scamschool>).

~~~
gitarr
He is even more prominent on TWiT (<http://twit.tv/>) doing shows like NSFW or
GameOn etc.

~~~
moreorless
This is not surprising considering that his original producer
(<http://twit.tv/people/eileen-rivera>) for Scamschool on Revision3.com went
to Twit.tv.

------
bambax
> _Here's a compositional secret. (..) Surprise me._

> _Here's how surprise works. While holding my attention, you withold basic
> plot information. Feed it to me little by little. Make me try and figure out
> what's going on. Tease me in one direction. Throw in a false ending. Then
> turn it around and flip me over._

This is the secret of storytelling. Hell, it's the secret of art. Music,
painting, writing, architecture, wine making... you name it.

Storytelling > story, BTW. That's why P&T can make new with the same old
tricks. If you tell the same old story in a new way, it feels unique.

The surprise is not in the content, it's in the experience.

------
jasonkolb
I recall reading a study once where the brain waves of people listening to a
story literally synchronized with the brain waves of the person telling the
story. Quite literally the storyteller was controlling the minds of the
listeners.

Apparently we are hard-wired to become entranced by stories, but there is a
skill to telling them in a way that doesn't break the trance--or, as Teller
talks about, leading people to a place where you can smash the trance in a
dramatic way for maximum impact.

Storytelling has fascinated me ever since I read that study. I must go find it
again.

~~~
BrandonM
That sounds very interesting, and I'd love to read the study. Please post back
here if you find it.

~~~
jasonkolb
Here ya go sir
[http://mblogs.discovermagazine.com/80beats/2010/07/27/study-...](http://mblogs.discovermagazine.com/80beats/2010/07/27/study-
the-brains-of-storytellers-and-their-listeners-actually-sync-up/)

~~~
Splines
There's also a related radiolab episode:
[http://www.radiolab.org/2011/apr/18/soul-mates-and-brain-
dou...](http://www.radiolab.org/2011/apr/18/soul-mates-and-brain-doubles/)

------
randall
First: Brian is the man. (Had him on a show I used to be on called The 404,
and he had me both laughing and vomiting by the end of the show.)

Second: Teller's advice is echoed by another great... Ira Glass. He talked
about how to make it in broadcasting.
[http://shorty.randallcbennett.com/post/36484012/ira-glass-
gi...](http://shorty.randallcbennett.com/post/36484012/ira-glass-gives-
creative-types-a-pep-talk-one-of)

The thing with all of this is pretty simple. When you start, you have taste.
If you have good taste, you'll know what you're making isn't quite what you
want, but it's on the way to being good. If you keep perfecting your taste
along the way, you're making positive progress. For startup entreprenuers,
that often means starting lots of insignificant companies / working at
insignificant companies on your way to perfecting the sense of who you are.

I feel like I'm _just_ starting to know who I am professionally. It's been
about 7 years, and now I know that the only thing I want to do is make it so
anyone can create TV quality video without a TV quality budget.

Failing in numerous ways has finally led me to figure out who I am. Now, it's
time to take what I've learned and actually contribute something to the world.

For Brian, it's kickass magic which people can consume online. For me, who
knows what my end "product" will be, but either way, if you don't enjoy the
taste refining process, you'll probably both be dissatisfied with your life,
but also miss out when you're about to break through.

I hope anyway.

------
mgallivan
Why does transferring knowledge across domains have such exponential returns?

Is it only because the time it takes other fields to adapt to new methodology
is longer - or are there other factors?

EDIT: Holy crap, I worded this terribly.

Rewritten: Why does going across domains with new ideas have such high
returns? Obviously you're a fresh idea but are there other reasons that
influence your success?

~~~
yassim
"A change in perspective is worth 80 IQ points." (Alan Kay and others)

Basicly I think its because they have different points of view on problems we
can find similarities in.

~~~
gwern
Ah, but _which_ perspective? One can't sell non-apples, and 'a stroll through
the insane asylum demonstrates that faith proves nothing'.

Perlis, epigram 39: "Re graphics: A picture is worth 10K words - but only
those to describe the picture. Hardly any sets of 10K words can be adequately
described with pictures."

~~~
khafra
Is there any way to discover how much selection effect occurs here? I wonder
how many people apply insights from study in one field to another, and utterly
fail because they weren't applicable at all.

------
abalone
Teller closes with a great point about where to draw inspiration from. Look
beyond your own field. If you can distill something about the greatness you
admire in a different art and adapt it to yours, then you will have
accomplished something original. Study the masters, but especially the masters
of other arts.

I wonder if the same could be said for software engineering. Maybe it's
pretentious but I like to think of it as a practical art. Certainly much of
what Teller teaches about "how to surprise" could apply to Steve Jobs'
keynotes. Withhold information. Tease. Throw in a false ending. LAND the real
ending.

Sounds like Jobs had a lot in common with magicians.

------
ctdonath
Great letter. Thrilled at the start where he remembers, without prodding, one
of thousands of people he briefly met long before. Great insights, prompted by
the questions I want to ask great people but could not put in words.

P&T have a great show. As the letter, they tell so much more than just clever
tricks - they comment on the human condition. Because of its insights into
Occam's Razor "Teller Smoking" is my oft-recounted favorite ... Well, that and
the bullet trick, but that because I inspected Teller's bullet, shell and gun,
and still have the shell I marked and the bullet (also marked) Penn "caught"
and spat into my hand.

------
motoford
Hey did you guys check out the comments section with that one guy calling BS,
saying regular people didn't have access to email way back in 1995? Good
stuff. I love how people assume their tiny reality is _the_ reality.

~~~
dlinder
Heh, I noticed that guy, too - made me look up my earliest Usenet post, July
4, 1994, when I was 15 years old. I had other Usenet, Fido, and BBS identities
before that, but I can't remember what they were.

So yeah, in 1994, a 15 year old and his 12 year old brother were definitely
able to figure out their way onto the "Live Internet" (to differentiate from
dialup relay like Fido or UUCP)

Then came the convincing of the parents to get a dedicated line so we could
leave our SLIP connection up 24/7 so that others could check our finger
status, etc....

~~~
motoford
Similar case here, but it was 1984 when I was 15 and had email. Didn't have
internet then of course, but BBSes were already linked, with email and forums
being synced among the others in the network every night.

Even then I knew I was late to the game, Compu$erve was in it's prime, and the
grassroots infrastructure was rapidly maturing.

That's what kills me with this guy pulling the "IT Professional" card. 10
years later claiming regular people didn't have email. That's like 100
computer years.

------
adrian201
What I took away the most from this article is taking things outside of your
realm and applying it... Goes hand-in-hand with “Good artists copy, Great
artists steal”

------
mathattack
Yet another reason to love P and T. Although unmentioned he captured the
valley spirit of execs mentoring youngsters who might nonetheless become
competitors.

------
kposehn
Teller's letter is amazing, and I think we all have much to learn from it.

------
jackreichert
This is truly relevant to all who strive for greatness.

------
huhtenberg
> _Surprise. Withold information._

Works well for Apple.

------
rglover
Wonderful.

------
michaelkscott
Not a very relevant HN material. Still puzzled on why it got so many votes.

