A Quote by Mason Cooley
Magic trick: to make people disappear, ask them to fulfill their promises.
Related Quotes
Politicians make a lot of promises when they are campaigning, and they come to towns, and people get enthusiastic about them coming to their communities. And then they don't fulfill the promises.
I had a point of view, which was different. I looked at magic as theater, as storytelling, and I tried to have an approach that was different from what they were doing. "How can I move people and really get them to dream with a card trick, with coin magic, or even a piece of stage magic?"
When I'm traveling a lot the flight attendants will ask what I do and if I say I'm a magician then I have to do a trick. But if it's a red eye flight and I haven't slept at all, I'll say I'm a comedian. And then they say, "Do a joke." But if you're a magician you should be able to do a trick anywhere, any time of day. And if it's not the best situation to showcase what I do then I'll offer them tickets to my show that night. Trying to do a magic trick right outside of an airplane lavatory isn't the best viewing conditions.
My experience in work, even going to work with Scorsese, is that people always think there's some magic trick. There's no magic trick. The people who are really good at what they do do simple things really, really well.
People think they want to know how magic works, but really they don't. How it works is never as amazing as what the trick was in the first place, so it's never going to make you feel good. Somebody just wanting to know how a trick works is never enough to make me want to tell them.
Many people expect, just as they did then, "those at the top" to make all their decisions for them: Please get us work, and take care of our rent. These people vote for those who shout the loudest and deliver promises that are ultimately impossible to fulfill.
The goal is to really blur the line. Can you perform a magic trick in a way that someone doesn't think it's a magic trick but is something amazing they haven't seen before? Then they have to wrestle with reality.
There are certain promises you make that are more sacred than anything that happens in a court of law,I don't care how many Bibles you put your hand on.Some of the promises,it's true,you make to young,before you really have an understanding of what they mean.But once you've made those first promises,other promises are called for.And the thing is you can't deny the new ones without betraying the old ones.The promises get bigger,there are more people to be hurt and disappointed if you don't live up to them.Then, at some point, your called upon to make a promise to a dying man.
There are somewhere between 20,000 and 30,000 working magic professionals in the world, and since we debuted our Magic Kit, we have sold over 1 million. So it's for people who have a strong interest, but be it for one trick or a lifetime, we will be there for them. We will guide them so they don't waste their money.
Flip-flopping is kind of an easy thing to identify. During a recent convention, we heard an irate Senator make an angry speech declaring that it is not what you say but, rather, what you do that counts. You flip-flop when you make promises and fail to fulfill them.
People who are just starting out are always sort of coming to me for advice as the example of "independent girl," and lots of people ask, well, how did you get the booking agent or the national distribution or the tours? And I look at them like, "Good lord! Relax!" I mean, how I did it was to not care about it and to not even think about it for years and years. All I thought about was getting the next little gig in the little bar, and I get this sense that people want me to give them the secret formula or the magic trick to make it all happen.
The only limits to prayer are the promises of God and His ability to fulfill those promises.
Now the British are coming. I think Cameron should ask the Chinese government not to make people 'disappear' or to jail them merely because they have different opinions.
In the first place, you shouldn't believe in promises. The world is full of them: the promises of riches, of eternal salvation, of infinite love. Some people think they can promise anything, others accept whatever seems to guarantee better days ahead, as, I suspect is your case. Those who make promises they don't keep end up powerless and frustrated, and exactly the fate awaits those who believe promises.
Making promises to myself, in my personal writing practice, has been important to me all my life. In practical application it is so much easier for me to make promises to others, and keep them, than it is to make promises to myself. "Why is that?" and the answer I gave myself is that in making promises to others I create a model of accountability and reinforcement. I duplicate that in my writing and have grown increasingly better at making and keeping promises to myself.
Health foods make promises that only the Second Coming could fulfill.
Related Authors
Ayn Rand Quotes
Russian
Writer
C. S. Lewis Quotes
British
Writer
Francois de La Rochefoucauld Quotes
French
Writer
Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes
English
Writer
H. L. Mencken Quotes
American
Writer
Haruki Murakami Quotes
Japanese
Writer
J. R. R. Tolkien Quotes
English
Writer
Kurt Vonnegut Quotes
American
Writer
Leo Tolstoy Quotes
Russian
Writer
Mark Twain Quotes
American
Writer
Ray Bradbury Quotes
American
Writer
Samuel Johnson Quotes
English
Writer
Seth Godin Quotes
American
Writer
Sherrilyn Kenyon Quotes
American
Writer
Suzanne Collins Quotes
American
Writer