Teach Me Magic Tricks
Many years ago when I was a kid, I remember asking my father to teach me magic tricks because I wanted to perform in front of my friends and didn't know where to start. I was very young and wanted to learn desperately, but Dad had a penchant for doing things by the book...and that covered all aspects of my growing up, not just learning magic tricks.
So here I am as a young kid, starting out with the easiest of tricks and then my Dad made me do exercises also to build up my skills and help me down the road when I decided I was ready to perform.
And practice I did, over and over and over until I got the trick right, even the easiest ones sometimes seemed to take forever for me to get good at. Then I couldn't perform just any old time, I had to be really good at the trick or tricks before he would let me even think of showing what I could do to an admiring audience.
But, of course, all this training was a boon to my magic career in later years even though I thought it was over the top when I was a kid. I realized just what a good thing my Dad had done for me in instilling the desire for doing things right and never giving up until you could get it right. As I kid I just wanted the limelight and the adoration of friends and family when they saw me perform; I had no idea what I was in for when I asked my Dad to teach me magic tricks.
All this training also placed in me a strength of character that has carried through to this day and is something I always thank my Dad for. As I dropped and fumbled my tricks while practicing as a kid, I realized that in order to get really good at this magic stuff and to get where I wanted to be, I had to stick to it and follow it to the end, never giving up. All these years, that thinking has held me in good stead and I am thankful for it.
Today's youth don't seem to have the same way of thinking when they are learning anything these days, much less magic tricks. This lack of character and stick-to-it-ness can be a detriment if carried too far and not clipped in the bud. One thing is they needn't beg anyone to "teach me magic tricks" because everything they need to learn is at their fingertips and they only need to sit down in front of a computer to find out everything they need.
But these tools and the information on the internet sites can take you only so far; after that you need to jump in with both feet and really commit yourself to learning and learning the material well if you are going to do a performance with any amount of credibility.
So on that point, there is just one main factor that has remained the same after all these years and will always prevail, and that is practice, practice, practice. So if you are asked by someone, especially a young child to "teach me magic tricks, please"; do them a favor and remind them just how much practice is involved and they need to be willing to invest that if they have any hope of succeeding in anything, not just magic.