YouSaid · the spoken record

Simon Coronel

lines on the record: 195
first: 2023-06-28
most recent: 2023-06-28
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“What if you could create the illusion of it being created instantly so a piece of the act then lingers beyond the end of it into the world? And that was the idea. And in 2012, I did this first kind of very rough, janky, thrown-together seed of the pans version of it that was not good but worked and I loved the idea. And I also then gave up on magic competitions because they're great, they serve a purpose, but at the time I was trying to have a career. I now quit my full-time job to go full magic, which I don't necessarily recommend, but has been going okay.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“There's still this amazing photo somewhere of me on stage in 2012 accepting this award with this completely bemused expression on my face. I believe it but just surprised like the last thing I saw coming. And so that happened. And the idea that I threw together at the last minute that came to me at like 4 a.m. while stressed out and vaguely panicked was I'd always been obsessed with this idea of can you take this fleeting, transcendent instant of wonder and somehow preserve it into something physical and tangible that lengthens that moment lets you sit in that space longer because I love that space. That space is powerful and life-changing. And the idea was, what if you did an act where you create one of these things live?”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And Yao and YC and everybody in Melbourne who helped with that and all the names I'm now forgetting in the moment and somehow got something adequate over the line and it ended up winning the award for most original closer fact not best close effect but most original which isn't necessarily the same and I think it was because in that insane pressure cooker of having to come up with something I count with something so bizarre and unusual out of just sheer brute force necessity of what can we do with what's available There wasn't any time to develop any sort of good polished methods. We had to just use some bizarre stuff and just decide, you know what, I don't even know if this is going to work. But let's try it and miraculously see it did work. Barely. Like I still watch the video of that and just, oh, God, the amount of things that almost went wrong but failed to is still insane. Somehow it got across the line and got this originality award, which again, I hadn't expected, hadn't been aiming for originality. I'd just been.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That happened. Then, in 2012, three years later, I enter again. It's now in the UK this time. And the very short version of that very long story is I prepare a different routine, again, for over a year, and I find out about two weeks before the competition that a big chunk of what I'm planning to do isn't going to work. Now, normally, what you would do is pull out of the competition at that point or try and find something else to replace it and come with something. I possibly naively, stupidly chose the latter. Turns out I'm not a quitter. Once we're doing it, we're doing it. And it was insane. I am still kind of astonished, you could call it legal insanity that went for it, worked with an amazing group of people, friends, shout out to Dave.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You just squeaked into something, and I was ecstatic, and it was amazing. And very quickly, I realized that I was like, oh my God, I've made it. This is incredible. And then it did nothing for my career or life in any way whatsoever. So that band-aid got ripped off pretty quickly, which was probably healthy in hindsight. Yeah. There was the moment where the Chinese media came up, and I was there with a friend who'd won second prize in his category. And we were going, oh my God, this is amazing. The Chinese media come up and go, you are prize winners. We're like, yeah, thinking, yes, this is awesome. We're going to be famous now. And they go, what did you win? I go, I tied for third in close-up magic. And Charlie here came second in parlor magic, and they went first. I'm like, oh, no, but like, and then they just, oh, sorry, and left.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Ended up worked for over a year on preparing the routine and getting ready for the competition and ended up tying for third prize in the close-up magic category, which was so far beyond what I'd imagined. I think about that thing that the bronze medalist is often happier than the silver medalist. The silver medal is missed out on gold, the bronze medalist missed out on having nothing. You know who's even happier than the bronze medalist? The person who tied for bronze. Because maybe fourth place was a long way below you. But when you tie for third, you are a hair's breadth from nothing.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And the war, the magic shows what it's got. And it's always got something cool. And also a lot of stuff that sucks and everything in between. And in 2009, it was going to be in China for the first time ever. It's mostly been in Europe throughout its history. It's always in a different city around the world. And I ended up with the opportunity to be the only Australian entrant because clubs get given entry slots pro rated based on membership. And Australia has a very small population. And so again, getting those critical masses is very hard in Australia. And it's one of the reasons I eventually came to the US to seek more people and more inspiration. There are plenty of really cool people there, but again, the critical mass just isn't there as much. And I went, oh my God, the prospect to who gets the chance to represent their country at the World Championships of anything, particularly a kid who didn't really have much he felt he was talented at. This was extraordinary and terrifying and all the things. And so I did it. And much like kind of rocky, I just wanted to compete and not embarrass myself and my country. That was the goal, just to compete at a world stage was already more than I'd ever imagined.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And so organizations where these people get together and workshop and talk and exchange ideas, some of those then affiliate with FISM, which is French for International Federation of Magic Societies that began in like the 50s as a way to kind of like try to unite, like to make some international collaboration, which is a really healthy, nice thing. And it's like any organization, there's politics and there's a bunch of bullshit, but mostly it's a really good thing overall. And the main thing they run is every three years. They have a big competition that is kind of the de facto magic world championships as a way to kind of, I think of it as to paraphrase Rick and Morty every three years Fism says to the world of magic, show us what you got.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Make a living and still chase this passion. Again, with no thought that it was going to be a profession or anything at this point. It was just like, I just loved it intrinsically. It was fascinating. And then 2009, so the Magic World Championships, the Sing Fizm, which stands for Something in French that we can get into or not, it's basically a way to think of it is like imagine the UN of Magic Clubs. And again, Magic Clubs, professional organizations for technicians, designers who try to create the illusions of impossibility, right? That's the way to think of magic. Special effects design, but live and in some ways more powerful.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Frequently been surprised by what people haven't found Reson So I enter and I unexpectedly win it. I go, holy shit, very unexpected. And so that was the first sort of sense I got that maybe, maybe I'm kind of onto something here. Maybe I've got something I'm doing that's working, that's kind of exciting. So I kept starting to enter other competitions. And also I learned from it. It's great to have a deadline. It's great to have a challenging, slightly healthy, stressful thing to work towards. So I kept sort of doing that. I found competitions useful as a way to grow and I kept winning little ones locally, which was really gratifying. And then fast forward a few years of this and still working full time at the job doing magic on the side and on weekends, often when exhausted from 12 hour days at a big corporate job and then going out to like open mics to grind in material and try and get experience and workshop things and just burning the candle just like holding the candle in the fire with tongs not even more than both ends i was just really burning out but i was so excited and needed to”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And also the theme that I've often not really realized how what I'm doing will be experienced or perceived by others. Again, neurodivergency.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Was a thing a guy called Nigel McCullough in Melbourne, a magician, ran a little one-day magic convention, a get together just to have a bunch of workshops and shows called Melbourne's Magic Malaki. In 2001, and it had this close-up magic competition. And at the time, I can't remember why I think I'd like read something or just this idea that it's worth trying things even if they fail, because you gain experience from it. And again, at the time, this was a new idea to me because I was young and, you know, everything. And I went, yeah, you know what? Why not? Step into the arena, you know, try a thing. There was zero percent chance in my mind that I had a shot at it. And I ended up winning it, partly because, again, the thing with competitions, it's often who turns up on the day?”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Jackie and everybody else. But it wasn't really my thing. It didn't play to my strengths, it played to a lot of my weaknesses, which I didn't really understand at the time. And the magic was continuing to grow in the background as a real passion, but there wasn't really a sense I could ever do that professionally. I didn't see much of a market for it where I lived. And I started to sort of win little competitions locally, which was amazing. This was the first time I displayed any sort of noteworthy skill at anything, which was kind of addictive. It's a good feeling. We want to feel significant and competent at things. I hadn't mostly in my life.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And so then fast forward a bunch of years I'm working full time at a graduate job, which I don't really like but is a good experience. And some of the people there were great and I'm glad I did it, but I didn't really fit in. What was the job? I worked for Accenture, big business consulting company. And again, I met some great people there. Shout out to Grant and Thomas.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And so when I saw this magic club and I saw this card trick at age 18, it was the first time in my life that it felt like, again, there was like a crack in reality that I could sort of see something brighter and more extraordinary through. And again, I only realized this like a decade later looking back and trying to make sense of the path. It only becomes clear in hindsight. So it makes sense now. I got so captivated by magic. It was the first time I could kind of engage with that, with something more extraordinary and that altered state of consciousness that was profound. And so I became obsessed. But again, I wasn't particularly gifted at it. There was no apparent natural talent, but I loved it so much that I kept going despite the absence of natural talent. And as we know, that's what tends to make a difference is if you love it enough to stick with it and enjoy the process with no thought as to the destination, which will become a theme as well, I think.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So, as a kid, I was not particularly happy. I was not having a great time growing up. Nothing super horrifying, but I just didn't fit in. Again, I now know neurodivergent. That tends to not be a good time if you don't know that and you're a kid in a normal sort of area. And I realized I was always interested. I figured this out in hindsight. This was looking back. I saw the pattern. I was interested in stuff that evolved kind of breaking out of reality, like ESP and aliens and the X-Files and space exploration and quantum physics and science fiction and just ways that life felt just so mundane and uninspiring and grey and dreary and just and all those things for different reasons weren't accessible to me. Australia didn't have a space program so I couldn't be an astronaut. Quantum physics was real but too hard. Hypnosis was real but not that interesting to me. Aliens don't seem to be real sadly as far as I can tell. Who knows? There was just no way I wanted out of reality. I wanted life to be more extraordinary.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It wasn't even invited. I didn't expect this would happen. That makes it even better. Yeah, I'm just like, oh my God, holy, yeah.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And then I was just backstage decompressing, going, Oh God, thank. Oh man, so glad that's over. Finally, I can relax. For months, I've been looking forward to this moment where I can finally stop stressing. Then a friend comes backstage and goes, You should come look at this. I'm like, what? Just come. And I walk out and I see this mob has gathered spontaneously.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The only small correction I'd make to that, I mean, it wasn't quite 2,000 people. It was a lot, it was hundreds of people, hundreds of people. But the thing that made it even more powerful for me personally was that I didn't actually invite them up. What happened was I had one person on stage who gets given the thing that is created. And they then go back to their seat. I'm like, thank you very much. You know, you get to keep that. That now gets to linger in the world. And I just went, cool, thanks, bye, and just left the stage. I'm like, thank God that's over. Oh my God. That was so stressful. We did it. We got there.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I'm still working out how to tell this story because, again, there are so many ways it can be told. Let's start with a short version and then you can unpack, request unpacking any bits you think are relevant.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Not easy but simple technique. You could do the most profoundly transcendently amazing thing I've ever seen in my life and the implication of the leverage of that was just extraordinary. It's like discovering that you can sort of poke a table and power the entire city with the energy of that poke. It was just, I was so fascinated and just started going to that club every week and just became completely intrigued by what is this art and craft and what the hell? And the motivation was purely understanding. It was just knowledge seeking. I just want to understand this thing I'd seen. Yeah, if you see something amazing intrinsically, I want to understand it and learn more about it.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And Brian, not realizing I hadn't been turning up for them so far, quote unquote, reminded me, oh, the blah blah technique like this from last week where you do this and this. And so in seconds, I went from being profoundly transcendently amazed to seeing how it was done. And it was like, whose quote is it? Give me a leave along enough and a place to stand. Archimedes, yeah. It felt like that. It was this revelation that from this...”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I think, oh, crap, Magic Club. That's right. Oh, God. Where is it again? Damn it. So I turned up about 15 minutes late. Just in time to see someone, this guy Brian, who was one of the special guest sort of teachers, explaining this trick. And he was basically going, okay, now via the blah, blah, blah technique at jargon term I didn't know at the time, you know their card is the king of clubs. And you could just say that. Or you could use the blah blah technique that we talked about last week. And then he took a seven of diamonds. waved it on the table and it changed like right ten inches in front of me into a king of clubs and this was the most incredible thing I had ever seen in my entire life it was just like reality broke down in front of me everything i knew about life and physics and i was like what the it was just this transcendent consuming moment and i sort of made semi-incoherent noises of like wait what the heck what what what what what what is”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“310 yet at this point, the story, and said, Hey, we've got you down as having signed up but not turned up. Do you still want to come? I was like, oh, yeah, Magic Club, right That's right. Oh, yeah. When did you meet again? Wednesdays, 1 p.m. Great. And then Wednesday, 1 p.m. rocked around. And I was like, 1 p.m. I was supposed to be somewhere. I hadn't discovered radical illness yet. I'm like,”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And I'd had like a magic kit when I was 10, but it had as much effect on me as it did on my 10-year-olds, nothing. I had no ability. It was confusing, and I gave up after two days. But, you know, magic was one of the many things I was interested in, like everything. I wanted to learn how everything worked in the world. Again, wasn't doing a great job of it. And I was saying Magic Club, what do you guys do? And they said, well, you know, magic, like card tricks and stuff. And I'm like, oh, I can't do any of that. I tried, but I sucked. So gave up as you do. And they said, well, if you join, we teach you that we've got a beginner's course. And I was like, I don't know. I mean, I don't, I'm not very dexterous. And I was like, why not? Give it a shot. And I remember they had really cool membership cards, which I thought was cool. That kind of tipped me over the edge. And so I just kind of joined. And then I forgot that I joined for the next month because I had other things going on. It was very busy. And then Tina, the club secretary, called me up on my parents' landline because this is pre- I didn't own my 30.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And as with many universities, I think it's similar in the US. There were lots of student clubs and societies around the place. Yeah. And during Orientation Week, one of the main things they have there, you know, it's like a couple of hundred clubs have joined us, you know, the fantasy science fiction society, the chocolate lover's society, the beer connoisseurs society, the taekwondo club, like everything you can imagine and a lot more that some of them are stupid, ridiculous ones, some of them are very serious, special interest ones. And I was just wandering around trying to join stuff to, you know, try and get out of my shell and explore a bit and take advantage of being on a university campus. And there was a table for the Melbourne University Magician Society.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Jifter Software and in first year, like Melbourne University is about 30,000 at the time was a 30,000 student campus. So it's a big serious university, one of the big sort of two or three in Australia.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, that's a new thing for me. I have spent my entire adult life kind of hiding that and not acknowledging that. And literally, in the past few months, I've kind of gone, you know what? Maybe it's time to start being more open about that.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, well, from any perspective, like, what are the electrons doing? What's going on? What happens in a capacitor or an inductor? Like, how do you design a circuit? All the stuff. And I think eventually I realized after many decades of going, why can't I understand these two damn things no matter how much I try and no matter how many people I ask for explanations? And I think it's because for better and worse, it's a lot of both. I don't feel like I understand something unless I completely understand it from the ground up, from the protons upwards to the human experience and everything in between. And I think the way, because of how electricity and music in their own very different ways work, in a way no one understands them to that level. And it took me a long time to realize that. And so I was always asking these questions about, yeah, but what's actually going on down there? And I realized that's not the way it's taught or thought of because I think actually we really don't know.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“There are two things not count in quantum physics because no one understands that there are two things that I have completely failed to understand in my life. One is music, one is electronics. The harm from the heart.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And so I did a psychology major under arts and a software major under engineering. I started off in a computer major, but I sucked at the electrical subjects and did okay at the software subjects, so I saw the writing on the wall and shifted. And, you know, blah, blah.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It comes through. And again, in the bubble I lived in that I hadn't yet realized was a bubble because everyone grows up what's normal to you. You say, yeah, this is what everyone does. You go to university next. That's what you do. And then you get some kind of job and then you work and retire and die. Like that's it. I'm like, oh, fuck. I don't know. That didn't sound very exciting to me, but I didn't know any other options. So I went to university and I failed to get into the degree I applied for, which was engineering slash law as a double major because I don't know. That's what everyone said was good. Be a doctor or a lawyer if you can. I didn't have any better ideas. And I missed out on it. I didn't quite have the grades and I got into engineering arts instead.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And I had no idea what to do with my life. I had no real thing I was good at. I had never really excelled at anything at that point. I tried a whole bunch of stuff, but this is a topic I know you're into. I hadn't learned how to learn yet. I hadn't figured out how to use my own brain yet. And so I was sort of fumbling through most things and tried a bunch of sports and a bunch of martial arts and a bunch of creative arts and, you know, got a couple of small roles in a school play and just nothing really clicked. I wasn't really good at anything. I was like, eh, adequate a bunch. And I got OK grades, but again, it was school was stressful and difficult and I didn't really find it easy. And so I sort of, everyone I knew just, well, you go to university next. That's what you do.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Small ambitions. Oh, look, I mean, I don't know if I was doing a good job with it, but I was interested. Motivation is different from results.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The first thing to note about it, I think, is that I think I was lucky to get into it late. We'll sort of get to why, but I was at university in Melbourne, I'd finished high school, I was interested in everything, I was just an insatiably curious, like science-y engineery, nerdy, brained kid who just wanted to understand the whole universe. Micro all the way to macro and everything in between.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Of the craft and students of it and technicians and everything flooded from all over the world to visit the place and then more people started to move here and slowly Hollywood because of the castle, because of Vernon, because of the Larson family's vision to offer Vernon a really sweet deal to live there and stay there, it became this mecca and this sort of community gathered around it and this incubator, this pressure cooker, this critical mass of talent and ability and creativity that still lingers to this day.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The theory of what's called naturalness, natural action, that before Vernon magic was mostly done in these very sort of like overstated bombastic gestures. And he, from trying to understand like gambling and card cheating, which has to be, magic is, again, historically very showy and dramatic. And look at this. Whereas if you're a card cheat using some of the similar techniques of deception and sleight of hand, you have to look the opposite. You have to be completely unassuming and unnoticeable, draw no attention to yourself. And Vernon's big innovation, again, oversimplifying, was to take this concept of unassuming naturalness hiding in plain sight and start to apply it to magic theory. And this just really changed everything that went after him. And to this day, pretty much every competent magician that performs has elements of Vernon's influence in their technique, their approach. And he basically lived and hung out at the castle for decades. And he was the main, again, not the only, but the main reason why magicians gradually, again, practically...”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It's almost impossible to, no matter where you live in the world, if you get interested in magic, which I did at age 18, it's a whole different topic we can get to, but everyone's heard of it. Its influence extends all over the world. One of the many reasons for it is one of the things that made the Magic Castle the Magic Castle, apart from being this amazing venue and again the eclectic interior, is back in, I don't even know the decade, my magic history sucks, there was a guy called Di Vernon, who a good way to think of him is You could say he was to magic in a way what Einstein was to physics. Not the only person by a long shot, but one of the single ones that had the biggest single-handed influence that changed everything that went after afterwards, a real paradigm shift. And Vernon's big contribution to magic.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It's one of those rare places, particularly in somewhere like LA, that it's the real deal. So many places in LA are kind of trying to pretend to be the thing. This is the actual thing. This is the place. It's history and significance in the world of magic is infinite. There's nothing like it. It's one of a kind. It really is.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Falls in the woods, and there is no sound because there is no magic without the mystery. So you need the targets for magic is the general public. So the magic castle mashes these two unusual bizarre things together and you get magicians like mingling and hanging out and chatting and like workshopping ideas and gossiping or whatever it is. And then you have the general public like yourself coming in to experience the results of this creativity and workshopping and everything. And it's just, it's fascinating. It's a fascinating unique, bizarre place that's the real deal. It's a genuine, profound part of magic history as an art and a craft and a venue.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So, take a moment to imagine that. And when I say magicians, think of them more as cinematic or theatrical special effects designers, but live in person. That's the good word. Don't think wizards. Don't think Harry Potter. Don't think Gandalf. Like think engineers, designers, performers, like special effects engineers who then perform them. Because that's more the mindset. It's like craft at skill, etc. And so it's this club where they can hang out, network, have drinks or dinner together, talk shit, bring guests, private club for magicians to hang out, like a professional network. That's thing number one. Thing number two is a public-focused entertainment venue to take these illusions, these magic effects, and then present those to the general public. Because doing magic for magicians is at best, I don't think very useful and at worst impossible because, you know, the quote-unquote magic, the illusion of impossibility happens literally in the mind of the observer. And if you know how it's done, that illusion doesn't happen. And so, you know, the tree...”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Oh, yeah. So the magic castle is, it's a bizarre, completely unique place. There is nothing like it on earth anywhere. And the easiest way, I think, to think of it is imagine two very separate unrelated things mashed together. Thing number one is a nighttime country club for magicians.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I often find it easier to get work on in those situations because there's not all the distractions of my living space. There's not much I can do except write or think or work or design or whatever it is I'm meant to be working on. And I'm often really productive there.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Completely. Yeah, you're either hanging out doing stuff at home or hanging out doing stuff at the airport. I also find a double benefit to that. I've really become a connoisseur of enjoying sitting in departure gate. How rarely are we exactly where we need to be ahead of time with no stress?”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I have noticed LA and LA Geography and Traffic Aside, one of my weaknesses is that I am not great generally at estimating time and planning ahead. There's almost certainly some kind of executive function disorder going on that I'm in the process and the journey of trying to figure out in my own life. But I've noticed I historically have been late a lot of my life. And I went, you know what? I don't want to be that. I don't want to be that guy. I don't want to do that to people. It's not fun. And I've finally worked out the only way I can reliably be on time for anything is say today. I know, all right, I'm meeting Tim here at this location. I Google Maps for a cafe nearby that has Wi-Fi and looks nice. And I get there an hour or two early. At least an hour, ideally more. Often I end up there like half an hour, 20 minutes early because of all the reasons. And then I just camp out and I either do work or read a book or chill or meditate or whatever. It's easy to kill time. And then by the time I set an alarm for 10 minutes before the thing and they just walk over and I'm exactly.”
2023-06-28 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #679: Simon Coronel, World Champion of Magic — Quitting the Day Job, The Delights of the Magic Castle, Finding Glitches in Reality, Learning How to Use Your Own Brain, and Worshiping at the Altar of Wonder · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT