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Discovering A Magical Direction by Shawn Anthony
Shawn Anthony’s Magic Alchemy Series: a new article will appear each month. These are direct from Shawn Anthony’s lecture.
How do I discover what magical direction to take?
To understand Street Alchemy you must first understand why you are performing magic and the types or type of magic that is best suited for you to perform. It has been said that magicians are not made but instead are born, what this means is that somewhere inside of you there has always been a desire to perform magic and unlock the mysteries of this ancient art.
To begin grab a sheet of paper and make two columns and title them as follows: My magical strengths, which you will list all of the areas you feel are your strengths (examples: card magic, close up, acting, pantomime.) in the second column title it my Magical weaknesses, here you will list all the areas you feel you need improvement in (examples: presentation, story telling, coin work) Once you have these columns made you can now asses what your next step should be in finding your magical direction. The key to this exercise is to be brutally honest with your-self, this is no time to let ego get in the way.
Once you have made these two lists turn the paper over and title it “My Dream Show”. Describe in detail what your dream show would be. Now compare the effects of your dream show sheet to those on your strength and weakness sheet and see if they match up with what you are capable of performing. If you want to do more items that are listed in the weakness section than you have some decisions to make. Does this mean you can’t perform your dream show? Of course not, it means you have a lot of work to do and now have a direction to focus on. Remember to capitalize on your strengths and utilize all of the talents you have.
The key to being a success in magic and in life is to never limit yourself but instead understand what your capable of and strive to become more self aware. This will bring your audience closer to you as a performer and it will have clients lining up at your door because they want a confident and competent performer.
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