The Magic, Misdirection, and Mindset of David Blaine (#245)

“I never look at anything really as a success. I always look at it as a work in progress.”

– David Blaine

David Blaine (@davidblaine) is a magician, illusionist, and endurance artist. He is best known for his high-profile feats of endurance and has set and broken several world records.

A while back, he taught a group of TEDMED attendees (and me) how to hold our breath for longer than Harry Houdini’s lifelong record of three minutes and thirty seconds — which still pales in comparison to David’s own record of just over seventeen minutes.

This episode comes from the premiere of my new television show Fearless. If you want to watch the entire first episode, you can see it for free at att.net/fearless. (To watch all episodes, please visit DIRECTV NOW). Don’t worry if you’ve seen the episode or plan on seeing it because we recorded three hours of material and only one hour was used for the show. This episode is almost all bonus content that you won’t see anywhere else. Please enjoy!

You can find the transcript of this episode here. Transcripts of all episodes can be found here.

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Want to hear another podcast with a talented performer? — Listen to this episode with Jamie Foxx where we discuss Jamie’s workout routine, what he learned during In Living Color, and he shares some of his best impressions (stream below or right-click here to download):

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QUESTION OF THE DAY: What was your favorite quote or lesson from this episode? Please let me know in the comments.

Scroll below for links and show notes…

Selected Links from the Episode

• Connect with David Blaine:

Website | Twitter | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube

• Fear{less}
• The premiere episode of Fear{less} with David Blaine
• The 4-Hour Body: An Uncommon Guide to Rapid Fat Loss, Incredible Sex and Becoming Superhuman by Timothy Ferriss
• How to Hold Your Breath Like David Blaine, World Record Holder (and Now, Me)
• If This Is a Man and The Truce by Primo Levi
• Laird Hamilton, The King of Big Wave Surfing (Plus: Gabrielle Reece and Brian MacKenzie)
• “The Iceman,” Wim Hof
• The “Wizard” of Hollywood, Robert Rodriguez
• A Hunger Artist by Franz Kafka
• Aortic Valve Stenosis
• David on TED Radio Hour: Is It Possible to Be Fearless?
• Souen
• Cervantes by Jean Canavaggio
• Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes
• The Secret Connection Between Cervantes and Shakespeare by David Kipen, Los Angeles Times
• The Macrobiotic Way: The Definitive Guide to Macrobiotic Living by Michio Kushi and Stephen Blauer
• Searching for Bobby Fischer: book and movie
• Saint-Tropez
• Reuben’s Restaurant
• Grigory Perelman, the Maths Genius Who Said No to $1M by Luke Harding, The Guardian
• Mirin Dajo: The Man Who Could Survive Being Impaled by a Sword
• Naked by David Sedaris
• American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin
• Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl
• How to Survive a Nuclear Attack by Irwin Redlener, TED
• Scientists, Politicians Take the Threat of an Electromagnetic Pulse Very Seriously by Dan Vergano, USA Today
• How I Held My Breath for 17 Minutes by David Blaine, TEDMED
• Watch Domenico DeMarco Make Legendary Di Fara Pizza by Hillary Dixler, Eater
• Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse
• 15 Things You Might Not Know About Michelangelo’s ‘David’ by Kristy Puchko, Mental Floss

Show Notes

• Numbers that make you go “wow.” [07:07]
• Why I had to remove David’s section from the second edition of The 4-Hour Body. [08:03]
• David explains the story behind his Primo Levi tattoo. [08:47]
• What Wim Hof taught David about cold that he couldn’t learn by himself. [13:24]
• On fasting inspired by a Franz Kafka story. [17:42]
• David’s heart condition may give him an (albeit risky) edge in endurance performance. [19:23]
• Growing up, how did David interact with his teachers and other kids? [20:18]
• David talks about running barefoot in the snow and exposing himself to the elements as a kid. [21:42]
• We talk obsession, chess, and misdirection. [23:43]
• The balancing points of salesmanship and magic — how does David pick subjects for his tricks? [25:34]
• When David was a waiter, why would he make patrons’ tips magically reappear in their wallets? [26:34]
• David has an obsession with Don Quixote and its author Miguel de Cervantes. [27:29]
• Being a loner as a kid gave David time to practice magic. [30:07]
• David talks about his mother’s fight against cancer. [30:47]
• Why David hopes his daughter doesn’t pursue a career in magic. [33:06]
• David’s summer in Saint Tropez that changed his career, and what he learned from Jeffrey Steiner and Jack Nicholson. [35:16]
• How David struck up an acquaintance with Bobby Fischer. [44:06]
• David’s needle-through-the-arm trick was inspired by human pincushion Mirin Dajo. [46:54]
• What advice would David give to his twenty-five-year-old self? [48:31]
• We discuss our own experiences with sleep deprivation. [49:27]
• A favorite short story by David Sedaris. [51:10]
• What does it take to divert someone’s attention while performing magic tricks? [51:44]
• David’s TED Talk if he had to speak about something for which he’s not known. [56:30]
• Are there any quotes David lives by or thinks of often? [1:00:10]
• What ninth-grade class would David teach? [1:00:19]
• How does David take failure? [1:01:41]
• What’s next for David Blaine? [1:03:42]

People Mentioned

• Primo Levi
• Philip Roth
• Italo Calvino
• Marcus Aurelius
• Laird Hamilton
• Gabrielle Reece
• Wim Hof
• Robert Rodriguez
• Patrice Maureen White
• Franz Kafka
• Bryan Callen
• Miguel de Cervantes
• William Shakespeare
• Michio Kushi
• Josh Waitzkin
• Jeffrey Steiner
• Jack Nicholson
• Adam Gibgot
• A. J. Benza
• Mickey Rourke
• Frank Garcia
• Bill Kalush
• Bobby Fischer
• Denise Albert
• Grigori Perelman
• Mirin Dajo
• David Sedaris
• J. Robert Oppenheimer
• Herbert Hoover
• Galileo Galilei
• Domenico DeMarco
• Abraham Lincoln
• Michelangelo
• Winston Churchill

The Tim Ferriss Show is one of the most popular podcasts in the world with more than one billion downloads. It has been selected for "Best of Apple Podcasts" three times, it is often the #1 interview podcast across all of Apple Podcasts, and it's been ranked #1 out of 400,000+ podcasts on many occasions. To listen to any of the past episodes for free, check out this page.