The Hoy/Banachek Principle
Not too
long ago I wrote an article about some funny
episodes in the lives of magicians for the GeMiNi
network. Amongst these tales I mentioned an
offbeat prank played by the late David Hoy on
Walter Blaney. It involved the four letter "F"
word. Funny enough, few magicians know that
mentalist/psychic David Hoy started out as an
Evangelist then became a magician then a mentalist
and finally a "psychic." Seems David came full
circle when in the later years he opened his
own church. This church was only on paper but
he had letter head and envelopes made up. The
church was called "First Universal Church of
Knowledge." Of course David only used the acronym
for his letter head, which brings us back to
his use of the four letter "f" word. David thought
this quite a funny joke on the unsuspecting
who often never "got it."
Reading
David Hoy's biography, I remember being astonished
that the author was so struck by the fact David
knew that there was something wrong with one
of his parents. Seems the first words out of
David's mouth at their initial meeting was about
how the author's parent was doing. What amazed
me was that the author cited in his interviews
with other people that David has also known
there was something wrong with their family
members as well.
Guess
I should explain here what I mean by the fact
I was amazed. I was not amazed that David had
known that there was something with people's
family members, but I was amazed that the author
never seemed to catch on how David knew. In
reality, I suspect David did not know what was
wrong with people's family members. It was just
a standard thing that David would say. "How
are you parents?" He would ask.
Now think
about this. If there was nothing wrong with
them, the person would answer "they are doing
fine," and the fact he asked how they were would
be forgotten. If however their was something
wrong, the person would reply with something
like "my mother is not doing so well, she has
to go into the hospital next week!" To which,
I am sure David would reply "I had a feeling
there was something wrong with your mother,
give her my best!"
This
is a very clever gimmick and one that can be
a reputation maker for any mentalist as it seems
to have done for David. Of course this can be
adapted to cover more family members by stating
"how is your family doing!" and then creating
the false memory of fact you asked about a specific
family member by stating "I had a feeling your
*** was not doing so well!" Inserting the type
of family member with the problem after you
know who and what it is.
Of course
you can try to be very specific up front by
asking something like "How is your brother?"
If there is something wrong with the brother
you simply add "I had a feeling he had been
on your mind lately!" What happens if the person
you met just says "I have no brother!"? Don't
worry, just state "Oh, I was thinking of someone
else, sorry!" And they will forget the incident.
But if you hit, remember to point out the fact
you even knew they had a brother, "Don't you
think it strange that I even knew you had a
brother, beside the fact I knew he was on your
mind and I knew something was wrong with him?
That is what I do for a living, I am a thought-reader."
What
about the ethics of this psychological ploy.
I am not advocating you go out and call yourself
a psychic. In fact I don't, like Max Maven,
Marc Salem, Richard Busch and few other mentalists,
I tell my audiences that "I do not read minds,
but I am a thought-reader, one who uses non-verbal
communication, body language and psychology
to tell what thoughts are on people's minds."
Of course I use other things as well, but the
above stands true and psychology does comes
into play with the Hoy/Banachek principle.
In thoughts
Banachek
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