Robert Ray joins Neva Lee Recla to talk about the power of magic. Robert has loved magic since he was five years old and by the age of sixteen he mastered it. As a professional magician, he entertains people of all ages. Listen in as Neva and Robert talk about Harry Potter, superpowers and the magical world of magic.

How are you?

First, I have to clear my mind really quick. I have a pen. That’s better.

That’s impressive. I can already tell that you have a lot of super powers, but can you tell our guests at least one of them?

Sure. One of the things that I claim is a super power is that I can manipulate perceptions, people’s perceptions, which in turn manipulates reality because we all know perception is the reality. If you can manipulate perception, in a way, you can manipulate reality.

That’s really cool. That’s a cool super power to have.

That’s part of how you really develop a super power, is understanding the different forms of energy and how they can be used and harness need to affect change in reality.

I would say I also studied different forms of energy and how they can be used to mitigate delayed reality. That’s part of how you really develop a super power, is understanding the different forms of energy and how they can be used and harness need to affect change in reality.

Yeah, I agree. We’re very in this family. We talk a lot about energies and how that can really tie into superpowers.

That’s great. Yeah, it’s important. Everything is energy. Because everything is energy, everything is possible.

Exactly. So what inspired you to do magic?

Well, I’ve always been interested in anything mystical, magical, paranormal, supernatural. But when I was five years old, my mom and dad hired a magician to come to my birthday party. He showed up and he was actually drunk and he was messing up on all of his magic and he actually almost cut a little girl’s arm off, for real. He messed up on one of his tricks and it didn’t go so well and that was the end of his show. But it was very traumatic for the little girl, but it left some kind of a mark on me I guess and here I am doing magic.

That’s cool. I’ve seen quite a few really cool magic tricks, but can’t imagine being drunk while doing it. It’s a good idea. What other magicians do you look up to?

Well, one of my teachers was named Jeff McBride. He’s a fantastic magician, considered one of the best magic teachers in the world. I really looked up to Eugene Burger who passed away this year. I was very sad. I really admired Eugene Burger and I’m a huge fan of a guy named Derren Brown from the UK. If you haven’t seen that guy, you’re into superpowers, you should look up that guy, Derren Brown. He’s awesome. You should start with, Derren Brown Makes The Sun Disappear.

Oh, wow. That’s cool.

Yeah. What I like about it is he makes the sun disappear for one person and he shows how he does it and everything else. It’s really, really cool. You should check it out. You’ll like it.

I definitely will. That’s awesome. What advice would you give to kids if they want to become a magician?

Well, first off, you start off with what you can do for free. You go on to YouTube and there are tons of tutorials and things like that on YouTube you can start with, lots of online free magic tutorials. There’s, of course, a public library. Now we mustn’t forget about the public library because public libraries usually have tons of magic books and you can go there and rent them for free and they have different ones. When I was a kid, I used to go to magic libraries and I didn’t want anyone else to have the magic secrets. So I would go into each library and I would take all the magic books and I would put them in different sections of the libraries so no one would be able to find them later.

That’s awesome.

A big part of the magic is keeping secrets.

Yup. I’m not very good at lying, so I don’t know if that would be my best super power.

Have you ever heard of a movie called V for Vendetta?

I have.

All artists use lies to tell the truth and to entertain and inspire.

Well, if you haven’t seen it, it’s a really good movie. You might be too young for it yet, but in that movie, she talks… Evey Hammond talks about, there are two types of deception. See, all artists use deception to create art, and politicians use deception. She says, “My father used to say, “Artists use lies, to tell the truth, while politicians use lies to cover the truth up.” So in a sense, all artists use lies to tell the truth and to entertain and inspire. So there are several types of deception, like when you’re looking at a painting of someone, it’s not a picture of someone, even if it looks like a picture of them. In that sense, it’s a deception because it looks like a picture, but it’s just a painting. So all art kind of has some form of deception in it.

That’s really cool. So what is your favorite part about being a magician?

Doing magic for people like yourself and seeing their faces light up and seeing them feel really happy or inspired and moving people to tears with magic. That really makes me feel good. I’ve actually had a mom who came up to me and told me that I brought her daughter on stage several years ago and her daughter didn’t really speak too much and after I brought her up on stage, she felt very confident in her ability to speak. It was kind of a magical thing for me. Things like that. That’s kind of why I do it.

That’s really cool. I can kind of agree because I talk on stages and so having that impact on somebody’s life and knowing that you’re bringing joy to them is really cool.

Indeed.

Yeah.

I like your wing, by the way.

Thank you. All about being sound and creative over here?

I know you can’t buy those. You have to develop them.

Yup. I have a ton of wings so I enjoy them. What would you say to someone if they were in business or magic and maybe they had a time where they felt like it was kind of going down and they felt like they wanted to give up. What would you say to them to help them keep going?

Well, I guess I would have to speak to myself here too because I’ve hit that point many times myself where you feel like, “Whoa, I’m not good enough or maybe I should be better or further along than I am.” But I think we all are where we are for a reason and for our own development and our own highest purposes. I feel like we try and push ourselves past where we are. For example, we spend our whole lives as children wishing we were adults and we spend our whole lives as adults wish when they were children. It’s about just enjoying being where you are and what you are and how you are right now and being content with that and not trying to be better than you are or trying to be more than what you are because each one of us already is enough. It’s just our ego and parts of our brain sometimes don’t let us see that. My advice to anyone who’s struggling is to just be more of who you are and to take action.

Often times, people get stuck in their heads and they forget just to take action. Nothing else matters if you’re not moving. Energy always is moving, so if you’re not moving, you’re not really going with the flow of energy. So things are getting stuck and stagnant. If things are getting stuck and stagnant for you, I would say to speed up and work more and do more actions. Do more things you know you should and do fewer things you know you shouldn’t and really just try and be a little bit better today than you were yesterday. I think that’s really the secret right there, it is just each day try and be a little bit better than you were the day before.

That’s really cool. That’s good advice. We actually need to take a quick break, but I’d love to keep talking with you more about magic. Can you tell our listeners where they can go to find out more about you?

Yes. You can go to my website, robertraymagic.com.

Awesome. Definitely go check out his website because he’s so cool. We’ve been talking with Robert Ray about the power of magic. We’ll be right back after the break.

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