331 - Performing to Teach: The Power of Wonder and Magic with Dr Ben Levy

What does it take to make workshops work? And how can we facilitate collaboration that sticks and leads to results? My name is Miriam Hadnes, and with the Workshops Work podcast, I'm on the mission to find the magic ingredients that make workshops work. Today with me on the show is Dr. Ben Levy. And talking about magic that makes workshops work, we speak about magic and magic tricks. And how to use a magic trick to teach a framework. And if you're similar to me, then you will be amazed and tucked into this episode through awe and curiosity just to find out more. So please join Ben and myself as we go on several tangents to explore what it takes to involve learners and the audience and participants to deeper thinking and curiosity and eventually innovation through magic and educational science and psychology. Stay tuned and scroll down to the show notes to find more information about Ben and to subscribe to this podcast if you enjoy it. Thank you for listening. Hello, Ben Levy. Welcome to the show. The Magician.

Thank you, Magician. Thank you for welcoming me. I feel very much welcomed, and I'm really delighted to be here, excited to find this journey with you.

Yes, me too. Speaking— I'm particularly curious about the link to magic and control and everything around that. And I always start with the same question, just to have a little bit of Continuity, certainty, control. When did you stop calling yourself a facilitator? And actually, do you?

I haven't, Myriam, and I don't.

How do you call yourself? Do you apply a label to yourself?

This may become one of the subthemes of our conversation. I don't apply a label to myself, but I'm finding myself in our culture consistently pushed into doing so on social media, in conversation. The best I could probably approach is psychologist and magician.

What does a psychologist and a magician have in common?

We care deeply about how you think.

Very interesting. I can totally see the connection with the psychologist, and I wouldn't see the immediate connection to the magician, so I'm curious.

I'd love to know, Myriam, your associations when you hear the word magician.

Thank you. Yeah, thank you for asking. I think that's a— my association with a magician is someone who is playing with my perception and attention to make my mind believe something that might actually not be true. And with the goal to put me in awe. I think that's the image of a magician that comes to my mind. Hmm.

I love that. I love that. That's very closely aligned to how I would see myself and others who perform magic.

So I invited the right guy.

The next magician in town may have a completely and radically different answer or different set of associations. I want to tell you a story, and I have to guide you through the story so that by the end of the story, you feel amazed. And my methodology, my means of doing so, is to think carefully about how you're likely to think, what you're likely to see, how you're likely to feel at every stage of the story, so that by the end, you feel as amazed as is possible to feel.

And now the connection to the psychologist is very clear. Were you first a psychologist or first a magician?

Which label was placed on me first? Well, I first became— magicians often call it the bug.

Mm-hmm.

Bitten by the bug. And the magic bug bit me when I was 12, and I had gone to a friend's bar mitzvah. There was a magician strolling around the room. Objects from his pockets were being taken out and amazing things were happening with them. And he was visiting small groups of 13 and 14-year-olds, blowing their minds. And I had never seen anything like this before. And the moment I saw what he was doing and I experienced that feeling, I followed him around the room for the rest of the evening. And it is such a crystal clear memory of mine, well over 30 years ago. And I think this is a theme for many magicians who now perform professionally. They were desperate to find out the answer. How did you make me feel this way? And so we have this bittersweet relationship with what we do because we're giving everyone the experience that we had, but we can't have any more.

Yeah. I can feel that. And I do feel a connection with group work and facilitation, which might be similar but different, right? Once you understand the craft and you can create it for others, it's very difficult to, to be in the state of awe of what's happening because your mind is always on you. You're always on the meta, on the meta level to try to understand.

Right.

And maybe it's actually not true, but how beautiful. And in your work, you work as a coach mostly, and as a trainer, teacher.

That is a label that would be recognizable in some of the work I do for sure.

Yeah. So how do you combine all of these labels into something that is unlabelable?

Well, I think until recently, I was fairly stratified. I was fairly subdivided in my attitude to my work. I had a client base who were coachees. I had a client base who received psychological services that were not coach-based, so training, for example. And I had a client base who just enjoyed to be amazed. And really within the last year, I took ownership of the idea that I can be a magician and a psychologist, and the two really can sit together, not just in my mind, but in what I then end up doing out there in the world, that I can illustrate important learning through magic.

And how do you do that?

The story for that, I would say, starts quite a while ago, because the early signs of that, which I probably did not take enough ownership over, was I am also a trained educational psychologist. I work with children, young people, as well as with corporate teams and schools. And about 15 years ago, I thought it'd be interesting when I worked with a young person to perform a little piece of magic before I carried out an assessment of their cognition.

Was it a sort of priming?

Well, my intention initially, I think, was to build rapport.

Okay.

And I gave myself permission to do it and feel like it's acceptable to do because there was justification with my psychologist hat on. Right? Let's build rapport with the client. What came to me from that was it became a mini assessment. As I vanished the coin, I was watching where that child was watching. And it certainly built their interest and engagement in magic. Whether or not they were interested in the next 2 hours of their life, I'm not so sure. However, it really gave me insight into where do they perceive the coin has gone? Are they curious about where the coin has gone?

Hmm.

Do they want to find out? Are they content to just move on and be episodic? This was something in my life. There's— here's the next thing. So it became something of an assessment. And so I kind of kept it within my behavioral repertoire as a psychologist before assessments, carrying out this little mini piece of magic. But I didn't really expand it beyond then for many, many years. And it's only, as I say, fairly recently where I've taken much more ownership of saying magic can say much more and do much more for people than perhaps they even realize. And I now build it into my workshops.

I love that. And it's What I can see working, you'll correct me if I'm wrong, is the disruption from the usual. So people come in with a certain expectation, maybe a PowerPoint deck, maybe by now they realize, okay, PowerPoint, not so much, maybe a circle, maybe some sticky notes, and then a magic trick.

Mm-hmm.

So being taken out of this, standard flow of expectation, and then have their curiosity stimulated in a very different way than usual. And maybe having control in some sort taken away from them, because you confront them immediately with something that they cannot understand.

And that, that itself is a subtopic, which we can have plenty of conversation about, Myriam. What happens when you take someone's feeling of control away? how they react. And it's usually visceral, but there are many flavors of a response. And when I perform as a magician, perhaps let's park the capital P psychologist label and talk about myself as the entertainer magician. I go to some events and one table responds to the same routine, the same effect in one very distinct way. And the next table will respond in a completely different way. And indeed, individuals within the table, you can see. Because when you take someone's control away, it could feel threatening. I'm in charge. I understand how the world works, and I can impact how the world— this person's taking away that certainty from me. Whereas others find it exhilarating. A bit like when you're on the top of a roller coaster and you're about to fly down, and you're out of control, but something in the back of your mind goes, it's going to be all right.

Mm-hmm.

That moment of magic is something analogous to that for some people. I think it was for me. The world's just turned upside down. What I've just experienced, I know is impossible, yet has happened. That dissonance sits with me, but it's going to be all right.

Yeah. And I can imagine that then the psychologist voice in yourself puts these people into boxes. So what can we say about some people's personality and how they react to magic? And how does it then play out in a workshop? So do you use it as a sort of assessment priming?

So, I use it in a very different way, in a very different way. And perhaps the word play will come out through this conversation. So, I've developed an approach which helps people understand how to become more effective. And I thought twice, perhaps 3 times before introducing magic as a way to teach the concepts, but I went for it and it's really going well. People really respond well to it and they don't feel threatened. And I think part of it is that they know that they will learn how to do what I've just shown them.

So you give them back control, or at least some certainty.

They get some level of— they get that level of, there is a secret to this, which at some level I must have known, and that secret will be mine too.

And then it's basically this hook that they want to know more. So you caught them. It's like a cliffhanger. So they have to, they have to stay attentive in order to learn that one thing.

Well, there's 2 hooks. One is immediately obvious, which is I will learn this. So I too can offer others the same experience that I just felt, that feeling of freefall and play and the young me, where anything is possible. I will learn that. That's empowering. That's, that's It's energizing at some level, I think, for many. I also tie what I'm doing to what really matters to them, perhaps professionally, if they're a professional team, because I explain that by learning the secrets to this, I'm actually going to, without even realizing, teach you my framework.

Hmm.

So, you will also be able to learn not just the secrets and how to amaze others, you will learn how to become more professionally, personally effective as a result. And that is my pledge.

And I wonder whether this is maybe what you mean with the second hook, because it's again a puzzle. So how can it be that by learning a magic trick, I will become more productive? So that, okay, this doesn't make sense in my mind. And now I really want to know how to solve that puzzle. And it is indeed the way how we most effectively learn. So how can we create a container story, a hook for the people to actually put the phone away, give you their full attention so that they focus on what you're going to tell them. So you're creating all these open loops, and open loops that then people just want you to follow up on so that they know. Yeah.

You've raised this and you've framed it in a way that I perhaps haven't before myself. Which is the medium and the matter, the content and the process. So the open loop that must be closed is inherently motivating for the vast majority of humanity. It's just such a desire for us to close loops. And the loops we want to close most are the loops that we are told or we sense are loops that are going to be beneficial for us.

Mm-hmm.

So you have kind of both, I suppose, there, which is Let me trust this process and go through it and engage with it because I'm being told I will learn something. But the thing that I will learn, this guy standing in front of me is telling me will benefit me in this specific way, which I would love to benefit from. So can both be possible? Well, it's only an hour and a half. I'll give it that time.

Yeah. Because this was the other thing that just crossed my mind is, to what extent can there also be frustration? You mentioned that different tables react very differently. And with that scene, there's much to unpack because I wonder whether— is it one person driving the table's reaction? So, is there a dominant character that actually does something to it? Or what is it about that table? And how do you balance this, the edge of frustration? There might be people who say, oh, I want to know why you're doing this. Just give me the answer. So, because I can imagine that the patience, the sitting in discomfort leads to very different things in different people, and there might be those who just get frustrated.

Yes, I think that particularly applies to Ben as entertainer, as coming in, seen and framed as a magician, whatever that means in the minds and hearts of the people who are experiencing it. And frame, I think, is a key word. Before coming to the room, How do I understand what my powers are? Which I think has a read across potentially to facilitators, to coaches, to trainers. What is my secret power here? And how am I understood?

And by power, do you mean the kind of abilities, authority, space for action and impact? What do you mean by power?

Yes, yes, and yes. When I walk into a room and someone looks at me and they place a label on me because I'm in a 3-piece suit and I'm holding a deck of cards, what's their first association? And what's their sense of what I'm going to bring to their life? Who am I as magician to them?

If it's a rhetorical question, is it a real question?

The rhetorical ones are probably the best. They're the real, they're the capital R real questions, aren't they?

Yeah.

Perhaps not an answer, but something I need to reflect on is, How do I then prepare for that?

Mm-hmm.

At the simple level, I'm here to give everyone a good time. Okay, a good time. Am I here to do any more than that? Am I framing what I'm doing as something that's a power that I'm almost myself unable to control, but it seems to happen between my hands and between mine and others, in the space between me and others? Is it something I fully control? Do I have an arrogant control over it? Do I have a weary control over it? It's just something I'm stuck with. I just end up doing magic, and so I'm here for, you you just to show you what I can do.

And the expectations in the room, there's always the smartass. So there is a—

Did you almost say man? Because they normally are.

Yeah, yeah, that was my internal image. Yes, it was a man indeed. And that's actually interesting. There's almost a struggle around authority or a different way of power. And I think it can be very similar for a facilitator, coach, trainer stepping into the space, facing the same expectation and almost struggle around authority, because there will be someone in the room who's like, I know that already.

Is that something that you've frequently experienced, that facilitator equates or has an association for many people of authority, something to reject? Because that word itself to me connotes something quite different.

Yeah, and I think they, um, I find the notion of authority in relation to facilitation and training very interesting, um, because there is, there might be, um, there is a power difference that can be very subtle. There can be knowledge, a knowledge transfer. I know something that you don't and you want to learn. And then there's this very subtle authority around a facilitator.

Mm-hmm.

That comes with almost humility, the authority of, oh, I'm here for you, I have nothing to prove, which as such I think has a very different notion of authority.

Humility and authority, it's almost like I'm trying to put the two together.

Hmm. I, um, oh, who was that? I had a guest on the podcast, his name Will. We'll come back. And he said that authority comes from authorship, and real authority comes from self-authorship. So this, um, someone who steps into a space and has this natural authority through charisma because they know who they are and don't have anything to prove. And that's the kind of authority that I had in mind. It's not from a power game. It's not from power over.

Mm. That's really sitting comfortably with me, this idea of self-authorship. And actually what that does in the space for those— my mind goes to projection and transference.

Mm-hmm.

So when a group sits in a room and they feel that projection, what do they introject? Do they introject a comforting sense of reassurance, a desire to submit to the if we call it authority, to that humility that's comfortable and sits well? Or does it trigger something insecure?

A vulnerability because being exposed.

This is what I would love, but what I don't have myself.

Yeah, yeah. Because it can be confrontational to be with someone who's totally okay with themselves. And then suddenly you can sense that the room is opening up, something's happening. And everything is a little bit more exposed and a little bit more seen. And then suddenly, whoo. Yeah.

I can't imagine myself. I think I tend to see myself and operate with a low level of insecurity in all areas of my professional life, at least. I'm not sure if that's something that requires work, whether that's actually helpful or when it's helpful. Perhaps there's a better way of framing it and thinking of it is when That approach because it's less confrontational to those who resonate with that low-lying sense of he does have the this could all fuck up mentality somewhere.

It's interesting because then we're back to control. So there is— so the magician who communicates that it could all not work out and they could fuck up is one thing. But then to have someone fuck up in public, there's this disappointment, there's a, there's a lot of status, I think, and something then happens. So to play with, with that, that it could, but it won't, because I have it under control. Has it happened to you that a magic trick didn't work out and you—

Oh yeah.

Yeah.

It's sometimes a tight, tightrope. We're engaging between what we've rehearsed and the real world, and what people in the world might do, which is often entirely unpredictable. And you could perform a routine 1,000 times, and 1,001, that person turns their hand the wrong way, or the caterer walks in right at the moment when the magic needed to hit home, that magic moment. Or a million other things. And so I think as a magician, performing magician, you're always prepared for that. And there's actually a very interesting dialogue, which within this conversation I think is relevant, of how do you prepare but not seem too prepared? Which I think is also something we talked about in relation to prior to today.

Yes.

And how do you project but also feel internally that sense of this, not just that it could go wrong, but perhaps to reframe it as, We're in the moment.

And how can you predict behavior and still make them feel as if it's the most uncommon and natural thing, although it's almost scripted?

And there's one way that magicians, and there are a few out there, do this, is they over-rehearse to the point where they are so brilliant and so well-versed in dealing with every scenario that they can think of. It's very rare for a situation to come up that they don't know how to respond in a way that seems spontaneous.

Which is also very true for many facilitators or trainers being overprepared, and then it lacks the magic.

Yeah. And I wonder what's going on for them, because part of my joy is there's something— this word comes to mind now is febrile. Something that's like a frisson that something could go wrong. And surely if I'm trying to create a moment that's impossible in the universe, somewhere in the ether, somewhere in the space, there should be febrility. There should be Uncertainty, because I'm trying to create something impossible. For fuck's sake, if it was easy and if it was predictable, then don't bother having me here.

Yeah.

So I'm going to try and create something. I'm going to light a match, and hopefully many times it will light and we'll all enjoy the glow. But once or twice it will spark and not flame.

And is this then— so I think there is a big difference between the performing magician and the educating magician. Where for one, it's like, oops, how can I save this? Or maybe use humor. I don't know what you do, maybe some clowning or pretending that this was part of the game. You'll tell us. And the other one, it could be a potential learning moment.

Yes. I think I play even safer, full disclosure, which is I perform, explain, and then teach one routine. Very boundaried. And it's pitched at a level that the vast majority of people, I anticipate, and usually is the case, can grasp. They can grasp the steps, and they have the dexterity to achieve this and learn this and perform it well. So it's pretty well controlled. Mm-hmm.

It's safe.

Sometimes to keep myself on edge as magician Ben, performer Ben, I will bring out a routine that either I've not performed for many, many years or something I've just learned, and I'm going to take a risk to keep myself on edge, keep myself feeling like this could go wrong because it really could.

And what does it do for you that is necessary?

The word that first comes to mind is presence. So back to that space between us that feels magical in a positive way, that feels dynamic, energizing, exciting. I think it's more powerful when I'm present.

And the presence vanishes if you have performed it so many times that it's a routine, and then you don't even see what's happening around you.

In fact, that word routine, I had never considered it, but magicians talk all the time about, I have a series of routines. Routine is the most dispiriting word, actually. Perhaps we should say we've got a series of magic experiences. Or referring back to our first part of our conversation, magic stories.

Yeah. Yeah, because there's, um, I had this, this time end of last year, I gave the same workshop 18 times in 5 weeks. Yes. No, it was 18 times in 3 weeks. So it was seriously a lot.

Just felt like 5 weeks.

And to still maintain the level of presence to actually listen to the questions and to the ideas from audience and to still be excited about the anecdotes and stuff that I have to share. That's difficult. So yeah, so I can— that's how I relate to what you just said, that if everything is too rehearsed and too perfect, then we cannot be present to really react and absorb and include what's happening around.

I think one of the themes, if I were to reflect on where I've been driven and where I've been drawn to in my life is to avoid habituation, which is subtly different, I hope, from thrill-seeking.

2 extremes.

Yeah. Perhaps if it sits on a scale, I don't know if they're conceptually slightly different, but if it sits on a scale from habituation to thrill-seeking, I don't want to be either extreme, but I would like to consider myself more towards the thrill.

Yeah. And funny enough, I have the impression that both extremes are quite self-centered. Whereas for the professions, we have to be centered towards the audience or the learner or whatever.

Yes and no would be my instinctive response, which is we're always here for ourselves. Ultimately, it's doing something for us. And if we're habituating, it's doing something else for us. And if we're drawn to that, that's giving us an experience that at some level we're desiring because we're not breaking out from that. We're not motivated enough. to move in a different direction. And if we're moving to thrill-seeking, it may be very obvious and visceral for others that we are doing this for ourselves, but it's no more self-centered than staying in a habitual approach to doing whatever we're doing the same way every day.

Yeah, I think the focus of the attention— you're right, obviously, if we wouldn't do it for us, we wouldn't do it at all. And the ultimate altruist is gaining joy from being altruistic, so they're doing it for themselves. That's where you were heading.

The ultimate win-win, I would probably, uh, yeah.

And yeah, I think the overly ritualistic and the overly thrill-seeking both don't serve the— but anyway, it's maybe more philosophy.

In less context, so if I'm in a space where my desire for thrill-seeking meets the needs of the audience I'm thrill-seeking with or for, then we have a very happy marriage. If I'm in a space where habituation is desired and meets others' needs, then we're all winning. I think it's that alignment. It's that, in which context? So it suits me to be a performer of magic and to feel like I can do unpredictable things and try my best and almost always fail to amaze myself. Because as I said before, there's that bittersweet feeling of, I'm going to give you something and maybe one day— I'll be just as amazed. The closest I usually get is to be— there are a few methods in magic, secrets, that are almost as impressive as the effects they create. But we can't fucking tell you. It's very rare.

Secret.

There was one this week I performed where the secret is so diabolically clever, almost more at an intellectual level amazing, but it gives me a frisson to perform it. Just the level of knowing what's really going on behind the scenes.

I can see that, how it's exciting. And to have this intellectual awe around it, that someone came up with it.

Yes. And it's a different awe. It's not the same as my 12-year-old me, who essentially my critical faculties were frozen for a few moments. And I experienced that as joyously energizing. That's not always the response. But for those who it is— and then my next response was, now I have to find out how that works, because my cognition kicked back in. The world must be put right.

And then if you— and we come to how it all connects and what you're actually teaching through the magic in a bit, because now you have created so many open loops. Is it then the connection between Because our mind, we remember better if we have, for instance, an emotion connected to the learning, or if we have a visual connected to, uh, to a concept or a theory. So is it that you connect then your method and how to increase productivity to the magic trick? And that's why then sticks because you experience it and you have this kind of embodied aha moment?

Yes. The way I've seen it and the way I frame it to the participants is they're going to learn something very fast that they would've assumed was very hard. And my guarantee, which I start with, is I perform the routine for them. The routine. I tell them the story at the beginning. I show them a story that ends in amazing. And then I say to them, you will learn how to perform this within 20 minutes, and you'll learn how to perform this well. And as a result, you will... And that's where I introduce something that I understand is a goal for them as a team. You will learn how to more likely and more efficiently achieve your year-end revenue goals. Now that feels disjunctive, and I've opened a loop.

Hmm. So how do you do that? How much can you give it away about your method?

No problem. Like, the framework is open. I share it happily and openly. The experience of learning the magic and through the magic learning the framework is something that can be explained. I think it means little until— and again, I think there's a read across probably to facilitation is my assumption. Being in the room is nothing like describing what happened in the room.

Or even watching the recording.

Okay.

Yeah.

So that part, it just wouldn't make, it wouldn't hit home what we do. So let's see if I can find a way to bridge the gap between the two, explain the framework and something of the flavor of how that would play in that space, in the workshop. Perhaps to take one step back, it's useful to appreciate what the framework is. To then understand how the framework is applied to teaching something that you would imagine you couldn't have learned, but yet you'll do so very fast. How does that framework get put together, which is the ABCME? And that came from a moment in time. It was about 5 years ago. I woke up in the middle of the night. I really woke up in the middle of the night. And I had some realization that all the clients who I had worked with for many, many years prior, who were, let's call them for want of a better phrase, high-performing. It wasn't a personality thing. They had just graphed 5 principles. There were 5 aspects to their success. And I mulled over it and checked it out first with my wife, because don't you? And she was not happy to be woken up at 3:00 AM, but she didn't hit me. So at that level, I would say, It passed the wife test. And then I continued to try and verify this framework. Are these 5 things really the only 5 things that are at play when you're trying to get something done and do it quickly, or do it as quickly as you can? And it seems to be the case. I've checked it out with people fairly high level in academia at Stanford and so on, and it seems robust. So that framework, ABCME, is what I Then teach through the magic. So what are the 5?

Yes, please.

Let me help close the loop. So the ABCME is, of course, an acronym, or they call it a cross-sticker. A, B, C, M, and E each stand for a different factor. So for argument's sake, let's say we're trying to have a podcast episode that grabs the audience in a way that no audience has been grasped before. They keep paying attention the whole way through. They are bristling with excitement at the next sentence that's going to be spoken. They learn so much from it. They are so engaged with it. And that is, let's say, our collective goal, Myriam. The extent to which we'll be able to achieve that goal will be based on ABCME, is my contention.

Mm-hmm.

So A, what's our ability? To what degree do we have the Capacity. What do we bring to the table that enables us to give that experience to our audience, if that is indeed the objective we're trying to achieve?

So this would be something like the content, our rhetoric skills to actually have a conversation, the format, the questions.

Absolutely. The experience we've had of doing this before, your extensive experience is going to play a part.

The technology.

Technology's coming later.

Okay.

Because that wouldn't be what we bring to the table, but we are harnessing it.

Okay. Yeah.

What's our capacity to— if what's expected of the episode and what the experience at its best level would be is perhaps thought-provoking conversation, to what degree are we capable of doing that, of bouncing off each other in a way that is stimulating for the audience and achieves the goal?

Would this also then include, for instance, our rapport that we are having?

Our collective ability.

Yeah.

And that becomes a dialogue. It becomes a relationship. Because now we're together creating.

Yeah, because if there would be friction, then the ability of each other separate wouldn't be the same. Yeah.

So the overall levels of ability are affected. That's all in A. B is belief. What's our attitude to our ability?

Self-limiting beliefs. And then we don't go all in. We don't dare. We question, we doubt, and lose energy there. Mm-hmm.

To what degree do I come into this, perhaps if this were my first podcast and I didn't perceive myself as someone who can perform well at podcasts, despite the fact that on paper my ability might be quite high, I might have had plenty of interesting things to share, fantastic ability to bounce off you and spontaneously come up with interesting, thought-provoking ideas, but it didn't come to light. It didn't come out. Because something inside me said, I can't do this. This isn't me.

And on the other hand, if you really have the belief, then all your charisma kind of spills over and creates the extra magic. Maybe also the belief in the others motivating them.

I haven't thought of that. I'd like to think more about that. Yeah, I like it.

Because I'm thinking of all the research that they've been— that has been done with children in classrooms, that when I think they did experiments where they informed this teacher about wrong abilities of the students, so they told them these are high achievers and they're very high talented, and at the end of the term, they actually did achieve highly because the belief of the teacher actually motivated them and let them believe in themselves.

That's also pointing at really—

Yes.

And I hadn't Yeah. I was thinking about in terms of the dialogue between us and how belief in the other facilitates in some ways further belief of the other, what they're doing and therefore— and the dialogue between A and B. So what did the teacher then do that built the pupil's capacity and ability?

Mm-hmm.

Did they teach more clearly? Did they offer resources that those students enabled them to learn more, learn faster? Did they What built the belief levels up and the ability levels up. Yeah.

And sometimes it's just leaving more capacity and autonomy to the other person. Because if I believe you're smart, I don't give you the answers. I ask you a question. Okay.

My favorite story, I think. So as I told you, I'm an educational psychologist by training. And over 15 years ago, I was watching— this barely happens anymore. I was in a semicircle, Watching an educator working with a, I think it was a 7-year-old boy, and the agreement from the parents and the boy himself was he could be observed in real time learning with this educator. It's a very particular methodology around cognitive development and brain maturation and the exercises he was carrying out through the booklet. At the end of one of the pages, the educator stopped and he said to the boy, he said, You know, I think you've done so well. You probably deserve a reward. And the boy's, you know, eyes lit up. And he said, can you guess what your reward is? And the boy, you know, we were wondering, and this was such a learning moment. He said, your reward is you get an even more difficult one. Wow.

Yeah.

Can you imagine if schools operated with that mentality?

And parents, instead it's the chocolate and TV. It's basically counter.

Or something easier.

Yeah.

That's not going to build belief.

And capacity and stamina and grit. And I can imagine, especially for children, it would be frustrating because the children who are high achievers, they want to do more. They want the more difficult. Oh, thank you. Beautiful anecdote.

It's always stayed with me. And it's so rarely experienced. So rarely I see that.

And I wonder what belief there is that avoids this from happening more often.

They say in England, the, what do they call it? The sickness of low expectations. There's something also linked to the concept of growth mindset in this as well. The idea that we could inculcate that mentality of growth and the excitement of growth through the way we frame our feedback.

Yeah, because it's the underlying assumption. I just finished Bo Lotto's Deviate. What a brilliant book. And he speaks a lot about assumptions. And once we start questioning assumptions, we open our mind for innovation, actually do things differently. So what comes to my mind is that the underlying assumption is that we are lazy, that the reward is always rest and doing less. If the assumption was we are eager, we're energetic, Then it wouldn't even cross our mind that a reward is chocolate TV or time off. Yeah.

And perhaps if I put a flavor on that of linking it to the story I mentioned, of challenge is exciting. It's to be gravitated towards. It's to be looked for. It's to be given a positive feeling of pull, a pull, a challenge. Ooh, that's attractive.

Yeah.

So then what happens as a result? Do I default to the easy? Do I seek new? Do I find mistakes? Which I think some of the— someone I'm a family friend with, his father won the Nobel Prize for chemistry, and he's a leading professor, international professor, and he's obsessed by his mistakes in the most healthy way possible. He loves it. He's so excited when he's realized that he's gone down the wrong path because it's given him information.

Yeah. This, this belief, this culture on a collective level to embrace learnings. Oh, we made a mistake. We can, we can share that with each other because otherwise we're depriving each other from learning. This excitement, I, I don't know if I have seen it in any organization, actually. beyond maybe the crazy startup in its infancy.

That's interesting. Yeah, I worked as the site lead psychologist for a startup, and I think there was much more of that atmosphere. I think that world necessarily, because they're constantly confronted by missteps.

And it's because the missteps is what makes them grow until this one stage where suddenly— and it might be the same with status or money or anything that we can accumulate, that in the early stages, we are risk-friendly, risk-seeking, because there's not much to lose, basically. So every potential win is an additional win. So we, we embrace the learning, the failure, it doesn't cost much until the tipping point where suddenly the risk and the danger becomes really costly.

Right.

And then suddenly failure is something that we must avoid, that there's shame around it. There's a— yeah, it would be my spontaneous theory around that.

And if I, if I take a— if we put that in a circle and I try to go to a circle out from that, and again, perhaps try to link it to, uh, this scenario that I shared at the beginning of this part of the conversation, there's something about what we frame as what matters.

It's magic. Sorry. Yeah, go on.

You go on.

I didn't want to interrupt you, but what What you frame is, is what matters. That's what magicians do.

Yes. Imagine if, imagine if we, as a culture, said, if you lost a huge deal because of a brilliant idea that didn't quite work out, we hold you in higher esteem because you went for something with such interesting thinking and such a forward-focused, hopeful approach. That's what we value in our society. The result was secondary. Could we, why couldn't we inculcate some of that culture in our schools? What the grade on your page is, is one thing. And by the way, the grade on your page will change if we focus on the process.

Yeah.

So, let's get you excited by working out what might be the most efficient way. And when there's a complete error, something that takes you, deviates you from the solution, let's celebrate the fact that you've arrived at that error, which tells you no doubt so much about where you've gone on the journey and where you need to shift. And perhaps that error will teach you something else down the line as well. Let's celebrate it. Let's explore it. And let's not worry about the result. The result will come. And I think we start— the tail often wags the dog in education. We look at the results and we try to work back. What's the most efficient way to get to the result? And are you following that path?

And I think this method or belief has or is coming to a natural end and death now with access to knowledge at no cost and no time because everything can be— so the outcome can be quickly achieved and generated if you're asking the right question. So maybe the next educational system is actually a sort of Jeopardy where you're given the answer and you have to come up with a question that would lead to that answer.

Yeah. And also notice how the answer becomes de-emphasized.

Yeah, because it's just an answer.

In fact, not here's the answer, potentially here's an answer.

Yeah. So what is the answer to the sea?

I'll slowly close some loops for you, Myriam.

Thank you for the tangent.

Loved it.

Yes.

Is it about the destination or is it about the journey? And on that note, C is clarity. So how clear am I what the final picture looks like? What would a great podcast look like? Or a great version, given what we've just said, of a podcast look like? And what— that's the destination. What would the journey look like? How clear am I?

Okay, so once you have the ability and the belief that you can do it, then you need the clarity on the goal. And this could be an entire episode as such. Because which are the goals? So I'm thinking we're talking about the grading on the paper. So the goal is basically the criteria by which you grade or what you're aiming for. So the clarity of what you're after, is it just a metric?

I'll try to— answer's the wrong word, maybe. I'll try to respond, like bounce back. bounce of thought back. What I've come to feel, sense, realize— too strong a word, realize— is everything we do, whether we've consciously apprehended it or not, is guided by a goal. From the smallest movement at the beginning of our day through to the most complex calculation we may make.

And would this be what the Buddhists, others, Buddhists call either seek of satisfaction or avoidance of pain?

Oh, at a meta level, perhaps. I'm almost looking through the microscope the other way.

Okay, good. Thank you.

Yes, I suppose. So goal-oriented at that broader level, instinctually, evolutionarily, where am I moving towards with these set of actions and feelings and thoughts? And also with the absolute micro step I'm taking when I move my lips, what is the goal that my brain and body is trying to achieve?

Hmm.

At each stage of my lip moving, of my body moving. Much of it is so habitual and part of our repertoire that we don't consciously apprehend it, but they're all goal-oriented actions and behaviors. So if that's the case, if we were to agree with that premise, the clearer we are about what it is we're trying to achieve and the actions or steps that are required, and indeed in what order to take those actions, to take those steps to achieve that goal, the faster and the more likely we are to achieve it necessarily.

Yeah. And what comes to my mind is the law of attraction, that if I know very clearly what my goal is, then I will achieve it at some point because my unconscious will do all the work to seek the path. And then it sounds as if the ABC is kind of, if I do have the ability and I believe that I can do it and I have the clarity, then I will achieve it.

So often I talk to people about how the clearer— I think of this model, if anyone takes away one aspect of it, of the framework, I should say, it would probably be clarity.

Mm-hmm.

I think clarity is almost like the hub where the spokes of A, B, M, and E, the other 4 elements, are affected. So for example, if we are together clearer or super clear about exactly how it would look if this episode was the best it could be, and exactly what we could say and do at each stage, almost inevitably, our confidence levels, our belief levels will also go up.

Yes, 100%. And it's funny, it makes me smile because in our exploration call, I think I have very rarely been so explicit and so clear in what my wishes and expectations towards a podcast conversation are. I think we're doing, at least from my very Subjective standards, we're doing brilliantly.

Perhaps the goal as defined is a process that is agreed, that is not prescribed, to create an outcome that is defined as something once only, that wouldn't be repeatable, that offers insights, learnings that are not predictable. It's a very rare example of predictable unpredictability, I would say.

Yes. Yeah. Okay. Clarity. Yes. This makes a lot of sense. And it might be the most difficult one. I don't know the M and the E, but clarity is—

Well, if we talk about clarity, so I think I've often found if I'm working with individuals or teams, the clearer individuals or teams are, the confidence levels rise, and so does the levels of M, motivation. I think energy levels grow. I think when we start, we want to seek feelings of competence. It's almost instinctive. We want to feel competent. That might be one of the core drivers for much of what we do.

And I think there's, again, connected with certainty, the moment we have clarity, then it is motivating also to put the effort in because we know that it's air quotes well invested, or we know where we are running.

And then you have like a loop.

Yeah.

The feedback is it is working.

Yeah.

So I have got this clear. So I do know that I can do this. So I want to keep doing this. That's very interesting.

Yeah.

It's again, conceptualized in that way before. But yeah.

Yeah. And thinking back of the 13-year-old you, you saw this magic trick, you were in awe, and then you were, you set your mind up that, okay, this is what you want to do. And then you're motivated.

I certainly had motivation. I happened to go to a school that was very near a magic shop, which was the oldest magic shop in the world, actually, which sadly closed a few years ago. And I think it was the next day I went to that magic shop and I bought a book. The Sunday was the show, performance the Monday, and I never left that shop for the next 7 years. And once I bought the book, that's what built my sense of clarity, I would say, if I were to analyze now. Use ABCME to analyze my journey into magic.

So you got the abilities through the book?

It enabled me to understand better the steps to take, and I could see that I had some of the physical skills to look and the reading ability to go through some of the steps. A bit like a recipe, you know, learn the recipe to perform this piece of magic. It was a card magic book called The Royal Road to Card Magic. It's a book that many magicians use as their foundational bit. And as I read it and realized I could understand it and then began to perform it to myself and to others, that's when probably the feelings of belief would've grown. So, but they're always talking to each other, C, A, B, and M. Now I'm motivated because the feedback from the audience is, that was amazing. Great, let's learn the next one.

And then the E is the evaluation for the feedback loop.

E?

No?

Well, not in my framework. So, not no, but not in my framework.

So, what is the E?

E, environment. So, I bring plenty. What happens outside of me? I subcategorize environment in 3 ways. One, we've discussed, resources. What do I bring? What does the tech bring to our podcast? Without it, what do we have? There's the physical environment. How loud is it outside? Does that distract or disrupt me, you, us, the podcast? Is it warm inside this room? Is it cramped? Is it spacious? Do I have the physical space that I need? The psychological environment, are we encouraging each other to bring the best out of each other?

Feeling safe.

How does it feel? Is it safe? Psychological safety has come out of many of the episodes I've heard, a foundational one. At base, do I feel safe to share who I am, how I am, how I think in real time, trip over my words, think through, contradict myself sometimes, and it still be okay? And for you, the same. Can we bring ourselves to the degree we need to because the environment has set us up?

The culture, coming back to the culture of failure, making mistakes, experimenting.

The culture. So the physical environment, the psychological environment, and the resources. This constitutes my environment.

ABCME.

ABCME. So how does this relate to the workshop, which probably at some point I should Close that loop for everyone. So I begin by trying to build levels of motivation from the start. You talked before about slides or circles as a kind of default. So I immediately want to break that. I want to break that internal narrative, that assumption. So I walk into the room and I immediately perform. I bring someone up and I just perform the magic to them without saying anything else. I want attention and interest immediately, because if I'm sharing that with a teacher or a trainer, that's a great strategy. To use with their group. Grab the attention, grab the interest without any other preconditions. So, I try to model the framework in action. Once I've performed it, I try to offer C, clarity. Today, you're going to learn this in under 20 minutes, which is also M, motivation. And by learning this, you will... more motivation.

Mm-hmm.

So, I start with a hook and a motivator. Then I try to bring clarity of what we're trying to achieve. Add in some, what I call, core motivation. Why should I care? Why should I really care? Because learning a magic trick is enjoyable, but what does this really matter? And if I were to go off on a slight tangent here, when I'm working with teachers and I ask them, having observed a lesson, for example, why should your students care about this lesson? Their answers are almost universally shit. And I encourage anyone in education to ask the same question, not in a threatening or confrontational way, but in a curious way. Why would your students— why would it matter to them? Most teachers will reach for the curriculum because by learning this, they will learn something else, or in their longer-term future, they will.

They will be tested on it.

They will be tested on it and they will do well in the test. And all we care about, remember, is that result. So, we're all happy. Which leads me to a further thought. When I received coaching to learn to build my business, something that's stuck with me and will stick with me for life, I'm sure, is my coach said, marketing is empathy.

Hmm.

Marketing is empathy. And I wonder if great teaching is empathy.

Hmm.

The better I can get into the shoes, into the souls of the people who I'm teaching or training, everything will flow. Because once I've helped them understand and really grasp and really feel the energy for why this is being shared and it's being shared in this way, I'll forgive you a million things. I'll stay with you on this journey because I can really Now understand why it matters to me. So, I try my best before the session to really get a handle on what matters to this team. Where did we get to? So, clarity of what and motivation of why. Then I say some very distinctive things, specific things. I say, I'm going to give you some promises. Number 1, you will learn this within 20 minutes, because I've taught this to hundreds of people before, people in their 80s, people Under age of 10. They all get it within 20 minutes, and you will too. The secret is easier than you imagine. And I promise I will take you step by step. Why do I say these 3 things?

Control uncertainty.

Control uncertainty so we can build belief. Because where do people often fall down? Now I've got the clarity. I really like this, but can I do it? So I want to build their belief. And then I finish the little early stage of the workshop, and I do the rule of 3. First, we're going to do X. Next, we're going to do Y, and we'll finish with Z. That's clarity of how. Here are the steps, and this is the order we'll do it in.

So relax.

And what we do in the second half is I show them exactly what I've just showed you. I did this for a particular reason so that you could learn this in 20 minutes. I'm using the framework and applying it by starting with the hook, clarifying what Helping you care, building your confidence, your belief, and then explaining how this is going to roll. And that's the formula I use. And you're welcome to use it too.

It's beautiful. Thank you. And it's beautiful. It's clear, it's scripted and leaves room for awe and excitement and curiosity and playfulness. And I think that's what— now I understand what you meant. I'm like, okay, you can learn it by listening to this podcast. But then the hook to imprint it into the embodied learning, embodied cognition.

And that's why I brought the magic in, because that moment at the beginning, the disjunctive nature of starting with something that isn't, hi, I'm Dr. Ben Levy, and I'm a psychologist who focuses on performance. No. And then what's replacing that moment is something that's more visceral and hits at a different level. It brings a childlike wonder. to the space. And that's what I wanted to create, a flavor that was different.

Yeah, very nice. What would be your— so looking back when you began, what would be your advice to your younger self?

My flippant answer, and it probably is flippant rather than profound, is don't take advice from your older self. And I'm not sure whether I agree with it, but there's something underneath that that probably does matter to me. Which is, there are so many voices off all through our lives, internal and external, and external that internalize. And maybe the journey is more important than the destination.

Hmm.

And everyone knocking signposts into the ground and pointing you in actually takes away from that spontaneity and that feeling like, I am going through a journey that's very much about the choices I'm making and the learning that I'm taking. It also makes it very difficult for me to now give a different answer, by the way.

Yeah, and what I hear in that is, um, that by taking advice from your older self, it's basically not listening to your own inner voice and your intuition, and thereby giving up some parts of your authenticity. Um, and then not doing— you might have never come up with combining your degree in educational psychology with coaching and magic if you would have followed all the advices of, oh, if you want to build a business or if you want to be an academic.

As you say this, maybe something in my mind now is I would maybe say to my younger self, don't get scared, get excited.

I love that. On the other side of fear, it's always growth.

I have a choice in how I frame my experience, a bit like the mistake conversation. Did I just do something monumentally growth-inducing, or did I make a really big fucking mistake? Am I worried about the consequences of this, or I'm excited to learn how I can find a way through, patch things up, learn something from it, do something different next time that will give me a different experience? And I think I've operated with a feeling often of fear or some level of anxiety and placed a label on the experience. As something that has a negative connotation, a limiting connotation, a closing in. That's what the word scared to me connotes, fight-flight. And if I could label, it's very rare actually in life circumstances, and please God, that's the case for most of your listeners, all of your listeners, that one has that real kind of biological experience of high degrees of anxiety, fear, and a fight-flight response. Most of the others are psychologically constructed from previous experiences that could be reframed relatively straightforwardly if one was minded to do so and if the environment supported one to do so. If I think about different family experiences, my in-laws and my family, how they perceive a particular experience, is it one to avoid in future because that was unnerving, or it was capital U Unnerving, let's go for it again? And that's just a The frame of reference for me that I'm thinking now, but, and how we're conditioned then. What gives me my fear experiences? And do I have to own them as fear?

And is it actually your fear or is it an inherited fear from your parents and your family?

Yeah. And it has that biological substrate or that kind of overlay of anxiety, but actually it doesn't have to. It doesn't have to. I think maybe that would be my internal conversation.

Thank you for sharing that with us. Last question, just because it's— I only have 3 scripted questions I have to ask at the very beginning, very end. What's your facilitation challenge?

We didn't discuss this earlier, but when you said facilitation prior to our conversation, I have been and do consider myself occasionally to be a mediator, but not in how it's commonly understood outside of education. There's a concept of mediation As a person who stands between the learner and the stimulus, the thing to be learned, let's call it, and tries to help clarify the stimulus to the learner to bring them closer together so that eventually the mediator can step back. So mediate the learning, not mediate conflict. Although maybe you could frame it as an interesting conflict between where I'm at now and where I need to be with my learning. So if I were to answer the question in terms of, as my understanding as a mediator, My biggest challenge is probably to step back. I say and believe, but don't always live the maxim that if I've done my job well, I'm out of a job. Because the draw of being the star of the show, the magician, marrying myself is very strong.

And even if it's just a curiosity of how the story continues in a maybe more positive framing. So now that they learned, now they've found peace with the content, What are they doing with it?

Yeah. Which again, I'll link to fear and how did I come across? And the fears associated with that, the judgments of others. Well, perhaps they don't give a shit. And perhaps that's perfect. What's the goal?

Yes. Hook to the next conversation.

Open a loop and it can be closed by others.

Yes. Thank you, Ben.

A real pleasure.

This was very thought-provoking. And yeah, it takes some time to think about this stuff.

I'm just going to throw one thing out for what it's worth, thinking in the back of my mind now, what might be a goal of a podcast? What might you perceive as a goal if you were to go down that route of thinking? Perhaps it is to leave everyone listening with questions. Perhaps great questions or great thinking is a great goal. And so it's so countercultural. The podcasts I listen to are mostly, what's the answer to? What's the strategy that? Who's the expert who will?

And we have so many answers inside ourselves already, if we only ask the right question. And I had a conversation with Khedwa the other day about questions. And she mentioned that there are some questions that are just too big to ask. So how can you break it down? And then sit with a more comfortable question to find your answers. And I think it is a beautiful goal for a podcast, at least for how I understand this podcast, is stimulating the thought of the audience.

Yeah, because realizations are not the same as answers.

Yes, it's an embodied answer.

Yeah, yeah, I love that. Thank you.

That was a gift to me.

Shared, very much shared.

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