Often I have read advice in our books that one should forget the sleight or gimmick.
The best way to use a thumb tip? "Just forget that it is on your thumb!" Afraid of palming a card? "Forget that you have it palmed!" Now, this advice certainly seems valid.
It might be very beneficial if you could forget you are doing a sleight or forget that the thumb tip on your thumb.
But this advice does not offer much real help, does it? It instructs that you consciously forget! How on earth does one do that, forget on purpose? Just one attempt will be enough to convince you that such a thing is impossible! However, this laudable but impossible idea of forgetting provides an excellent case for the practice of structuring your performances as a string of highlights.
Focus attention on something other than the secret and the audience will pay no attention to the secret- but just as importantly, it correct directs your attention as well! One cannot purposefully forget, but you can substitute one thought for another.
If you do not want to think of something, think of something else! The trick is not to forget the thumb tip; the trick is to think of something else while you wear the darn thing.
And if there is a strong point of interest, you can place your interest there as well.
It can and should be so strong a point that it will make you think of the important and relevant features of presentation, the highlights only; and this makes it impossible for distracting thoughts concerning method to enter the mind.
Your conscious mind is completely occupied with the important aspects of the effect.
No place is left in it for you to think about the secret; and the secret is pushed into the shadows of your subconscious mind.
When you do this, you can deceive yourself! Of course, it does require practice.
You might not succeed the first time you try (at home); but if you really concentrate, if you force yourself while practicing to think only about the highlights of the presentation, soon thoughts concerning method will slip into the safe dark shadows of your subconscious.
You simply would not have time to think about sleights and gimmicks, as your thoughts will be too engaged for such things.
To learn to believe your own magic, apart from good direction you will need a solid "silent script".
The silent script, a basic acting tool.
A silent script correctly grounds your acting.
While it is formally an acting tool, it also helps you to avoid undesirable thoughts concerning method.
The idea of replacing certain thoughts with others may sound a bit mystical at first, but it is practical and not particularly difficult.
However, it is not automatic.
It must be practiced.
Otherwise, when you execute some secret action, before you know it, a thought about this action will appear in your mind.
But if you practice, while seriously concentrating, to supplant such thoughts with presentational ones, eventually the divorcing of secret actions from thoughts about them will become easier and easier.
And eventually this detachment from method will work for you during actual performances as well.
You must, though, stick to your silent script during practice.
If you attempt to use your silent script only during shows you will have trouble.
Only thorough practice with the silent script will produce the desired results.
From this you will see that there must be not only continuous direction, but continuous thinking as well!