#2056 - David Blaine
2023-11-02 02:24:48
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.
Joe Rogan podcast, check it out! The Joe Rogan Experience. Strain by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day!
Hello, David. How are you, Joe? What's happening? Good to see you.
Good to see you.
How you been? Good to see you're still alive. You're not full of visible holes.
I come wood.
What are you up to, man?
Spending a lot of time with my daughter, number one. And then number two, I've been working on this series for National Geographic. So I've been traveling around the world, searching for these people that do incredible feats that they've passed down through generations. And I'm trying to learn, but it's a fast learning curve. So it is the most dangerous thing that I've ever done in my life, but I have the best of the best helping.
That says a lot.
By far! Yes! Whoa.
Well, you showed me some things off camera that we can't talk about.
Well, you can talk about them, I just can't show them. So the scariest thing was like three days ago. The cobra? I kissed a king cobra.
Yeah.
In the wild.
Yeah. Is there a trick to that?
Is it a movement thing? Do you move slowly so you don't...
I studied for weeks and just tried to understand their behavior and worked with different cobras and was... I had a team around me that taught me how to move quickly and get out of the way.
What happens if you get bit?
Well, they have enough venom to kill a full-grown elephant in 30 minutes, so... Is there anti-venom? We had that there, but...
But still?
In my case, I don't trust that.
And even if you get anti-venom, it's still a rough ride, even if you live, right?
Yeah. Is it similar to... But it was amazing, it was incredible.
Is it similar to rattlesnake venom? Because rattlesnake venom essentially...
It's a neuro... yeah, I mean...
Digests your body.
This one shuts everything down, so your heart, your lungs, everything just starts to...
So were they like ready on standby with a needle?
Well, they don't... they put it in a serum, you have to go to a hospital. Oh, you have to go to a hospital. Yeah.
So you have to travel.
But we had an ambulance right there and...
How far is the hospital?
It was 20 minutes away. Oh, God. So 20 minutes of King...
Oh, God. So 20 minutes of King Cobra venom that can kill an elephant.
It was the scariest and most intense thing I've ever done. Yeah.
How many of these guys died doing this?
Well, the snake... the two snakes we had, one of them killed its previous owner. Oh, boy. Yeah.
And they don't kill the snake after it kills the previous owner? No. This guy died, so...
Exactly. Right. That's right. Oh, boy. Yeah, it's...
but it is kind of incredible because there's another guy named Chris Sweet.
who... well, that's his Instagram name, but he lives in Thailand with 90 venomous snakes and he just lets them move through his legs. Well, he was bitten twice on my birthday and his heart stopped two times, but he lets them just move.
While you were there?
No. Oh, okay. No, no, no. On April 4th, I mean. Oh, okay.
Yeah. But he's so calm with them and he studies their behavior and he watches how they move, and then he gently takes them out. And there was one... we were outside and the scariest thing wasn't trying to kiss it. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah. And I think that's a snake called a spire. Yeah. So, that's one that was slithering through my legs, and you have to keep your heart rate down, because if they sense, they have pheromones, they detect if you're nervous or uncomfortable. So, anytime I would get like super tense, I would have to...
I'd walk away carefully. Oh, boy. Yeah, that's him. And that's... yep, that's a snake called a spire.
It has a name. You're so good at finding everything.
Wow.
Oh, my God. It's trying to bite you through the glass.
Why is it trying to bite you through the glass, but won't try to bite you when you're right there?
Well, there it's feeding. Oh. When it smells snake or food, it becomes aggressive. So, you have to make sure you don't smell like any other snakes or anything. Or food.
What kind of food? They eat? snakes. The king cobras.
They eat other snakes?
Yeah. Not king cobras, but other snakes. But other snakes. Yeah. Dude.
Do you have a second guess when you're about to do something like this one?
That one I second guessed. I left and then came back a few months later and did it again. I wouldn't go... I was too afraid to go near it.
What made you go back?
Well, I went to Cleveland and I trained with my friend Mike and my other friend Chris Gillette, who's Gator Boy, Chris, who's amazing. And we slowly started to understand just a little bit of the behavior of king cobras. And then I went back to Indonesia and trained with Fitz, who's unbelievable, with how he handles the cobras. And slowly I felt okay. But there was days I wouldn't even do anything.
So, luckily I had a week, which is still a really fast learning curve. Normally I would train for something for a year, but with this show, I get like a few days. And then I have to try to do it.
Oh, boy.
So, what strategies are you using to keep your heart rate low? Like, if you feel yourself freaking out, how do you calm yourself down?
I get out.
You just get out?
Yeah.
Yeah, just get out and regroup?
Yeah.
Oh, David. But that's the last dangerous thing I'm going to do like that, ever.
That's it, ever?
Yeah, yeah. Like that? Yeah.
Well, I'm glad you're alive.
And I feel like in my, I did it in my show in Vegas. I was jumping from like the height of a nine-story building, landing in boxes, and I dislocated my shoulder. It came down to my armpit. But in retrospect, I think I was lucky because I could have been really bad. It could have been the neck.
It could have been something else. Oh, yeah. So.
Did you get surgery?
No, I didn't get the surgery.
Well, they did.
There was an orthopedic surgeon's convention in Vegas at that time. So I had five orthopedic surgeons in the audience. And one was a shoulder specialist. And he, they all came on stage and he popped it right back in. So then I walked out to do the show, Joe.
But my arm was all numb. It stayed numb for like two months. But I was going like this to get like, to see if I could get feeling back. And it fell back out. So I had to go back on stage.
They popped it back in. And then I did the whole show with one arm.
Yeah, that's it. Yeah, that's a bad one. I think that's when I got injured. Yeah. And my friend Doug, who's with the hat right there, he, when I jumped, he knew that something was going to go wrong.
He bent over and took a heavy breath because he knew that was the one.
There's a gentleman named Yuri Prohaska. He was the UFC light heavyweight champion. And his shoulder dislocated during training. And his trainers tried to pop it back into place. And they were yanking on it.
And they just destroyed his shoulder. They tore everything apart, just kind of pulling on it. And it ripped apart. The UFC doctor says the worst shoulder injury he'd ever seen. That's crazy.
And he's fighting again next weekend. Got it repaired.
He got surgery?
Yep, got surgery. Vacated his title. And now he's back fighting for the title next weekend.
Yeah, mine is still messed up. Really? Yeah.
Like, in what way?
Well, I can't really work out or do anything the same way.
How long ago?
Maybe March.
Did you get an MRI?
Oh, many MRIs.
What's the damage?
No, it was really bad. What's in there? It was bad. It came down to here.
Right. Why didn't they do surgery?
I'm like afraid of surgery, I have to say. Like horrified of it.
Why are you afraid of surgery?
I don't know.
You're not afraid of King Cobra's?
Yeah, it's crazy. But I'm horrified of surgery. Why? I don't know.
Yeah, you should probably get surgery. Like specifically, which ligaments? I have a lot of experience with this stuff.
I have all the scans and the whole write-up of it, so I can show it to you.
And so it's just very weak and it's not stable? It just hurts.
No, I can go overhead, so I'm good. like that. It's just hard to like...
Push things?
No, I can still do it, but not like I used to.
Have you ever gotten stem cells? No. You should get stem cell therapy on it. It could help a lot. I avoided surgery completely with stem cells.
Really?
Yeah, I had a full-length rotator cuff tear. My right shoulder went away. The doctor said it was extraordinary. He went to look at it six months later, and the tear was completely gone. He said, this is insane.
Wow. Yeah, they can do wild stuff.
How did you rip your rotator cuff?
Training. Just jujitsu.
Like too hard?
I don't know.
But it was a slow, or it was a one-time. you ripped it?
Jiu-jitsu is very addictive, and a lot of times you get injured, and you're like, still can roll. I'm going to go back in. And you go back in with like fucked up discs, and tweaked knee, and fucked up shoulder. And I know a lot of guys that have some pretty significant injuries, and they just can't stop training. They just enjoy it so much.
Stem cells could help you a lot. Specifically, if you go out of the country, because they can do some wild shit that they can't do in America because of the FDA. I have some good friends that run a clinic in Tijuana. It's called CPI, and a bunch of my friends have gone down there, a bunch of UFC fighters. It could help you a lot.
I'd be so afraid, though. Why? I don't know.
Why are you talking about being afraid of that?
Maybe because when I was young, and my mother was sick, and that whole thing.
Well, what they can do with modern stem cells is pretty extraordinary. But unfortunately, the United States is very limited in what you can get away with here. Right. Yeah. They're constantly putting restrictions on it, unfortunately.
For no reason.
It doesn't make any sense. There's no downsides.
I feel like. also, just when I eat right, and do everything perfectly, the inflammation all goes away. For sure. And then the pain goes away, and it's much better.
Yeah, for sure. Yeah, that's definitely a factor. Yeah. Inflammation's huge.
Yeah.
And a lot of it does come from bad food. A lot of it comes from too much sugar, too much bread, pasta, that kind of shit. Ice cream, all that shit. All the stuff that's good.
But yeah, afterwards, I'll connect you with those people. Okay. Yeah, I bet it can help you a lot. And it doesn't hurt.
Oh, really? No. There's no downside?
No, it's not going to hurt you. No. No, you'll go there. What they'll do is they'll do IV stem cells. They'll do local stem cells into whatever the area that's injured, and then they'll use hyperbaric chambers, which also accelerates the healing.
They'll have you down there for a few days, and I guarantee you, a few months later you'll feel significantly better. Wow. Yeah. That is all dependent upon what structural issues you have. Now, if you have something that's completely torn off the bone and it's not connected anymore, they can't help with that.
I don't think it's that bad, because I can already do this.
Sometimes you can do that even though it's torn, because there are other ligaments that compensate and other muscles that compensate.
And I still have a little bit of numbness down here, by the way.
Yeah.
It was really crazy because I was numb all the way to here for months.
Yeah, generally that's nerve damage. It takes a long time for that stuff to heal. Nerve damage is rough.
But I feel like I got off easy.
Oh, yeah, it could have been your neck. Yeah, for sure. Right.
So I feel like that was a good lesson.
Yeah, don't do that.
Well, not every night.
Don't do it, period. Don't do it again.
The craziest thing was we only had insurance for the first 10 shows and the injury was on the 10th show. So Monday morning the insurance company called. They said, do you want to discuss this new condition?
Yeah.
So that was the end of that. Yeah. Which is a good thing.
Yeah, don't do that.
You've done some extraordinary things with yourself. I mean, you really have.
Some crazy things.
Yeah, some crazy things. But all for entertainment. I mean, it's interesting because it is entertainment, but it's also entertainment and sort of educating people the boundaries of what the mind can force the body to do. You know, like the one we did, where you're frozen in ice?
Yeah.
Like, that's basically just you. Standing. Standing and using breathing techniques and your mind to deal with that situation. How long was that for?
I think 63 hours.
Yeah. That's a long time.
But my brain tweaked at 55 hours.
Yeah?
Yeah.
Well, you probably weren't sleeping, right?
No, you can't.
Right. So there's probably a lot of the brain. tweaking is just from that.
Yeah. Wouldn't you imagine? I think that plus the extreme conditions.
Extreme cold and lack of sleep and you're standing up.
I'm standing and I had edema and my ankles blown out.
Oh, I can imagine. Yeah. Yeah. How long did it take you to recover from that?
A while. Yeah. I couldn't even walk for a while.
Oh, David.
But I was lucky because it was a 68 degree November, so the air pumping through was 68 degrees. So it created that drip that was awful from the ice, but that helped significantly.
Well, even just standing still for 68 hours.
Yeah. See how happy I am? Yeah.
You look super happy. You're probably hallucinating.
That does look like the beginning. That's hallucination right there. That's where I'm hallucinating.
What did you see?
Everything. Like what? Everything. My mother was in the ice talking to me. And my girlfriend was in the ice talking to me, and time moved completely different.
It was crazy. Whoa. But kind of amazing at the same time. Wow. Yeah, but kind of horrific.
I can imagine.
The way I explained, it was like having nightmares with my eyes open.
Wow.
I think your brain is doing anything it can to trick you to try to quit so you can go to sleep.
Considering all the things you've done, you're in remarkably good condition.
Time will tell.
I mean, you're walking around, you're talking, everything's fine. I mean.
Hopefully you're right.
Yeah.
But I'm always.
Pushing it.
No. No, I'm always concerned about the effects.
Yeah, I would imagine. Something to be concerned about.
Yeah. Because now that I have a daughter, I want to live long. Sure. I want to live till I'm 100..
Right. It's possible if you don't get bit by a cobra.
Now is probably the best time ever to have that goal.
To stop over.
Well, I didn't mean to have the goal of living to 100.. Modern science and medicine.
Yeah, I believe it's possible.
People live to 100..
But I think diet is everything.
It's a lot of it. Are you pretty diligent with your diet?
Well, since the injury, it kind of gave me an excuse to not be. But I need to get serious again.
The injury gave you an excuse to not be? Yeah. How come?
I don't know. I was like, fuck this.
That's funny. Yeah. No, if you. I mean, it seems simple. But it is true that your body is essentially made out of what you consume.
Yeah.
It's the only thing that it has to regenerate. And it doesn't. People don't think of it that way. You think of your body as your body. But your body is constantly reproducing itself.
Cells are constantly regenerating. And if you don't give your body good nutrients and real food. You suffer. You suffer. And that is the majority of Americans, unfortunately.
Even my friend is running a marathon in a few days. And I said, for the next couple of days, reduce any food that will give you inflammation and do extreme hydration. Because the impact of that distance will pay its toll in the long run.
Most certainly. Especially if you're not conditioned for it.
And, I think, really good. endurance athletes like Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan, LeBron, James, Tom Brady. They all are very concerned with inflammation. Oh, yeah. So they don't have anything that will give them inflammation.
And I think that allows you to continue much longer.
Most certainly.
Yeah.
Yeah. Inflammation is one of the biggest problems that people have. Particularly in this country, because of the way we eat. I'm sure you've seen those photographs of people on the beach in like the 1960s versus people on the beach in 2023..
No. But I can imagine. Yeah.
We've ballooned. And it's because of the American diet.
It's sugar.
It's sugar.
And the process. The bad sugars. Yep. And even just the way they genetically modified fruit. Like, if you look at watermelon from the Renaissance days.
Like a Renaissance painting of a watermelon. As opposed to a watermelon. now. It doesn't even look like the same thing. Right.
It yields such a high dose of sugar that it becomes addictive. Yeah. And buries everything.
That term genetically modified gets thrown around a lot. A lot of it is just selective breeding. They just figure out a way to. Breeding is not the right word either. It's like they select for very specific traits.
I mean that's why they've made a tomato that can sit on a truck and drive across the country and not rot. You know. But then you get it and it's flavorless and pale.
Yeah. But it's durable. Wait. Can you pull up a Renaissance painting of a watermelon? I just want you to see that.
I don't think I've ever seen a.
And then it'll show you side by side.
Renaissance painting of a watermelon.
Yeah. How they were originally.
Well, I'm sure you've seen like heirloom tomatoes. Have you seen heirloom tomatoes? Yeah. They look so. See.
Whoa. And wait. The middle left one. No. Yeah.
That one shows the. See the difference? Wow. Yeah. They've done that with everything.
That's wild.
Yeah. It's all. I mean. it's a reason. I think even fruit.
You would think fruit was so healthy. But then you get these berries when you go to Whole Foods and they're like this big and they're so juicy, and you eat the whole thing. But if you're in the wild getting blackberries, they're small, they're bitter. So. Yeah.
That's extraordinary.
So I think even the fruit and the things we think are healthy, we have to be careful.
Yeah. It's definitely very different.
But I don't necessarily think. I think. I wonder what is the difference in terms of the nutrient content, whether or not it's bad for you to eat modern watermelon. I would doubt it is.
No. I think it's fine. But I'm just saying it yields such a high dose of sugar.
Right. Yeah.
Most of it. And sugar creates inflammation.
Yeah. It certainly does.
And cancer thrives on. Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Yeah. Well, I've noticed a giant difference cutting sugar out of my life. When I cut it out and just live very cleanly, eat very cleanly. Just massive difference in how your body feels, how your back feels, joints feel.
That's everything. Especially things like the back. Like where you have pain. Mm-hmm. That stuff goes away.
Yeah.
Yeah. And even how your brain functions.
Everything. Yeah. Yeah. Right now my brain is on a lag because I've been not eating properly.
I would think if anybody would be taking care of themselves, someone like you.
Yeah, I need to.
Brutalizes yourself.
But sometimes I go so extreme that I need like a break and I go the other way.
I know what you mean. Yeah. You get tired of it. That happens to a lot of fighters. They get done fighting and they just get fat because they're just like, I don't want to train anymore.
I don't want to do anything.
Yeah. Because they're so extreme and so focused. Yeah. And all of a sudden it's like.
Yeah. I think little vacations from discipline are fine. But when I take a little vacation from discipline, I feel like shit. And then I'm like, what are you doing? And then I'm upset with myself.
And then I go back the way I used to eat and I'm fine.
And then you feel great. Yeah.
But that's, you know, it's what humans are supposed to eat. We're supposed to eat real food. And a giant percentage of our diet is processed bullshit. And that stuff is just, it tastes good and it tricks your body because there's all sorts of salt and sugar in it. And, you know, those high calorie, high carbohydrate foods are so easy to overconsume.
Yeah.
You know, we had, uh, Elon and I had pizza the other night and I just couldn't stop eating it. Jamie had to take it away from me. If you didn't take it away from me, I would have ate that whole box.
Yeah. Once you start, you can't stop. I can't stop. I'm a glutton. And then the funny thing is, then you're still hungry an hour later.
Yeah. Whereas when you eat foods with high nutrition, like broccoli or something, you're full.
Well, especially protein. If you eat foods, protein has a very high satiety rate. So like if you eat steak, you can only eat so much steak, or you could keep going if you wanted to, if you're in a contest or some shit. Like you ever see those places like restaurants where they'll, they give you a free meal. If you could eat a 72 ounce steak.
And so people try to eat them. You have to eat it like within 30 minutes or something crazy like that. Um, but when you eat steak, like at a certain level, you'll, you're done. Your body's like, that's enough. But if there's steak and then bread, the bread's right there with butter and it smells good.
It's fresh. Oh, give me some more of that bread. Or there's a bowl of pasta. Ooh. And then there's some ice cream.
Ooh.
You'll keep going.
And that's, that's where modern foods have kind of hijacked the human brain. Hijacked your reward system. It makes you crave these things that are ultimately detrimental to your health.
But when you're eating really healthy, what's your diet?
Mostly meat. I eat mostly meat and eggs.
Do you eat raw eggs?
No, no. I cook them.
I feel so good when I have raw eggs.
They're good, but you do have to be concerned with salmonella. You particularly have to be concerned with salmonella.
But I think it's like one in 35,000 and it's on the shell. I think it's a low risk.
It's a low risk. Yeah. But it does happen. There's a certain percentage of people every year, a certain number of people every year, they get salmonella from eggs.
But the eggs in Paris, by the way, they taste so good. It's kind of amazing.
Well, they're probably free range chickens.
Yeah. And they're like orange.
That's the difference.
They're like orange. Yeah. Yeah.
Well, that's a free range chicken. That's a chicken, that's eating bugs and worms and small rodents and things like that, which is what they're – I mean, they're fucking dinosaurs. I have chickens. And the chickens that you have, if you have like chickens in your yard, if you have a good amount of place for them to roam and free range, you get a dark orange yolk and it's delicious.
Yeah. Amazing.
And it's also if you're a person who's very concerned about factory farming and ethics, that are involved in that kind of stuff and you don't want to eat eggs because the chickens are mistreated. Chickens that you have yourself are basically pets that give you free karma, free food, because they're not even scared of you. They wander around you and peck at the ground right near your feet.
And they eat ticks too, right?
And they will produce food for you, because they're not going to make chickens unless there's a rooster. Their eggs are never going to fertilize. So, you're getting these beautiful, healthy eggs.
Yeah. That's amazing.
And no one loses. No. Yeah. It's a perfect cycle.
And they taste so –, Yeah. Yeah.
So good for you. And there's so many things that you can get from eggs that you're just not going to get from a plant-based diet. unless you're supplementing. You're just not going to get them.
Do you take vitamins? Yeah.
Yeah.
I take those liposol – the liquid ones, because you absorb them.
Liposomal?
Yeah, those ones. But I was going to bring them and share them with you, but I forgot.
Yeah. I take those. I also take – you know what AG1 is? Athletic Greens?
No. It's great.
It's just very simple. You take a scoop of it, put it in some water, stir it up. And it's probiotics. It's like 75 different vitamins and nutrients. Very good.
It tastes good. Easy. So simple. Just stir it up.
It's called AG1?.
AG1.. It's very easy because it's like – it's a no-brainer. They sell little travel packs. Just open up a bottle of water, pour it in the bottle of water, shake it up, drink it.
And it's all natural?
All natural. Yeah. It's all plant-based stuff.
Yeah, that I'll look into.
It's great. And then, you know, you really should supplement with vitamin D.
You know, vitamin D and K2, they work well together. All that stuff is one of the things that people are very deficient in.
Yeah.
Vitamin D in particular. It's a big one, particularly in cold climates, where people don't go outside very much. You don't get exposure to the sun. The best way to get vitamin D is from the sun.
Naturally, yeah.
Yeah, that's the best way. But most people do not get enough.
Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. We're indoor all day working.
Yeah. But when you think about, like, what did human beings eat to thrive? Well, their most treasured and – their prized food was meat. If they could kill a deer, if they could kill, you know, something that was nutrient-dense, that had fat on it, a pig. Like, that's what they treasured the most, because that's what would give them the most nutrients.
You would also assume they would have, like, coconuts, bananas. Sure.
Fruits. Fruits are good. Especially, I mean, again, fruits that weren't fucked with. But that's one of the things that we've done with wheat. You know, if you get wheat – and everybody talks about this – if you get wheat in Europe, you're getting this heirloom wheat.
You're getting wheat. that is really what it was originally. When they took wheat and changed it in America, what they've done is –.
To yield a high dose.
Exactly. They destroyed it. Much more complex glutens in it, and it just gives you more inflammation. It's hard to digest.
And you don't gain weight from those non-modified seeds of 500 years ago. I know.
You go to Europe and you eat their food. You look at them. They're not fat.
No.
It's crazy. Look at France, the people eating bread in France. They eat bread every day. They're not fat. Nope.
In America, we're all balloons.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's just – in making things better to sell, because the higher yield, and, you know, you can make more profit, we've poisoned ourselves.
Yeah.
Essentially. You know?
Yeah.
It's fucked.
But at least we know it. So if you do seek out the information, there's plenty of doctors that could explain these things to you and just seek out organic foods and just eat real foods. Eat real foods. And you'll be far better off.
You even sleep better. Oh, yeah. I don't snore. Oh, yeah. I don't need as much sleep.
Sure. It's so crazy, what a difference it makes.
It does. It makes a giant difference. Yeah. And it's so hard to get people to deviate, because once you get accustomed to eating certain kinds of food and you start craving those kinds of food.
Yeah, it just triggers your –.
It's very difficult to get off that path.
Yeah.
So we'll get your shoulders sorted out. I'd like to see what your MRI said, though, too. Yeah, I'll show you. And I'm sure the doctors want to see that, too. Yeah, I have all the MRI.
So I was doing MRIs before every jump and after every jump, just to make sure the blood vessels around the heart, you know, things weren't shifting. Because if we noticed something small, then we would stop, because that way something connected to the heart wouldn't become problematic.
So, yeah.
I feel like I got lucky on that.
You probably definitely did, because if it hit your neck and had the same sort of impact, what it did to your shoulder, imagine something that can blow out your shoulder like that, what it could do to your spinal cord. Yep. You know?
Yeah.
Very dangerous.
Yeah.
Do you ever think you're going to stop doing this kind of crazy shit?
I think so.
Really?
Yeah, I think I'll eventually just move towards magic only.
Well, you're really good at magic, too. That's what's so confusing to me. Your card tricks are fucking bizarre.
You did a bunch of card tricks for us off-air. You did them for my kids. You did them for the security guys at the old studio in L.A. And, I mean, Jamie is really good at watching that kind of stuff. I've been watching him since I was younger.
I love watching this shit. Jamie was fucking staring at you like a hawk. I want to figure it out. I mean, I know it's magic, but there's also... It's tricks.
He knows how to do it. I didn't always know how to do it. But after it was done, Jamie was like, fuck, I have no fucking idea. I tried. I thought I knew what was going to happen.
Yeah. And I didn't.
He couldn't wait, though. He's like, I'm going to watch everything. I'm going to figure it out. Couldn't figure out, jack shit. Yeah, that alone.
But, I mean, you're kind of the only magician who also does things that aren't necessarily magic, but they are extraordinary feats of control of your body and just dangerous stunts.
I think part of the excitement for me is just learning something that's unique, that's not really done in the magic world, but then just the actual training and learning a new skill. So it's like a continual search to try to figure out new things. And that's kind of what keeps me excited in a lot of ways. And I think it's like something different, because I think most people that are magicians, they, you know, a card trick, everybody can learn. But when you, when you go and try to figure out one of those things that are insane to learn, or you're inspired by something else and it leads to the trick itself, that that's exciting for me.
So when I went to Africa to learn how to swallow a gallon of water and then spout it out, I didn't know it would lead to being able to hold frogs in my stomach, then produce them at any time. But it ended up leading to that. So it became a magic trick, but it started as like some insane skill that I saw somebody doing. I was obsessed with it.
When you swallow a gallon of water, are you stretching your stomach out? Is that what's happening? It's awful. But is it like, do you gain greater capacity because of that?
No. No. Every night in my show, I have to put a gallon of water inside and it's horrible.
What does it feel like? Awful. Like pregnancy, maybe?
I don't know.
I can't answer that. Maybe. I'm not sure. Something, so you feel your organs stretching? Do you feel like everything getting pushed aside to make room for the water?
I mean, a gallon of water is...
Is a lot. It's a lot. Yeah.
What does it weigh?
I think like 8.43 pounds or something like that. Yeah.
So just imagine eight pounds of food.
It might be 8.34 or something.
Just eight pounds of food in your body is insane.
Yeah. No, it's a lot. And it's solid. And it's all eating. And it's all solid.
It's water. So it's just like a big solid. Just a mass in there. And then I have to go do the show.
Oh God. So you have it in your body while you're doing that. So you have to ignore this awful feeling while you're doing your show.
And act normal.
Whoa. And then spit it all out. And how do you make sure you're not peeing it all out?
Like. how do you... I know the time on that.
Oh.
So I've practiced the window of time.
What's the window of time?
Between swallowing it and... Obviously, it starts to move in like 15 minutes. But I'm able to kind of control it for the length of the show. Pretty much.
Are you contracting your body? Are you doing something physically?
Well, then I spout it out to put out the fire. Right. So it's a break. And then I reload it. So secretly.
So when you spout it out to put out the fire, people are like, What the fuck? Like. where do you get all this water?
Well, they see me drinking it also sometimes. Right.
But still. It's pretty insane.
It's insane. It's a show that, you know, my show is a show that you can only do like once or twice a month. You can't do it right. If I did a card trick show, I could do it every night. Right?
It'd be like very good for business.
Yeah.
But I like this show because it's an impossible show. It's like one that I have to like, get into the mindset and be like, Oh, fuck. Here comes another night.
So when you put together a show like this, It's like when you're sitting down the planning stages and you're like, Okay, got a big show coming up in Vegas. What am I going to do? How much time is involved in the creation of something like this?
Years. Years. Yeah. Wow. Years and years.
Wow. I mean, it took me 20 years to even do my show.
20 years.
Almost. That's insane. Yeah. Because I wanted something that was different, and, you know, Something that I felt like would represent what I love and what interests me. So I worked on all these crazy things and it took so long to figure them out.
And then how to apply magic to them. Like how to make the trick part. And then the trick part always makes the other things seem like that's a trick. So when I'm holding my breath, everybody thinks like I have tubes or something. Right.
Right. Right.
Right. What did you do when you held your breath? Like how long did you hold it for? It was something insane. Like, I want to say like 13 minutes or something like that?
I did 17.04 on over. 17.. But my actual record with doctors and pulmonary experts on it was 20 minutes and 2 seconds. Breathing pure O2.. And my heart rate dropped to 8 beats per minute.
So they pulled me up because they thought I was going to go into cardiac arrest. And I actually, that one felt pretty good. But now I think the record is like 24.03.. Wow. Yeah.
And you're breathing pure oxygen before you do it.
Yeah. Without the pure O2 I was up to like 747..
Which is still insane. I know free divers can do stuff like that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But they're also, the ones that are really good, are really thin, really tall. They have a total lung capacity that's much greater than mine. Mine is less than average.
Your lung capacity is less than average?
Yeah. 80% of the average person, my height and size.
Why is that?
I don't know.
That doesn't even make sense if you can hold your breath that long.
My TLC is 80% of the.
Hmm.
That's crazy. But I think that's where a lot of it has to do with accepting the pain. Like mind over matter.
So generally like taller, longer people have longer lungs.
Bigger chest cavity.
Yeah.
That makes sense. Yeah.
Yeah. There was a dude who was an MMA fighter named Egan Inouye. And I know he did something insane. He was a free diver. He lived in Hawaii.
And I think. I think he was up to like seven plus minutes. And that's also physical. Right. Because you're holding your breath.
And then you're diving into the water and moving your body. So that.
Makes it much harder.
Consumes oxygen. It's not just sitting there.
Yeah. When I was doing it, I was just. And even your brain functioning. You want to shut everything down. Because your brain uses a lot of oxygen as well.
Ooh. So the more that. I didn't even think of that. You can just shut everything down the more efficient you are.
And when you're doing that. Like how are you getting your heart rate to eight beats a minute.
I didn't intentionally do that. It just happened. I think the body does. Does whatever it needs to do to make sure you survive.
Right. So your body's recognizing like this motherfucker isn't breathing. Yeah. Let's just slow it down. And like.
It's kind of like creeping towards the gas station when you're on E.
Yeah.
You know. Like you're going like five miles an hour. Because you know you're not going to make it otherwise.
Wow.
What do you think is the most difficult of all these things you've ever done?
Maybe the ice.
Just on the mind.
Yeah. That one was the worst one. I would never do that again.
How long did it take your brain to recover from that?
The brain recovers pretty fast. I think after one night's sleep I was okay. Really? The brain. Yeah.
So no more hallucinations.
Yeah. But also. I was. I was. Yeah.
It was bad.
I would worry about something like that. That I would open up a door that I could never close.
Yeah.
That would be horrible. That would be like in a horror movie. That would happen.
That's why I don't mess with sleep deprivation. Open up a door to the underworld. I tried to mess with that. It's scary.
Yeah.
I think it's a very effective form of torture. I think in North Korea they did that to the Americans. Extreme sleep deprivation. I think that's weak than the worst.
Oh, I'm sure we do it too. Yeah. Guantanamo Bay.
I mean. Sleep deprivation is horrific.
Yeah. Isn't it crazy?
It's horrible.
Because that's one you wouldn't even think of as torture. And when you think of. People, think of it as torture. They think of pain. You know.
They don't think of just like making someone stay awake. Well. But that's. Isn't that Chinese water torture? That you just drip water on your face?
I don't think that one's so bad. Really? I don't think so.
I heard it's pretty bad. I don't know. I think there's something about it. That just keeps you awake. And it's just nuts.
Because you're just. The drip. And like. It being. Irregular intervals.
You still get micro sleep.
I don't know. I don't think so. Maybe you should try that one.
Do you want to see this trick?
I would love to see this trick. What do you got?
Well, it's a simple one. But it's another one. So I just use some thread. But I might need your help. Okay.
Do you want to come. Okay.
I'll come over there.
Yeah. I can move. Should I move over? Or you can come here? I'll come over there.
Should I slide to the left or something?
So, first I'll show you the trick version. Wait, can I take this off? Yeah. So first I'll show you the trick version of it. Okay.
Which is just like this.
For the people just listening at home. He folded over a little loop in a piece of thread.
And he's putting it in his mouth and swallowing it.
He's chewing on the thread. Now he's drinking water.
Yeah. Here, wait. Hold on. So this is the trick version. See, you can pull.
Do you want to just pull it?
Pull the thread? Yeah. So you have a thread that you've stuck in your body.
See.
Uh-huh.
So that's the trick version.
That's a thread that he just had embedded in his skin.
But hold on. Here's the different version.
Actually wait.
Instead, I'll do it this way. So you can see what's actually happening.
Okay.
We grab here.
The one on your chin? Okay. So now he's got a thread coming out from under his chin.
I pulled up a little.
Okay.
Pull it down.
It's through his mouth and through the bottom of his mouth and out. his chin. Want to pull it out? Yeah.
Okay.
So that's something that I learned in India.
So you just essentially use a needle and shove it through the bottom of your jaw. And people think it's coming out of your mouth. Yeah.
It's pretty good, though.
It is pretty good. I'm going to go to the other side.
So there's a book called Swami Mantra.
How are you getting it into your chest?
Well, first I'll tell you there's a book called Swami Mantra, which is a collection of pamphlets, of secrets of what the fakirs were doing in India. So there was a trick that I saw a magician do when I was a kid. And he ate a thread and he pulled it out of his stomach. And I was with a bunch of amazing magicians and we were all blown away and in shock. But I cornered the guy and convinced him to teach me the secret.
So then I started playing with it. And then just now, when I was in India meeting street magicians and finding all these performers. I went to a festival. and they do all these extreme things I have never seen before. Like they push the ice pick skewer type thing through their neck.
And so I suddenly had an idea and I was like, wait, maybe there's a way. And then it becomes a magic trick. But you're seeing the early phase of it. Okay. Yeah.
Sometimes I get nervous that, like, you know, obviously anything could go wrong. You could, you know. Yeah.
Start squirting blood.
Like it happened last time. Yeah. I promised you there was going to be no blood.
Thank you. Yeah. When last time we poked the ice pick through your arm. We hit a nerve, right? We had to back it out.
Yeah. It was bleeding internally. It bubbled up. Yeah. Not good.
Yeah. I was not, that's not what I wanted to happen. I was traumatized. afterwards. I was like, oh, I'm fucked.
So is that just a luck thing? Like you miss? or you just don't know exactly where to push it through?
No. What happened was normally, I think I go in from this side and out. But because you were sitting here and I wanted you to push it, I think we went in the opposite direction. Oh. And I think that's what went wrong.
Oh, so you know where to do it normally.
v1.0.0.260408-1-a910ba6_os