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Magicians

December 3, 2021
1

Could you be a Magilitator?

By | Magicians, Magilitator, Team

A Magilitator is one of a kind… it’s a magician that facilitates or a facilitator that can do magic! Abracademy melds these two skillsets together to create this unique role. We’re growing our network so if this appeals to you, read on…

We work with clients big and small from all over the world, and we’re looking for new magicians to join our freelancer community. If you’re keen to develop a special set of skills, we want to hear from you! We train and develop Magilitators to make sure you’re 100% confident when it’s time to deliver workshops.

There’s lots of benefits in the community itself too as we host meetups. You’ll have the opportunity for peer to peer support… learn new magic or test, and get feedback on, a new performance. It’s a place for sharing and learning.

We want to expand our magical community with magicians from all corners of the magic world, the more diverse the better! We’re eager to balance genders, like the Magic Circle finally having a female president — so female magicians are especially welcome.

We want to hear from you!

Get in touch
September 27, 2021
0

Malerbi

By | Magical Moments, Magicians, Magilitator, Team
bio

Malerbi

Dismisdirectioner

Magician

A graduate in Communication and Body Arts currently living and working in São Paulo, Brasil.

Malerbi believes in the power of magic. He believes that every trick is a metaphor wanting to be recognised.

Contrary to popular belief, magic isn't about fooling people. In fact, it can inform by revealing hidden information. We humans are already being fooled... our senses and preconceptions misdirect us. And we're blissfully unaware of it! By causing little shocks and surprises, magic questions our senses and can reveal our blind spots.

Malerbi's superpowers:

🎩 Listening

🎩 Connecting everything

🎩 Metaphors

Abracademy

We’re a diverse team of magicians, facilitators, learning designers, strategists, communicators, scientists and creatives who love what we do at Abracademy ♥

Meet the team

”"Once the imagination is unshackled, liberation is limitless"

Walidah Imarisha

Contact us

Say hello
September 22, 2021
0

Ward van Laer

By | Magical Moments, Magicians, Magilitator, Team
bio

Ward van Laer

Machine Magic

Magician

As well as being a magician, Ward is a machine learning engineer and speaker. He has with experience in computer-vision, detection on time-series and NLP. He likes to agonise over the possibilities of explainable AI and AI interpretability 😄

Read his posts about machine learning on Medium / @ward.vanlaer

Ward's superpowers are:

  • Machine magic
  • Data
  • Insight

Abracademy

We’re a diverse team of magicians, facilitators, learning designers, strategists, communicators, scientists and creatives who love what we do at Abracademy ♥

Meet the team

”"Once the imagination is unshackled, liberation is limitless"

Walidah Imarisha

Contact us

Say hello
September 22, 2021
0

Sonia Benito

By | Education, Fashion, Magical Moments, Magicians, Magilitator, Schools, Team
bio

Sonia Benito

Spanish Trickster

Magician and dancer

"I think magic can be created anywhere. We are therefore surrounded by moments that make us question the impossible"

Originating from Spain, Sonia is now based in London bringing something new to the magic scene. She blurs the lines between classic and modern magic techniques adding in unique movement patterns.

Sonia has worked with us many times including the MURAL Maze and the Royal Museums Greenwich project with young women.

Sonia's superpowers are:

🗲 Tutting

🗲 Effortless style!

🗲 Making modern magic 

Abracademy

We’re a diverse team of magicians, facilitators, learning designers, strategists, communicators, scientists and creatives who love what we do at Abracademy ♥

Meet the team

”"Once the imagination is unshackled, liberation is limitless"

Walidah Imarisha

Contact us

Say hello
December 18, 2020
0

A look back at 2020

By | Belief, Curiosity, Food for thought, Leadership, Learning and development, Magical Moments, Magicians, Team, Wonder

In November we took a trip through a virtual maze to look back at 2020 together as a team. Here’s what we found on our way to the heart of the labyrinth…

2020 started normally. Refreshed after a break, we were looking forward to what the new year would bring. In early February we looked into our crystal ball. “It’s time for a team get together – a week in London, all together, to make plans and strategise“, said someone. It’s almost as if we knew what was coming…

That same week we took the opportunity to launch our magical magazine, The World Needs Magic, at Mama Shelter. They’ve never had so many magicians in their bar. Ever. We lost count of how many playing cards appeared in unexpected places that evening. Later in February, the magicians travelled to another dimension, aka the Blackpool Magic Convention. Who knows what they got up to, but they came back with new tricks up their sleeves. We then delivered a couple of Open Workshops and we worked with Sony, and Netflix.

“An excellent start to the year”, we said. “Can’t wait to see what’s next…”

March 2020

Coronavirus hits the UK and everything changes.

Our team was already partially remote so that aspect of lockdown was less of a shock for us. Nonetheless, it was the start of many challenges for Abracademy, personal and professional. The immediate hit for us was not being able to deliver sessions in person and clients cancelling workshops. Overnight, everything fell off a cliff. Making sure that you are always connected during this time can take its toll, there is always worries but in the face of something like this it can be tenfold. It was important that internet signals were high and so were spirits, that is why things like suddenlink internet plans, or something similar to it, was needed for everyone to keep in contact and communicating.

We had to completely re-think what we do. How do we pivot? How do we deliver what we do online and still make it magical, meaningful, and engaging? We had already been contemplating online delivery, but now we had to figure it out. Fast.

Spring 2020

Step 1 of pivot. We adapt one of our most popular Magical Moments – Unleash Imagination – for online delivery. We test it in a virtual Open Workshop. And it works! Participants stay engaged and we get great feedback, which, of course, we use to refine and improve the session.

Online events started popping up like bunnies out of hats. Rubens takes part in a House of Beautiful Business event and does a talk at FCB Brazil. Never ones to lag behind, we also launch our webinar, The World Needs Magic. Taking advantage of our talented network, Rubens invites a weekly guest chat with him. We want to highlight the magic of people, showing how resilient and adaptable we are when we need to be. Like now…

Meanwhile, we polish up another session for virtual delivery, Raising Resilience this time. It felt very relevant, something almost everyone needed more of. And we deliver our first client workshops, for Thomas More University and Echo in Belgium. The university, like many institutions, had shifted all their learning programmes online. They felt a need for creative sparks and ways to brainstorm together, online. We ran Unleash Imagination with them – the perfect session to unlock creative problem solving.

In May, we said goodbye to Julie and we decide to let go of our office at Containerville. Sad times, but we bid both a fond farewell and embrace the good times we’ve had.

Summer 2020

No basking in the sunshine for us! Well, a little bit of outdoor working perhaps 👆

In June, we organise a team day. We’ve been in firefighting mode since March so it feels like a good time to pause, reflect and plan. Katy and Priya put all their energy into strategy, structure and process. We establish monthly quests to stay agile and responsive, given all the uncertainty.

The Magic of Teams is ready for online delivery – ninja L&D skills from the learning design team! We deliver Raising Resilience to Start It KBC in Belgium. Having benefitted so much from that programme, it was great to give them something back. We also start planning Bridging the Impossible – a symposium combining the science of magic and wellbeing (with Goldsmiths / Magic Lab).

July was unexpectedly busy, but some of us manage staycations. Rubens delivers a talk to a huge university audience in Brazil. We deliver to Netflix again, yay! They introduce us to SumUp (who we eventually work with in November). And we start working with Unilever on Unite4Growth, an internal innovation programme. We also pitch to Montezuma. Time for some sweet, sweet magic…

In August, we take advantage of a little down time to make podcasts from the webinars. We also challenge ourselves with a design sprint for a scalable product. And last, but not least, we deliver a session to Civicus in South Africa. They’re a human rights organisation doing incredible work (check out how you can support their campaigns).

Jules’ gorgeous new kittens 👇

September 2020

Our lead generation campaigns pay off! Lots of potential new clients are conjured up, including Spotify. We do workshops with the students at The Farnborough Academy. Our friend and frequent collaborator, Sonia Benito worked with us on those. She’s a dynamo, an inspiration and brilliant with young people.

Rubens took part in an EduJam, we delivered to Netflix teams around the globe and held a couple of Open Workshops online. We also did our first sessions with Spotify. Not just one session mind you. Five sessions, delivered simultaneously to five teams! 😲 Ta-da!

Did we take on too much this month?! Maybe, but it was amazing and sometimes you do your best work when you push yourself out of your comfort zone.

👇 That’s Katy’s Faces in Magical Places

October 2020

October is Mental Health Awareness month and we had the great pleasure of working with Mind again. We also started workshops at Carthage College in the US – supporting student wellbeing. Continuing the theme, Geoff MacDonald was one of our fantastic webinar guests this month. He talked very frankly about his own mental health journey and [email protected] Listen to Geoff’s full conversation – it’s very moving.

We also worked with the London Business School again. It’s great to work with clients on a longer term basis and see the growth in people. We deliver to the Spotify Soundtrap team. And Rubens does a talk at the Brazilian Space Agency 🚀 Our crystal ball definitely didn’t see that one coming!

Three big future-facing things happen too: 1) we ignite the hiring process for a new team member, 2) we pitch to Google and 3) Miro champion the boards we created for online sessions. As well as being in their Miroverse, we’re also featured as Miro Experts. We are beyond delighted! Miro’s helped us bring our online sessions to life in a whole new way.

👇 Our map of 2020 magic

November 2020

November brings another major lockdown. It’s not great for anyone’s mental health, but luckily client work keeps us busy. A project with Spotify NY starts, and we work with two more great organisations, Young Scot and SumUp (we were introduced to them by our Spotify client 👌 – new business at its best). We also continue to work with Unilever and the Unite4Growth winners. The client has scaled the project and take us with them on the journey. This means global deliveries and 6am workshops with Asia! No complaints here – just a sleepy delivery team come UK lunchtime… 💤

December 2020

No pre-Christmas slow down for us. This month we’ve worked with Unilever, Minds At Work, This Place, Rock Your Life!, Pfizer, more Unilever, Zinc VC and RCKT.

We manage a little Christmas get together on Zoom to celebrate the year’s achievements. We’re exhausted. But happy. But exhausted. We play, we chat, we drink cocktails out of cans. We’re now in the middle of a two week break. Bliss. We’ll be in pyjamas hugging our magical bunnies, making 💤s appear.

Below is a little video we made earlier in the year. We were playing with Zoom communications, trying to bring joy to being online all day!

How was your 2020?

As you can see, ours was eventful. We don’t think we could have predicted most of what happened during 2020 – good and bad. Like many, we faced challenges that were scary and difficult to navigate. But also, we blossomed in unexpected ways. That’s partly because we seized the opportunity to work fast and adapt to the moment – unlocking something we’d been meaning to do, but kept postponing. It’s also partly because other companies did the same. So it felt like there was a mutual window of opportunity that we jumped through. To be able to close 2020 with clients like Spotify, Netflix and Unilever is real magic ✨

We’re very grateful to be here, celebrating the end of the year and welcoming 2021. We’ll hang onto that an agile mindset though… just in case.

Want to kickstart 2021 with your team?

Get in touch

Links

Blackpool Magic Convention: where magicians go down the rabbit hole once a year

Brazilian Space Agency: 🚀

Bridging the Impossible: a symposium to explore the science of magic and wellbeing

Carthage College: supporting the wellbeing of their students with Abracademy workshops

Civicus: a truly great organisation supporting human rights campaigners and campaigns

Containerville: the place we called home, where we stirred the cauldron and conjured ideas 💡

Echo: Belgian marketing and storytelling agency

EduJam: an educational response to the pandemic, providing skills, tools and community

Farnborough Academy: they embraced magic to develop the soft skills of their students

FCB Brazil: global advertising agency

Geoff MacDonald: ex Unilever HR, and mental health advocate

Goldsmiths: University of London

House of Beautiful Business: a think tank for making humans more human + business more beautiful

Julie Donckers: friend and alumni

London Business School: embracing magic to support their student community wellbeing

Magic Research Lab: our friends and collaborators in magic, and the science of magic

Mama Shelter: where we spent our team week and launched the magazine in February pre 😷

Mind: the UK mental health charity

[email protected]: co-founded by Geoff 👆

Miro: fantastic collaborative whiteboard tool, online!

Miro Experts: featuring Abracademy… thank you 😉

Miroverse: projects, workflows and templates from the Miro community (Houdini’s Locks, Faces in Magical Places and Hidden Truths by yours truly)

Montezuma: they make chocolate. Need we way more?

Netflix: surely we don’t have to explain this lot!?

Pfizer: 💉👏

RCKT: digital innovation brought to you from Germany

Rock Your Life: a mentor network supporting vulnerable young people in Germany

Sonia Benito: magician and dancer extraordinaire

Soundtrap: Spotify’s everywhere studio for music makers

Spotify: needs no explanation 🎧

Start It @KBC: start-up accelerator in Belgium

SumUp: set to become the first ever global card acceptance brand

This Place: a digital retail agency

Thomas More: school of applied sciences, Belgium

Unilever: many fingers in many pies, parent to several B Corp brands

Zinc: venture capital with a heart

Young Scot: travel, information, support and discounts for young people in Scotland

 

Abracademy links

The World Needs Magic, webinar: weekly doses of inspiration with special guests

The Magic of Teams: a virtual offsite workshop to spark the magic of your people

The World Needs Magic, podcasts: if you didn’t catch the webinars, listen to the podcasts

Open Workshops: personal development workshops open to all

July 15, 2020
0

Tips: how to make remote workshops excellent 💥

By | Education, Food for thought, Learning and development, Magical Moments, Magicians, Music, Team

We’ve learned a few unexpected ways to make remote meetings and workshops a great and human experience. Apart from the usual video call etiquette that you’ve no doubt learned recently, how about…

  • Hiding self view
  • Unmuting everyone
  • Creating virtual magic

Self view

We’ve probably all looked at our own faces far more than is healthy in recent months! Hiding self view allows you to focus much more on other participants. Less Is my hair really that straggly? and more I never knew that, very interesting indeed. Heed this warning however: don’t forget you’re on camera. Everyone can still see you even though you can’t! No nose-picking, texting on the side or stuffing your face with a sandwich and wearing it for the rest of the call…

Unmute

The generally agreed protocol is that everyone should stay on mute unless they’re talking. This cuts out all unnecessary background noise and allows whoever is speaking to be heard by all. But it’s fun to create a little audio chaos and allow everyone to talk at the same time. We guarantee it will liven things up. You can have a lively debate, like in real life. Remember that?!

Magical energisers

Obviously we perform and teach magic in our sessions. But magicians never spill their secrets, so you’ll have to get in touch with us for this one. We’ll send you a video of one of our magical energisers. You must watch it and then destroy it 😉 (leave your name in the comments or contact us directly).

Less unexpected, but still worth mentioning. Here are some more tips to help remote connections feel good.

Hand signals

When you’re on mute and you want to say something without interrupting the speaker, devise a visual language that suits your company. We had fun creating ours: see our video below 👇

Spotify 

We have various Spotify playlists ready to go. Integrating music into meetings and workshops creates energy and sets different moods. Use quiet, non-verbal music when people need to talk or think. And something more lively to perk people up at the start or during breaks.

Miro

What a great invention Miro is! A virtual white board with sticky notes you can scribble on. We use it all the time for both client workshops and internal sessions. The best thing about it is that it’s visually familiar so needs little instruction. Plus it allows everyone to get involved. People can share thoughts and ideas, vote and doodle. No more zoning out during long meetings! 

And finally, Spotlight

This Zoom function pins one person as the primary active speaker for everyone on the call. This is really useful when you want people to focus on the speaker and hear reactions to important information. We also use it when the magicians are performing. That way they stay in the spotlight without anyone having to tweak screens and miss crucial magic-making secrets.

All of these tips add up to fun and engaging online experiences. If you have more, we’d love to know what they are. Share @abracademy 🙋

Let us make your virtual off-site magical!

Get in touch
July 15, 2020
0

The World Needs Magic: wonder-full conversations

By | Belief, Curiosity, Food for thought, Learning and development, Magicians, What's new?, Wonder

No longer a spacey futuristic vision of life on the moon, video calling has become normal. Very normal. Captain Kirk would be impressed at how normal. Personally, we still prefer meeting face-to-face, but video calling is much much better than nothing and it has its own charm… (do let us know 😉)

Like many, Abracademy has adjusted to the new way of being. We’ve changed a lot about how we work and communicate. One way we’ve evolved our practice is to start a weekly webinar. It’s something we had talked about doing for a while. And in March this year, the moment presented itself and we got on with finally doing it. Of course we had to learn a few technical things and we made mistakes along the way, but we got there.

Each week we invite someone whose ideas and work we admire. They either have something to do with the world of magic, psychology and science, or learning and development. Or all three! 

It’s selfish… The webinar gives us the opportunity to talk to someone interesting about things that interest us. We enjoy learning from our guests and hearing about their personal and professional lives – how they feel about the pandemic, how it’s affected them, and so on.

Our guest in April, Nathalie Trutman, observed: “… Our automatic reaction is to replicate patterns that worked for us in the past. Unfortunately, they aren’t necessarily going to get us through this time”. On a previous pause from work, she learned to sail. ”Have a wild dream that you think is impossible. Then break it down like a puzzle and take the first step”. It doesn’t matter what your wild dream is or even if you succeed. Just dare to dream. We like that sentiment.

Sarah Gregersen talked about a circular economy and how nature can inspire us. A love of nature came early to Sarah, as a kid she thought “we’re breaking the earth!”. She suggested that we “think about our surroundings [suppliers etc] as part of our ecosystem. Develop new practices, new ways of operating”. When you’re annoyed in a traffic jam, remember that you are the traffic!

Doctor of Wonder, magician and scientist, Dr Matt Pritchard answered the question: what kills wonder? with “Busyness… work, home, technology. Learn to stop, pause, reflect, adjust. Make space to notice things, discover things. See the extraordinary in the ordinary. The magical in the mundane”. He quoted a study of 135k people on wellbeing. The #1 aid for wellbeing was having people around who care about you. But #2 was learning something – discovering new things helps your wellbeing. So perhaps we can use some of this time to pause and learn?

Another magician and psychologist, Goldsmith’s Dr Gustav Kuhn warned us that “if 3 small kids appear, I didn’t just magic them up!” 😄 We never did see them so they must have stayed in the hat… Gustav said of the positive emotions of magic: “use them in education to enhance learning experiences and wellbeing”. We couldn’t agree more!

There’s a sense of embracing the unknown throughout these conversations. We can’t ignore that for many this has been a very difficult time. However there can also be benefits – extra time in the day, more time with friends and family, more conversations around wellbeing in the workplace, more meetups on Zoom without leaving your house! Accepting that things have changed enormously and proceeding with the positives as best you can. And, always be learning!

Have a look at forthcoming webinars here.

Links

I have an idea for your next webinar guest 💡

Get in touch
July 6, 2020
0

Magili-what?

By | Belief, Curiosity, Education, Learning and development, Magical Moments, Magicians, Priya, Wonder

How Magilitation can help companies cast a spell or two 💫

If you’ve ever thought that you really need to:

  • Create wonder
  • Inspire through storytelling 
  • Control attention
  • Shift group energy
  • Listen compassionately
  • Speak powerfully 
  • Work with emergence
  • Dance in the moment…

Then think about hiring a Magilitator. You won’t regret it. Allow me to explain why…

Abracademy is interested in the overlaps between magic and other spheres – business, education, mental health, personal development. At the same time, we’re certain that magic means much more than coins, cards, rabbits and hats. For the past few years we’ve been developing ways to apply the basic elements of magic – wonder, awe, intrigue and stories – where they’ve rarely been used. What we call Magilitation is the result of those experiments.

Magilitation is the beautiful merging of magic and facilitation. It was born out of an idea I had at a skills-swap seminar one day. Magicians are incredible presenters and facilitators are masters of group dynamics. If we learn each others’ abilities we can make a hybrid, a new skill set. One that creates wonderful experiences. One that helps participants through journeys of self-discovery and experiential learning. So, Magilitation and Magilitators were born.

These days we deploy our magicians to train facilitators and we work with facilitators to train magicians. Each profession develops their superpowers together.

It’s magic. The kind of magic that the world needs today: inclusive and democratic.

No-one arrives at our workshops already an expert. The playing field is level and everyone learns together. Being very visual, magic is a universal language which everyone can understand. And whatever feelings, and emotions, people experience are welcome. There is no right and wrong in this learning space.

Magic has the power to change the way people see themselves and others. We see the change in participants the instant they learn their first magic trick. Suddenly they’re doing something they thought impossible five minutes earlier. The mindset shift can be lightning-fast as people step out of their comfort zone and open up to learning.

That’s the magic part of Magilitation.

When the world is changing at an exponential rate, systems and structures shift as soon as we get used to them. This rate of transformation means that we’re working at an unsustainable pace. One unfortunate side effect is that, all too often, we forget to connect: talk, share, laugh, cry. Sometimes the speed of progress comes at a cost to our humanity. Workplaces become fraught with stress, low confidence, fear and uncertainty.

Our Magilitator-led workshops help to restore belief in the workplace and spark wonder again. We help companies slow down and invest in their people, improving the quality, and depth of relationships.

We work in a space where many learning & development programmes have yet to go. And while the outcomes are hard to measure, we believe that this is a space where real change happens. It’s a human-centred approach harnessing what makes us human: emotion.

We believe that our workshops can assist any company concerned with the creativity and wellbeing of its employees. But over the years we’ve noticed commonalities among the companies we work with.

Firstly, they dare to dream that there is a more powerful, magical way of professional development. One where people feel valued. Where their thoughts, experiences and emotions are welcome.

Secondly, they are companies who look for something fresh in their approach to learning. Something magical, which creates lasting memories for participants and movement in the company

Thirdly, they’re companies curious about the power of group dynamics. And with an understanding of creative processes. Employees are the lifeblood of any company. Our workshops instil new energy and unlock employee potential. These are vital to the health and progress of any organisation these days.

Magilitation is a unique mix of presence and performance. Our Magilitators help people of all ages and abilities find their inner magic. We’ve helped develop self-esteem and confidence in young people. And we’ve created learning spaces where everyone can share their struggles and joys, their ups and downs. We do this through storytelling – an important tool for good mental health. 

Magic was once a closed shop, the preserve of a few practitioners, performers and experts. But today, when the world is full of sorrow, anxiety, violence and loneliness, magic needs to be for the many – for all of us. Everyone deserves to find their inner magic and superpowers. The most powerful spell cast by Magilitation is to imbue the belief that the impossible is possible.

Hope arrives when we see a new possibility materialise in front of our eyes. And when people learn how to share their magic with others, hope becomes contagious and magic spreads. It’s the most wonderful feeling! 👭

Priya Ghai
Head of Learning, aka Mind Master

This article was originally printed in The World Needs Magic, our magic magazine. If you'd like to receive a copy - click the button below 👇

Send me the 'zine!
March 5, 2020
0

Alex Pittas: what’s your story?

By | Belief, Education, Learning and development, Magical Moments, Magicians, Team, What's new?

Now and then we like to shine the spotlight on one member of the Abracademy team. Today, it’s Alex Pittas’ turn to shine. We like to call him Magic Al, because he is.

Alex is very modest, but you should see him come to life in workshops. To say that he’s an amazing connector with people is an understatement! He’s brought the shyest people out of their shells and boosted the confidence of literally hundreds of people.

Hello Alex – obviously we know who you are, but for those that don’t, explain who you are and what you do at Abracademy…

I’m the Head Magician and a lead Magilitator (magician-facilitator). One of my main roles here is to innovate and research new magic for everything we do. I’m also one of the lead Magilitatiors. So, I deliver both client workshops and the personal development, Open Workshop, series.

I’m naturally a people person. This has helped me enormously as a magician and a Magilitator. I’ve been told that I have ‘people power’ by other magicians who have watched me perform. I have often been in a situation with an important client where I don’t actually know who they are! There is no fear and I find it easy to connect, strike up a conversation and perform a magic trick. This always breaks the ice and helps them understand the power of what we do by experiencing it.

As it’s at the heart of what Abracademy does, can you talk about what Experiential Learning means to you?

To me, it means a hands-on approach to learning – where participants learn by doing. We get everyone up and out of their seats, encouraging them to be involved and engaged. It’s such a fun, dynamic and interesting way of learning.

Experiential Learning with Abracademy means games and mental exercises. Groups work together to solve problems and face challenges. And, of course, as a Magilitator I help the group grow as well as learn, and perform, cool magic. 

I love sharing magic because I genuinely want others to experience the amazement I had the first time. And I love teaching magic – sharing practical knowledge, tips and wisdom gained over the years.

Do you have examples from workshops demonstrating the power of Experiential Learning?

We ran our Inner Belief workshop with a group of year 3 children (ages 7-8). Afterwards, they were asked how learning with Abracademy helped with other subjects at school. One girl said: “I was always nervous and shy in English lessons. Sometimes I’d have to tell a story or read a poem out loud for the class. But now I’m not shy at all! I learnt how to be confident and use my voice”.

That happened with a combination of exercises over several sessions. For example, the storytelling exercise – participants sit in a circle and everyone tells part of a story. You go around the circle creating a beginning, a middle and an end to the story. People learn to communicate with their whole body and improve their voice projection. We also did magic performances, individually and groups. This pushes people a little out of their comfort zone, but boosts confidence because of the sense of achievement

Can you recall someone having a WOW moment during a session, seeing how what they were doing in the workshop could impact them positively in the real world?

At the end of one Raising Resilience workshop, one person said that they were surprised and delighted at how easy it was to face their fears. That just by changing the way they looked at a situation empowered them to try new things. She said she could see how to apply the approach at work and to not be afraid of failure. It’s worth trying this even if it takes you a little out of your comfort zone.

What’s your favourite Abracademy Magical Moment workshop and why?

Hmmm, that’s a tough question! Not sure if I have an absolute favourite. But I do enjoy Unlock Your Mind. That workshop really tackles the common misconception many people have of themselves – ‘I’m not creative’. Through fun exercises and tasks, participants gradually unlock their creative potential. They always leave feeling inspired. Plus they learn a cool mind-reading effect that they can add their own creative angle to. A great way to spread magic because – the world needs more magic!

What’s an example of magic working really well to demonstrate a concept being explored in a workshop?

It has to be the Magic Lights. We use this trick in the Belief series of workshops because it’s all about believing in the Magic Lights! We chose it for several reasons…

  • It’s a very easy trick to learn – a great place to start and to boost confidence
  • The lights create a beautiful visual effect!
  • We use them to represent our inner magical energy
  • It’s fantastic for groups because everyone learns and plays together; this helps people believe in themselves and in one another
  • It’s a flexible trick – you’re only limited by your imagination!

Some magic-related questions to finish: do you have any advice for budding magicians?

Try to learn a bit of everything. It will help you in the future if you eventually focus on one area of magic. But if you choose one area to start, for example coin or card magic, then learn the basics first. It’s what I call the scaffolding! But do make sure that you have other interests, apart from magic. The knowledge and experience that comes from other areas of life helps strengthen you as a magician and enriches your routines.  

What do you find magical in the world today?

Apart from all the new magic that keeps improving month by month, I find technology, movies, people and places magical. 

How did you discover magic?

My grandmother got me into magic! When I was around 7 or 8 she would tell me a magical story using a pack of cards, over a toastie and a hot cocoa after school. There would be the “queens that were in a castle and the evil jacks had locked them up”. “The kings would battle with the jacks and save the queens”! There was always magic in her stories. 

How did you arrive at Abracademy?

I first met Rubens – co-founder and Director of Spells at Abracademy – in 2014. We shared a love of magic.

Over a coffee one afternoon he asked me – “If you could do anything with magic, what would you do?”
I answered – “I would open a real Hogwarts!”
His reply? – “OK great, let’s do it!”

And that’s how we started Abracademy 🦄

Alex Pittas
Head Magician

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October 30, 2019
1

Meet the magician: Sonia Benito

By | Belief, Curiosity, Magicians, What's new?, Wonder

In her own words, there’s more to Sonia Benito than meets the eye. Her work is about movement and magic. Not a combination of skills you come across too often…

We met Sonia through the magic world of course. Specifically via Instagram, where she’s a little bit of a magical star! And since then we’ve worked with her on a couple of projects – with the Wellcome Collection and Royal Museums Greenwich. Both projects involved young people, where Sonia was not only a fantastic guest speaker / magician, but also a superb role model – able to make hard-to-please teenage jaws drop and inspire (we hope) confident future magicians. Ta-dah! ✨

We had a chat with Sonia because we’re always curious to know what brought people to magic and what drives them forward. Here’s the conversation…

Tell us about you and magic…
When I was 13 years old, I saw magic in a little market and I bought a few tricks. I performed them to my family and friends. One of my old teachers at school was a magician and when he found out that I liked magic, he started showing me his tricks. He was doing magic with doves and I love animals. After 2 or 3 years he passed away and another teacher from the school told me that he left a note. It said that he would like me to have all his magic materials. And so I had one of his doves! Then I bought another one and started to perform in villages in Spain. 🕊🕊

What impact has magic had on you?
It makes me feel unique. I can be myself. It might sound cheesy, but it’s the fact that magic makes people smile and can take them to a world where everything is possible. It makes me super creative to make it my own.

What do you find wonderful in the world?
Art in general. The way we express ourselves. I find life wonderful. The fact of being here and now.

What do you believe in?
I believe in energy and nature. I believe there is no religion apart from the respect we must have for each other to keep the balance.

Abracademy firmly believes the world needs more magic, do you?
The world needs more people who believe in magic! And it needs more art and people who respect, and enjoy it. To let go of your worries for a few seconds and enjoy what is happening in the moment. That it’s okay to feel vulnerable and not know everything (the secret to magic).

Any words of wisdom for future magicians?
Always be yourself. If you enjoy magic, others will enjoy it with you. Remember that the real magic is you – who you are, not what you are. You can do magic with anything! As magic is everywhere 😉

 

There’s a further interview with Sonia in the first issue of our new magical magazine, The World Needs More Magic. If you’d like to receive a special gift copy of that, sign up for our monthly newsletter!

Sonia Benito
Magic and movement

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Find out more about her on her website

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