[00:00:00] Oz Pearlman: Who are those people? Think about it, analyze it, who you always have that great rapport with. They walk in the room and everyone lights up and looks at them. What is that? Is that a magic ingredient? I don't think it is. The best thing you can do is ask questions, listen, really listen, and allow people to open up and give that information away.

Like what's their passion in life? They've given me the subject that they're most interested in, and now that has an emotional connection. I did a party for Steven Spielberg. I was fanboying like crazy, and after the party, Steven Spielberg walks up to me and we talk for like 20 minutes. I didn't get to ask him a single question.

I just wanted to be like, pause, pause, pause. Dude, I have a million questions for you right now. You're Steven Spielberg. And what I learned at that point, and I've learned with a lot of people who are visionaries, icons, they always wanna hear more about you than they want to talk about themselves. And that's not a coincidence.

I think that's a causality

[00:01:14] Hala Taha: what is up young and profits. You are listening to Yap, young and Profiting podcast where we interview the brightest minds in the world and unpack their wisdom into actionable advice that you can use in your daily life. I'm your host, holla Taha. Thanks for tuning in and get ready to listen. Learn and profit.

Hey, yap. Bam. We have a special guest today and a somewhat unique one for this podcast. Ooz Pearlman is a world-class entertainer and one of the most sought after mentalists in the country. He's developed an interest in magic at a young age, and it quickly became a lifelong passion. After a couple of years working on Wall Street, he decided to pursue his dream full-time, getting his big break as a competitor on America's Got Talent.

He's now made appearances on shows like The Late Night Show with Jimmy Fallon, the Today Show in ABC World News. And he's been profiled in top publications like Forbes and The New York Times. We've never had a magician or a mentalist on the show, and I'm really excited about this one because Oz has a deep understanding of human behavior, and I'm excited to learn how we can leverage the tips and tricks that he uses on stage in real life and in business.

Oz, welcome to Young and Profiting podcast. 

[00:02:37] Oz Pearlman: Thanks, 

Hala. 

[00:02:37] Oz Pearlman: Thanks for me on the first, uh, first Magician slash mentalist, so I'm honored. 

[00:02:41] Hala Taha: Yeah, it's gonna be really fun. So I heard that magic came an obsession with you from a really early age. So can you explain how you first got exposed to the world of magic?

[00:02:53] Oz Pearlman: So I saw a magician when I was 13 years old and was blown away. Like one of those moments where it's before and after and it suddenly, I just said, I have to learn how to do this. And magic is kind of a secretive craft, but it's like anything in life. You can find things if you search. And this is pre-internet, I'm dating myself.

So I went to the public library, I asked the librarian, are there books on magic? They showed me the section. I checked every single one out and I read them cover to cover. So there's never an excuse. And then when I finished those books, I took all my money, my allowance money, my Bar mitzvah money, and I bought all the books I could at Borders, Barnes and Nobles, like I'm talking obsessive level.

And then I kept going at it like I was doing this for the next few years nonstop. You would not have found me without a deck of cards in my hands. 

[00:03:37] Hala Taha: And tell us about how you first started getting your, your first gigs. Cuz from my understanding, you were working and actually making money as a magician since you were a teen.

[00:03:45] Oz Pearlman: Yeah, A year after I started, my mom's like, I'm not buying you anymore tricks. Like, you better figure this out for yourself. She's very much the entrepreneur mindset. So I marched over, there was a restaurant about half a mile from my house, an Italian restaurant. And I talked my way into a job. I didn't know you could even do that, but I said, I bet the people at the restaurant are like watching me do this and fake it till you make it.

And I started getting kids' birthday parties. I met a guy who had a firetruck, a vintage firetruck, and we had this partnership where I would do magic shows. He would pay me, he would take the kids on a ride and we would do four or five, six of these birthday parties per Saturday. Oh wow. Yeah. And I was making real money and suddenly corporate events and just, you gotta hustle, you gotta, if you don't know how to do it, try.

You don't know if you'll fail until you do.

[00:04:27] Hala Taha: It's so interesting because then I found out that you ended up going to college and getting sort of like a regular job after college on Wall Street. Help me understand why you didn't just go pursue being a magician right away, especially if you're making money at such a young age.

[00:04:43] Oz Pearlman: I never thought it was an option. So, uh, you know how certain people, like when you watch a movie, no one usually thinks, oh, I'm gonna be the movie star one day. Maybe some people do and they become movie stars, but to me, I had no like North Star to look at like a David Copperfield. That was crazy to me. I can't become David Copperfield, but you know what, at some point you realize, well, he did somehow Right?

Or she did. So everyone does something and you can do it. You just have to believe it. I was very good at math as a teenager, like literally a genius. I got a perfect s a t math when I was 12. I'm not bragging, it was just math was very easy to me. It was like, my mind works that way. So it wasn't a challenge.

It was just easy. It was like natural language. And so I never thought I would do this for a living. It truly, I thought, I don't know what I would do, but I thought it would be something math or engineering based. And so I went to college, I studied engineering. I ended up working, like you said, on Wall Street for Merrill Lynch, but it, it wasn't my calling.

It wasn't really my passion. 

[00:05:36] Hala Taha: So let's talk about your time on Wall Street. You were there for a few years and all the while you had a side hustle doing, uh, magician tricks. I'm not sure if you were into mentalism yet. So talk to us about how you were able to move from a side hustle to then making it your full-time thing.

[00:05:51] Oz Pearlman: So my job on Wall Street was like one where everyone hated me. I was red tape. So imagine if you have some 21 year old who's suddenly bossing you around when you're 20 years older than me because I was the person right after, this is after nine 11 where they had data centers not to get too in the weeds, but you had to have a backup data center after nine 11 cuz if somehow a terrorist attack occurred, you can't knock out all of Wall Street's data.

So I was the person who told you how much money you could spend on this and I would always tell people less to save the fur money. So people would be like, we wanna spend 10 million. I'm like, you can spend 5 million, you know, internal. So they would hate me. So we'd go to happy hours and Id do magic. And these people that would like normally hate me, like you're not so bad buddy.

And so it was a great way to kind of win people over and just ingratiate myself and honestly build a rapport with people that honestly would've hated me otherwise. And so my side hustle was, I was always doing this on the side. If we went out to a bar or restaurant, me and my friends, we were getting free drinks, we were getting free dinners cause I would freak everybody out.

And so if you're doing this constantly, do something amazing or do something great and expose everybody to it all the time, don't be annoying about it. But if you can provide value, good things will come. And so I started being at parties and suddenly you meet the event planner and you follow up and you keep in touch.

And what started happening is before you knew it, I had four restaurants a week the same way I told you when I was 14 years old. That was my mo, find a good restaurant, high end steakhouses, Italian restaurants, places where people with a lot of disposable income are a good target market who have parties and then be there.

And then suddenly they'd hire me. And before you knew it, I was working every night of the week and weekends. And so I got to the point where I'm working all the time. So it was, it was time to give it a go and see if I could leave and do this full time. 

[00:07:33] Hala Taha: Now, did you get pushback from your family or friends?

I mean, you were really smart at math, you had this incredible degree, sounded like you had a really good job right out of college where a lot of people struggled to get a job. So did you have any pushback from for to leave your job? 

[00:07:47] Oz Pearlman: So I've always been pretty independent. I kinda left my house. I graduated when I was 16 from high school, and my parents both moved.

They moved to Israel. I was born in Israel, but they moved back and I was 98% autonomous at that point. Like literally, I had to find a place to live, pay rent, pay tuition, and I had to make money to do that, whereas I'm not complaining, but a lot of people I knew had parents that supported them at that time.

In hindsight, I think it was a tremendous blessing because I became self-sufficient at a very early age, and so I set myself up. I had a couple other businesses during summers and was very entrepreneurial. I'd always try to find, well, where can I kind of find a niche or something I can provide that either someone isn't doing or I can do better than them?

Me and a buddy, we opened a boat dock installation company because his parents lived on a lake and we installed their boat dock as a form of torture to us cuz it's freezing going in that water in April. And so they said, you know what, you should start doing this to everyone at the lake. And we realized how profitable it could be for two college guys to do this.

And so we started doing that and so I saved a lot of money. I put all the pieces in place where it's like, it was lucky, but I made my own luck because I had savings, I saved up and I was ready to give it a go. And I did and said, worst case scenario, I'll try to find another job, but I had some runway.

That can make all the difference in life, right? If you can't food on the table or pay the bills in a month or two, your options are very different than if you saved up and gave yourself that chance. 

[00:09:12] Hala Taha: Yeah. And it sounds like you got a way head start than most people in their twenties, right? Because you, you said you were on your own basically since you were 16, so that's really impressive and I didn't know that about you.

Can we talk about America's Got Talent? Because that was basically your big break. That's what really skyrocketed. You appearing on all these TV shows and, and really, uh, becoming one of the top people in your field. So talk to us about how that came about, how you ended up getting on the show.

[00:09:39] Oz Pearlman: So, I was a fan of the show because I liked Howard Stern and he was the judge.

And so a couple of my buddies are like, you gotta go on the show. You gotta go on the show. And I tried out once, two years before I got on and I didn't make it. So just be aware. A lot of people will say to me, oh, I didn't make the show. I go, good try again. Don't give up. One time somebody says, no, that's it.

You gotta have way more persistence and dedication than that. I came back on, I tried out two years later and that time I did get on and I kept going every week doing new things, kind of unique routines nobody had seen. And really thinking of it as a branding deal. Like think most people, if you go on, you think of yourself as.

What am I representing myself as? And I realize this is the biggest platform I've ever got. I always wore a suit and tie. I knew that my future target market was corporate. I wanted to be a corporate entertainer. That's my background. That's where I fit. That's the terminology and kind of lingo that I know.

And quite frankly, they have the deepest pockets. They're not spending their own money. So it's kind of much easier than than a private party whereby you are spending your own money and there's a lot more sticker shock. So all that went into thought when I went on there and also even became a mentalist, cause I was doing mentalism on the side.

But the year before I got on, I'm magician one, and I said, if I do magic, I'm gonna look too similar to the guy from last year. I need something new I need. So I was doing mentalism, but I didn't push myself to be 100% a mentalist until I got on a g t. And it was a really concerted decision. This is how I'm gonna brand myself moving forward.

[00:11:07] Hala Taha: So interesting. And so help me understand why you think you won your second performance and the first time around you didn't get it? Cuz a funny story for all my listeners, I used to sing when I was younger, very good singer. And I tried out for American Idol and I remember I practiced for months. I had to wait on this really long line, like all day.

And I was with like, I brought two friends along and they were stuck with me like trying to get on. And then I remember I got in front of the judges and it wasn't even like the famous judges, it's like Prejudges. They didn't even let me go for one. They looked at me and were like, next. And I was like, oh, I didn't even really get a chance.

And then I was like, you know what? Screw this. I'll try my own way. Right? And I, I never really tried again. So to your point, be persistent if you really want something, but why, what do you think changed for you the second time around? 

[00:11:54] Oz Pearlman: Multiple things. So one, I was set up more for success the first time I got what was known as a producer call.

That's where you don't wait in that big line with hundreds, if not thousands of other people. They, you know, it's like going to a club and no line. They opened the red velvet thing. So I got on there because somebody had, NBC knew me, I did a lot of parties for them and they said, let's bring you to the front of the line.

So I did a producer call, but when they brought me in the room, they didn't know I was gonna do mind reading. So they just had a camera person and I can't do my show without, you know, how do you read someone's mind without somebody to be your assistant? Do you know your spectator? So then they went and got a pa.

The PA came in, was all distracted and the trick sucked because the person didn't gimme their full attention. I wasn't set up effectively. And so what happened? Different, two more years. Figure 500 to 600 extra shows in those two years, I got more mature, I got more seasoned. And you never know what's happening on the other end.

People always think it's about you and like, oh, I got rejected. Forget about you for a second. You don't know what's going on. They might have a checklist and they say, oh, we already got the magician we need, we already got the mentalist. There's all these factors that have nothing to do with you that maybe it was the wrong timing.

And you can't blame yourself for take it personally. You just have to be aware, Hey, there's a lot of stuff that's outside of my control. Only thing I can control is how great I bring my efforts, my energy, you know, my charisma and performance that day. And this isn't anything. This is sales 1 0 1. You gotta separate yourself from the person.

Like your product is different than you. And for me, my product is me, so it can be very difficult, but I see it as two different things. I sell a product, I happen to be the product, but if somebody rejects me, I don't see it that way. I don't take it personally at all. And when I came in the second time, I was fired up.

I didn't care what would happen. I had a very successful career without America's Got Talent. It was just gravy. And so I went in there not caring, and they loved that energy. 

[00:13:40] Hala Taha: I love that. And there's a lot of great advice no matter what profession you are in that response. So thank you. Let's move on to understanding the art of mentalism.

Can you tell us the difference between magic and mentalism? I've heard you describe it as magic, but without props and getting into people's heads,

[00:13:58] Oz Pearlman: it's a subset, so it is still magic in a certain way. You know, it's not like I'm a psychic or a tarot card reader, supernatural. It's not. That's not the vibe.

It's not at all like I'm pretending to have abilities that you couldn't have. You might not be as good at them as me the same way. I'm not good at playing piano and someone else plays Carnegie Hall, but it's a natural talent you can develop. So it's the study of people. A lot of it has to do with what's known as misdirection, which is in magic.

When they make the elephant disappear, they make you look somewhere else. So you focus your attention on the wrong place. So if you take that to the next level, next level, next level, suddenly I can tell you what you're gonna think before you think it. Because either I know what you might do, I might lead you in that direction.

Or I've just studied how people act in certain ways, literally for decades. So the same way, somebody's a doctor and can diagnose you by looking at a bunch of things about you and they know what's wrong with you. I can do the same thing with certain, how would I describe it? Like behaviors, what numbers you'll pick, what colors you'll pick, what places you'll pick names, you'll think of numbers, all different specific pieces of info that I've learned how to seemingly read your 

mind. 

[00:15:03] Hala Taha: That was gonna be my follow-up question. So you say you're a mind reader. 

[00:15:06] Oz Pearlman: I knew. I knew that Holla. I knew you were gonna, I knew you were gonna a ask next. 

[00:15:10] Hala Taha: Yeah. So I was gonna literally ask you, I know you call yourself a mind reader, so what are you actually like? What are you reading? Cuz you're definitely not reading my mind.

Right. So what are you reading? 

[00:15:20] Oz Pearlman: Well, the term mind reader sounds good, but it's not really true. Even in my show, I say it, I don't read minds. I read people. And so everybody's a little bit different, but everybody's predictable in their own way. So there's certain ways that you can figure out how people behave, how they think, and once you learn it, you can try to do it yourself.

Albeit you might not have quite, you know, the years of experience, but some people get inspired and then they're like, I'm gonna learn to be a mentalist too. I've seen it. 

[00:15:44] Hala Taha: Yeah. So I'm gonna read a quote from you. Think of mentalism as magic of the mind. Rather than utilizing sleigh of hand and fast fingers, mentalism requires a deep knowledge of human behavior.

It combines a multitude of techniques, including the art of suggestion, subliminal messaging, body language, reading, statistical and analysis, and neurolinguistic programming. Every show is different as a result. So I'd love to understand more about these human behavior tactics that I just listed and how you use them in a show, and also why every show is different in the end.

[00:16:18] Oz Pearlman: Every show's different, which is great because every audience is different, right? Think about it. If you're watching a movie, the movie's always the same, versus what I do is not like watching a singer or a band where you know, they can change the song a little bit, but it's still the same song. For me, everything I do in involves audience interaction.

My show is the audience, cuz like if I'm doing a show for a thousand people, 50, 60, a hundred of them will be a part of it. At some point I throw Frisbees around the audience. We hand envelopes, we pick people out of the whole crowd. I've done arenas before with 10,000 people, and what my show is all about is audience reactions, watching someone's face and that shock and that amazement, and sometimes that just absolute silence.

When you've done something that seems impossible or you've told them something, there's no way you could have known or anticipated. That's really the product I'm selling is very memorable moments, usually with a lot of emotional impact and so it's helpful in certain parts of everyday life. But it's funny because it's not as if I can just walk into a real estate negotiation and be like, I know their bottom line.

I know how much money I'm saving. Like it works in certain ways. It's helpful, it's an edge, but it's not the same. It's a, it's a facade. It's an entertainment pursuit because in my shows I'm the director, I get to call the shots in a certain way. So I wish I could tell I'd go to the poker table and just make millions.

But you know, funny enough, a lot of casinos, they have people trained in what I do going against me. They're the ones who are making sure that I can't cheat. 

[00:17:45] Hala Taha: That reminds me of something that I've also heard you said, where you say that your profession is more like a, a comedian than it is a magician because you're actually feeding off the audience and not just like doing the same thing over and over again.

[00:17:57] Oz Pearlman: Totally. And it, and I can't, it's hard to practice what I do. So a magician think about it can practice, like I use example of a card trick. You can practice a card trick at home in front of the mirror for days, weeks, years, and perfect the moves that are required. But a comedian has to tell their joke. And the only way you know if it's funny is if an audience reacts right.

The audience is your canvas. So the exact same thing applies, and that's the reason right there, why there's so much fewer mentalists than magicians because the learning curve is so steep. You can't get better without first bombing. So you need to be bad and start doing it and getting better and better with audiences.

And a lot of people don't have that stomach. They can't deal with that level of rejection over and over and not be good for years at times. 

[00:18:47] Hala Taha: So let's talk about the pursuit of wonder. You say that mentalism is really about the pursuit of wonder. You say that there's not, not a lot of wonder left in the world. Talk to us about that and how you are actually engaging people with mystery. 

[00:19:03] Oz Pearlman: Well, think about it's universal, right? Like certain emotions and feelings are what you take away.

You rarely remember things like, like let's say for example, a movie's a great one. How it makes you feel is almost more important than what the content of the movie is. Like think about the movies that have changed your life. Like when I saw The Matrix, I left and my skin was tingling. Like certain movies, you know, I saw The Godfather, like, you leave there and you have a real, you might cry or smile or laugh or whatever it is.

There's an emotion attached. And so when I say I create memorable moments is I don't care if you figure out how I did it, I don't care at all. Like I'm not all about fooling you or even entertaining you. I want you to be talking about me for months and years later so that when you see someone else, you'll go, oh my God, I saw this guy owes and he did X, Y, z.

I wanna be the person you tell the next person about who's like me. And that's kind of my goal is that you remember those moments. And so what I've done over time is I've distilled, how do I engineer thoughts and memories? Marketers do the same thing. Advertisers do the same thing. Once you have an emotional attachment to a product, you're more likely to buy it.

And so the same thing. You're buying what I'm selling, which is a memorable moment, and astonishment and wonder are universal. You might not like a certain kind of music, a certain kind of food, but everybody loves to be wowed. That's kind of my secret sauce. 

[00:20:20] Hala Taha: Yeah, I mean, you have to tell us more about instilling these memorable moments.

I mean, that sounds really interesting to me. So how do you go about making sure that what you do is something they remember? 

[00:20:30] Oz Pearlman: Well, think about it in your, like, this could be anyone. You could be a teacher, you could be an entrepreneur, you could be in a startup, you could be working at a startup, and you're like a customer success manager.

What do all of us have in common? We all have relationships. We have people that we report to, our bosses, people you know, lateral, that work with this, colleagues, clients who are those people, think about it, analyze it, who you always have that great rapport with, or that they walk in the room and everyone lights up and looks at them.

What is that? Is that a magic ingredient? I don't think it is. I think that a lot of it involves taking a mirror and reflecting others. The best thing you can do, like Dale Carnegie 1 0 1, is ask questions. Listen, really listen and allow people to open up and give that information away. Like what's their passion in life, what drives them?

And then I use that for my audience. And those are kind of the things I start to reveal. And so now I've touched on things that they love care about the most. Like their family, their friends, their pets. And that's what they're gonna talk about. Think about it, if I guess a card out of a deck of cards, you're like, oh yeah, you guessed the six of diamonds.

But if I tell you the name of your dog when you were seven years old that you loved, or you know, the last thing that a parent who passed away told you, like something like that you will cherish and remember forever, you'll talk about it forever. And I'm intimately aware of that because that has an emotional connection.

That's what I r really shoot for in my shows. 

[00:21:47] Hala Taha: This is so interesting and it's, it's sort of hard to understand like, how the heck are you able to get that kind of information from people? I wasn't planning on asking this question, but walk us through how, how you would be able to guess somebody's dog name from when they were a kid.

[00:22:03] Oz Pearlman: Here. Let's have fun. Let's try this. So I'm not, do did you have pets growing up as a kid? 

[00:22:07] Hala Taha: I did.

[00:22:08] Oz Pearlman: But here's the thing, it's also, it sounds like I set you up and I said that to you. Repeat it to me. It seems fishy. And also you're probably all over social media. The queen of LinkedIn. You know what I'm saying?

Like I could maybe find out what your dog's name was. So I wanna try something different. How about this? Close your eyes for a moment. Close your eyes. 

[00:22:24] Hala Taha: Okay. 

[00:22:25] Oz Pearlman: And I want you to go back in time, and I'm hoping this is not on social media. If it is, we're gonna do something different. But I want you to think about like, I don't know if this was in grade school, teenage years, but imagine like you're drawing a heart and you're putting your initials and someone else you first.

Great love. Can you picture that person's face for me right now at this very moment? 

[00:22:45] Hala Taha: Yes. 

[00:22:46] Oz Pearlman: Okay. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. Is this someone you still keep in touch with regularly or not really? No. Okay. Here's what I want you to do, because some people are gonna be listening to this as a podcast and some are gonna be watching us on video.

I want you to count and I want everyone to know that ha's not gonna use her fingers. Don't move your lips. Count the number of letters in this person's first name, just to yourself. And when you're done say, I've got it. 

[00:23:10] Hala Taha: Six oh oh oh. So sorry. 

[00:23:13] Oz Pearlman: It's like, she's like, how do you read minds? They just tell me the thing. 

[00:23:18] Hala Taha: Okay guys. What? We'll leave that in cuz it was funny. I messed it up. 

[00:23:21] Oz Pearlman: Oh, hilarious. Definitely leave it. You didn't, you didn't mess anything up. It's totally fine. Ok, I like that. Ok, let's do another one. You know what? Holla, tell me your social security number next. 

[00:23:29] Hala Taha: I'm, 

I'm just on my open book. That's my problem. 

[00:23:33] Oz Pearlman: But hear me out. How many names have six letters? Literally a million. So let's keep going with this. I want you to mix up the letters in this name. Please don't say this letter though, I want you to just internally, don't say it out loud, but imagine you grabbing one of the letters out of the middle of his name and just focus on that letter.

Don't say it. Just think of it. Now here's what's funny for those cannot see who are just hearing us. I watched and what she did is she in her mouth, she rolled her tongue a little bit. You couldn't see it if you weren't watching, but I was watching. And when you roll your tongue, it's a certain letter, it's a certain, it's watch.

You either roll your tongue with an L or an R and it's an R. Were you thinking of the letter R? 

[00:24:13] Hala Taha: Yes. This is so crazy. 

[00:24:15] Oz Pearlman: And then, is there any way that I could have found out this name on Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. Have you mentioned this person on the podcast or 0%? 

[00:24:24] Hala Taha: Never. This was like a very short-lived stint in my childhood.

[00:24:29] Oz Pearlman: And imagine you writing down your name and you're putting your initials and then underneath you write Plus and you his name and think of it over and over in your head. And it's something with an E. Hold on, hold on. Don't say you're imagining yourself. Say it. It's not Christopher. Kareem. Is it Kareem? 

[00:24:43] Hala Taha: Yes.

I have no idea how the heck you knew that. That is insane. That is insane. That is absolutely insane. 

[00:24:52] Oz Pearlman: Kareem, am I right? That was your first love. 

[00:24:54] Hala Taha: You are right. 

[00:24:55] Oz Pearlman: And here's the crazy part. Here's the crazy part, is you are debating because when somebody gives you a set of directions and they're ambiguous, right?

How about they say, kind of go put that there. You're like, put what? Where? I said somebody, heart grade school, middle school. And you were like, oh my God. Who's my first love? And then you were like debating between two people. You thought of another guy and you kind of did this with your lips. Watch with my lips.

Hmm mm. Like something tastes good. You put your lips together. Hmm. The name starts with an M. It was a boy two years before that. Your first crush, was it Matt or Matthew? Matthew was your first crush. 

[00:25:27] Hala Taha: Oh my God. How the heck do you know this? This is insane. Like, how would you get that? I, I just don't understand how you were able to, but I guess, I guess you're right.

Like I was literally thinking those exact things you were telling me. Who was your first question? I was like, well, was it Matt or Kareem? Was it Matt or Kareem? And I was like, I'll just do kareem, 

[00:25:44] Oz Pearlman: you were debating between the two. Like, Kareem's a harder name. I'm gonna go with Kareem, but you said it. That's my job is to get inside people's heads.

But you give things away and it doesn't work with everybody. Keep in mind, some people are more difficult than others, but people, like I said, are predictable even when they think they're being unpredictable and you can glean a lot of information from them. That's my job, literally, is to try to hack the human mind.

[00:26:07] Hala Taha: That was so much fun. Do you wanna do, is there any other ones that you wanna do? 

[00:26:10] Oz Pearlman: I'm leaving one for the end. I'm leaving one more for the end. I'm gonna keep you, I'm gonna keep you wanting more folks. Number one rule of showbiz in sales is always leave somebody wanting more. 

[00:26:19] Hala Taha: Cool. Well, what happens when you're doing a trick on stage?

Like do you ever come across people where you're like, I can't read them at all. Like, or even people like maybe with disabilities and stuff, do they act differently and like you can't read them? 

[00:26:31] Oz Pearlman: So I wouldn't say that it's disabilities. Certain things can be difficult, like alcohol for example. If somebody's had a lot to drink and they're impaired in a certain way, then they might not react in a fashion that I can kind of control.

Does that make sense? Mm-hmm. Some people are more shy than others, some people are more timid. The beautiful part about an audience is I have different people to choose from. And quite honestly, the acts factor that if you were to tell me what differentiates me from another mentalist or somebody, if you were to watch to and be like, who was better?

Some of the things that you would realize are, who was better at picking people that give bigger reactions? So the part about it's, well, what if it doesn't work on that person? I go, you would never have known that cause I never would've used them. Do you see what I'm saying? It's kinda like I get to make the director's cut anything I want it to be.

It's more difficult on live TV because sometimes I have to use hosts and they might be very difficult on purpose. Like I'm on CNBC very regularly, and c n BBC hosts are designed to tough talk you, right? It's not like the Today Show or Jimmy Fallon or Kimmel or like any of those where they're host. I'm not saying anything bad about C n bbc, but they're, they're designed to talk to actors and movie stars and, and make them feel good and kind of make jokes.

If you're on CNBC and you're the c e of a major company who's not doing well, they're gonna grill you. They're gonna ask you all these hard hitting questions about what's going on, compliance, your shareholder value, like why aren't you delivering? And so they're designed to kind of be skeptical and cynical.

So in those environments, that's when I really have to bring my a game and deal with people that sometimes don't really want me to get it. Right. And that's a challenge in and of itself. 

[00:28:06] Hala Taha: Who, who are the types of people or the, the characteristics of people that you like to bring on stage or like what would make a good subject for you?

[00:28:14] Oz Pearlman: Honestly the same people that are fun at a party, like somebody who's loose, who's willing to be vulnerable in a certain way that's willing to smile, laugh, share things. Not always extroverted though. Sometimes you get an somebody who's very introverted and shy and when they open up and blossom, it's even stronger because you didn't anticipate it from them.

There's certain people in a crowd where, think of it as Domino's. You want the domino at the start to knock over all the rest. And so sometimes when you get someone in a corporate environment who's known as the biggest skeptic, whose arms are crossed, and like when you get them and they give a big belly laugh, or they just turn around and walk out the door, then everybody now feels comfortable that they can let loose and kind of, and finding who that person is, that needle in a haystack or when you get something amazing for them, that's kind of, uh, that magic moment when you can amaze them.

[00:29:02] Hala Taha: So I wanna move into some human behavior topics. The first one is listening. You alluded to it before that listening is a really big part of this. It's really important in order for people to feel comfortable like you, all that kind of thing. So how can we get better at listening and what are your tactics to be better at listening when you're on stage?

[00:29:22] Oz Pearlman: So listening's, honestly a huge one, and I think listening and taking copious notes, and I say I, this has been a secret to success for me for like going on two decades, which is I write everything down, I put it, there's no excuse. Nowadays, there's like never note. There's all these different apps on your phone.

You could do voice memos if you're not good at writing, but people will tell you stuff about themselves, about what they care about, about their business, all these different pieces of information, which if you let them go in one ear out the other, that's like throwing money away. And I'm not even saying monetarily, but it's a value because later on, if you remember those things about them and taking interest, Even if it's a nice gift because they told you, oh my God, I really like vintage clothing.

Like, I don't know. There's all different things that people will tell you. My kid's playing hockey on a travel league, you bring that up a year later, people know you took that extra effort and that's gonna win. You friends. That's gonna win you clients that's gonna win you loyalty of others around you.

And so many of the secrets of what I do are soft social skills that aren't even about mentalism or guessing stuff. It's just how do people feel around you in terms of listening? I find the biggest problem is most people aren't listening. They're looking at you and thinking of what they're going to say next.

Take a moment and think about that. Most of the time when you speak to people, you, you're formulating your own thoughts while they're talking to you, so how can you possibly fully take in what they're saying if you're just thinking about your rebuttal, if you will, and try to catch yourself. You'll notice yourself doing it all the time.

If you can find a way to just flip a switch, like on off and just say, right now I'm just gonna take in everything they're saying fully. Let it in print. Take it on my mind. Even if you have a terrible memory, pause, then decide what you're gonna say. It's a huge difference. It's a great way to remember people's names.

Most people, you don't remember their name cuz you never really heard it the first time. Like one second after meeting, you're like, oh crap, what was that person's name again? You never heard it. You never took it in. Your brain was on a different frequency when they said it to you. So I find remembering people's names, remembering things about them.

And if your memory's terrible, there's still no excuse. You have a phone, all of us. Do you know what this thing has on it? Literally more computing power than we took to get to the moon. Take notes. I take notes every single show I do. I write down everything about everybody I met. I'm talking literally this is 30, 40 people.

It's like homework at the end of the show. I spend a half hour. I will know everything about it. And if you see me in a year or two later and you walk up to me and you're like, oh, I saw you at this show, you'll never remember. Not only do I remember I tell you things about yourself, people flip out. I've gotten shows, I have money that I've earned in my life.

Relationships because things I forgot, I wrote down and reviewed right before I knew I was gonna meet them again. 

[00:31:58] Hala Taha: That is really, really, really smart and really easy to do. I had Jim Kwik on the show. You may have heard of him, and he does this thing where he can memorize hundreds of people's names in a room, and I found out you have the same talent and a lot of what you do really is about having a really strong memory.

So talk to us about the importance of memory and how you do something like memorize a hundred people's names in a few minutes. 

[00:32:21] Oz Pearlman: Memory's kinda like a muscle. So it's, it's something you just have to work out. But it's there. Everybody has a memory. There's very few people I've met who when you actually get to the bottom of it and they're like, oh my memory's terrible.

And you ask them a few questions, you get to the bottom of it and you go, oh, well you're doing certain things. Like if you're doing a million things at once, of course your memory's not great because you're not taking anything in. And especially now with our phones, they've destroyed our attention spans.

If you're memorizing a bunch of people's names, that's kinda like a trick because you can do a mnemonic. A mnemonic is where you create a story and you link the names together. So when you look at somebody that's a little different, I think most people don't wanna remember 150 people's names. They wanna remember 10 people's names, 15 people's names, or they wanna remember somebody they've met three times, they're meeting them the fourth time and it's like crazy awkward.

Cause you're like, oh my God, I should really know their name by now. How do you avoid that scenario? And I think that's a situation where a little bit of repetition goes a long way. You meet them, you say their name to them. You ask them if you're spelled it correctly, like, oh my God, Hala, what's the origin?

It's h a l a. I love that. Hala. That's, and then you say something like, Hala, I love that color lavender that you're wearing today. So nice, beautiful. And so if you've said their name three or four times, added some sort of context and remembered like in a party or in a room, oh my God, that purple's amazing.

When you see them again, some on your head, you're gonna be like, oh my god. Purple holla. It's gonna connect. You're gonna have like something that links it. Same way if you met somebody who always, you know, wears the same thing or like has red hair or something crazy and eclectic, you'll always remember that person, right?

They stand out. So find things that stand out about somebody or create something that stands out so you're more likely to remember them in the same way. Birthdays, things about people. You don't need to remember that stuff anymore. We have phones that can do everything for us. Utilize that technology.

It's so easy to put in like a Google Calendar alert and kind of utilize technology to help you out. It makes you much more thoughtful. 

[00:34:18] Hala Taha: I totally agree. I mean, I've been in very embarrassing moments where I've like hung out with somebody a whole conference and then I say goodbye and I like called them the wrong name or something.

It's like the worst impression you can make. So yeah, get better at saying names. Repeat it. And I love, I loved what you said, find something that stands out like you know, Molly with the red hair and you'll remember that because there's like other information connected to it. 

[00:34:40] Oz Pearlman: You absolutely will. But even if she doesn't have red hair, right?

Like make something up about the person that stands out. So even if they're cookie cutter, like this isn't a joke, but like I do a lot of insurance conferences, not to stereotype, but it's like 80% guys in their fifties who are bald. So you like, you look in the room and you're like, how am I gonna remember this guy?

This guy? It is very funny. I love the insurance industry, but I've seen a lot of like these events where everyone's kind of wearing the same thing, looks a lot alike. And so you have to find things that are distinguishing. And if they're not physical, maybe there's something else, but you create those moments.

That's what a mnemonic is. That's what Jim Quick is probably doing where he creates a story in his mind because stories are easy to remember, like right. But little facts by themselves are very difficult. But once you link them up and make a nice story in your mind, it's much easier. 

[00:35:25] Hala Taha: These are really, really good tips that we can use in real life too, not just on stage.

So let's talk about getting people to open up. Cause I imagine sometimes you meet people who are more on the timid side, they're shyer and you wanna get information because when it comes to human behavior and understanding people getting as much information as possible is sort of like gaining power in the situation, right?

So how do you get people to open up and tell you the max amount of information? 

[00:35:50] Oz Pearlman: I. I learned some of the best lessons when I was 14 and I got that restaurant show where I would go and think about it. If you go out to a restaurant and let's say you got a babysitter, you've got kids or you're just out at a a business dinner, the last thing you want is some teenager to come up to you with a deck of cards and be like, oh my God, are you serious right now?

You know, like that feeling of dread when someone comes over and intrudes on your space, especially when it's something as intimate as you're out to dinner. And so I learned very early on like really good sales tactics, which is start to think like the other person, what's going through their head, right?

Be a real life mentalist, if you will, which is, I knew that right when I walked up to them, they had a series of questions that when their head first, who is this guy? Does he even work here? Does he want my money? What's he about to do? Is he any good? Is he gonna leave if I don't like him? And all of these questions, like, imagine 10 questions that I knew happened in the blink of an eye when they saw me.

How quickly can I diffuse the tension on every one of those things? Establish the fact that I'm very good at what I do. That I'm hired by the restaurant, that I'm here courtesy of the owner. You don't have to tip me and that I'm leaving in about three minutes cause I have another table that desperately wants me.

And so within about 10 seconds of you meeting me, the whole power dynamic has flipped. Think about when you're a salesperson and you're selling to somebody, all the powers them saying, eh, you know what? We don't want this. We already have this product, but what if the opposite? What if you're selling them now?

They need you more. So when I walked up to a table, I wanted to flip it from me being selling to them. I want them something from them to them wanting me more. So that when I finished my first amazing trick, they were like, don't go anywhere right now. It's flipped entirely the other way. Now they want me more than I want them.

Find ways in your life to change the power dynamic, not in a bad way. I'm not saying this is like some sort of evil manipulation, but realize that when things switch, when someone wants you more than you want them, the whole relationship changes. That's what you want it to feel like or that you're equals.

That you're able to give each other each value in your life. Like people that I've mentored, I want it to be a give and take relationship. The next generation of people that do what I do, I wanna give them information, but also I always listen to them cuz they have new ideas, they have things that I haven't thought of.

And the day that I think that I know everything and I can't be a student is like the day you start dying. Like you always need to be open to others. But I dunno if I answered that. It was a roundabout way. It was really good. 

[00:38:10] Hala Taha: I, I, I thought it was really interesting and it reminds me of sales conversations like this, like diffusing objections, diffusing, limiting beliefs right up front, just so that people are more open-minded and receptive of you.

So give us an example, like what, what were you doing? And at 14 years old, what would you say in those first 30 seconds to kind of flip the script? 

[00:38:30] Oz Pearlman: Oh, so I walk up immediately and I go, you guys are in luck today. And right away when you say that, that's a, that's a great statement of why are we in luck?

It's like you just won something. Oh my god, what I win? It's never a bad thing. You walk up with great energy, smiling with your body, turned a little bit sideways. It's amazing how much perception matters where if you walk up directly, it's intimidating. If you walk up sideways and you have one foot out the door, you feel like you're coming in and out and you say, listen, I can only stay for a couple of minutes.

So right away you limit the amount of time and you say, but the owner of the restaurant brought me in special today and I've got something amazing you've never seen before in your life. I would say, and I'm here courtesy of the owner as as a special treat to you guys. So like all of those things would be said.

I don't have my script. I haven't done restaurants in years, but generally when I walk up, I will approach the people with a way where every single thing is kind of like layered, where you're not worried about money in this case, because a lot of people are worried, do I have to tip you? Oh my God, is this part of the thing?

And so I just realized early on how to do it. And so it was exactly that. Think if you're a teacher. And so what are you selling? Well, you're selling attention to your students. If you say, open your book, go to this. If you're bored, they're bored, right? Your energy, generally speaking indicates others' energy.

If you're way too over the top, people are gonna get weirded out. If you can match their energy and elevate it slightly, that's always a winning solution, and then bring them along with you for the ride. I think with entrepreneurs, people have to inspire others around them, whether they're championing their product, whether they're clients, whether it's somebody that you're asking to leave a steady job and work for you.

I know a lot of friends of mine who have started startups, and you have to be like the c e O, the cheerleader, the everything, because people are putting their dreams on you, and especially early days when you start a company, you're wearing all the hats, so you gotta really believe in yourself, and I think that's the art of being a mentalist when I walk up to people, if I don't believe that it's gonna work, literally, I'm not saying this cliche if I don't believe in every core of my being.

When I go on national TV and there's 10 million people watching, It will not work. I mean that literally, not figuratively, literally because people can see my body tension and if they see me being tense or scared or like little things that are panicky, my connection with them breaks and suddenly I can't get the info.

They change their behavior shifts and I can't do my job. I walk out there confident like my life is on the line and I've learned that tactic over time. And you have to learn how to do that because people can sense tension, they can sense when you're nervous. So you have to fake that you're not nervous.

Teach your body to not be nervous. 

[00:41:01] Hala Taha: This is so relatable to people in business too, because it's like when you're going out to, I have a, a business social media agency, a podcast network, I'm always selling, right? And the times where I close business super fast is like when I know we're crushing, my team is doing good.

I know we got the best offer. I know we're the best. And then it's like so easy to sell anything. If something's going wrong in my team and like I'm like, oh, there's this one thing I gotta fix and like I don't even know if I have room for this client or whatever. People can read that. Just on the call and the call doesn't go as well as, as it would've went if like, you know, I had fixed that problem that I'm thinking about or worried about.

Right. So it's just really interesting to think that what you do actually relates to business so well. So when you're getting people to open up, I have to imagine that there's certain cues that show what information you should sort of stick on, pay attention to, or dig deep on, versus other information that's not so important.

So how do you know when somebody's talking about something that's important to them that you may wanna remember or use in your show? 

[00:41:59] Oz Pearlman: For me, a lot of what it comes down to is giving them runway. So kind of giving them the chance to continue talking. A lot of people, it's kinda like a negotiation. Whoever talks first generally loses in a negotiation, say your number, and then stop talking and then just let the other person talk and set your value.

And just from there, that's it. Right? This is what I charge. Boom. And then it's funny because then when you're quiet, the next person's gonna say something and then they're gonna give you more information, right? It's like a chess move. Where are we going next? I think with a lot of people, my show and what I do is not necessarily applicable directly into what you do, but the skills that I utilize, right are tremendously Walking to a room, taking over the room where everybody sees you, remembers you and how you get people to open up.

For me it was wowing them. Magic was my kind of language of amazing somebody. But from there on out I focus on things that they're going to enjoy. So I like to ask people, I go, oh my God. I'll touch on like, do you have any pets or what's your best friend's name? Or think of you having an amazing birthday.

Do you love to travel? Like what's your passion? And somebody will say to you like, oh man, I love traveling. I go, great. Think of a vacation you went on. Or they say, I love music. I go, imagine the best concert you've ever been to in your whole life. And think of somebody that was there with you sharing that experience.

And now, rather than me just doing a trick I came up with that was like about me. They've given me the subject that they're most interested in. So think about it now. When they tell the story the next day, they're like, oh my God, I saw this guy. Oh, best concert I've ever been to. He knew and he knew who I went with, versus if I had chosen it, they might now forget it now.

It's something they're gonna remember for a long time. So, like I said, let people tell you what they want to hear, what they wanna be like interested in. Don't talk as much about yourself if you can avoid it, which obviously I'm doing on a podcast, but when I'm in person, I kind of stop talking at a very early stage and just let people go and they will give you gold.

[00:43:58] Hala Taha: Yeah, I totally agree with that. So we've had a lot of likability experts on the show. So my first episode ever five years ago was, was with Dr. Jack Shaffer, the author of the Like Switch. Um, Michelle Letterman is like, she wrote the 11 Laws of Likability. I had Robert Sheldini on the show who you probably know, likability is like a big thing that we talk about on the podcast, and I have to imagine that people need to like you because your business sounds like it's a lot of referral based businesses.

You want people to remember you to spread you word of mouth. So what are the ways that you get people to, like you, you, you mentioned some of them, but I'd love for you to cover anything unique that you haven't really discussed. 

[00:44:41] Oz Pearlman: I think be over the top, easy to work with. So no path of friction. Everything can be anticipated like we've done these events.

Hundreds and thousands of times. So we know what happens along the way and how do we maximize the impact of your event, right? You wanna be a guiding hand that makes everything easier, anticipate people's needs. So for example, if you look at America's Got Talent that show you said, and watch the people that have gone far on it, what happens to them a year later, two years later, three years later?

And how much continued exposure do they get? And so this is not to toot my own horn, but look at all the contestants that have ever been on and then look to see how many TV appearances I've had afterwards. I've had over a hundred since I was on the show, and they've been across all the networks. And so the secret there is that it's not about me.

Again, if you're a juggler or like if you're anything, think of it, it's look at my skill. That's not what I do. It's not my selling proposition. My superpowers. I read minds. I can read minds about any topic. So if you're on cnbc, the reason I've been on there is I used to work on Wall Street. I'll do it about stocks.

The reason I was just on ESPN is I'll do something all about football. I will literally package you if you're a producer. A content that knows your demographics, who's watching what interests them, and then creates something that makes sense, right? They're gonna be like, why is there a card trick? I don't do a card trick.

I go on a cooking show and we do a recipe where I predict all the ingredients and at the end when we rip open like the piece of bread, there's something in there that somebody just thought of. And everyone goes nuts. It makes sense for your target audience. So what I'm saying is the key is think of what your consumer wants, not about what you want, and like try to deliver something that's easy.

Anyone that I work with, from the makeup artist to the person doing security, to the person literally washing dishes, I'll literally go up to every one of them and perform for them like they're the c e o of a company. And what happens is those people then go to other shows, right? That makeup artist doesn't just work there.

He works at another place. The person who did my hair, she works somewhere else and she's gonna go talk about me. When I say being memorable, she's gonna mention me. And I can't tell you how many shows I've gotten on purely based on people that you would never think of put in a good word to me somewhere else.

And they go, we need you at our show. You're not gonna believe what the makeup artist said. And I'm like, yo, I'm sending her a gift basket. Thank you so much. And so treat everybody like they're your next boss, cuz you don't know who they are, what they're gonna do. Like treat everybody very well. Anybody we, I work with at the end, I always send them a text telling them how great it was, how much they set me up for success.

Like I want them to shine. I really think that's it. Be easy to work with, treat others really with abundant kindness. Never know what's gonna happen and right. Make it like a first impression that they'll never forget. And then that's it. Exceed expectations. Like whatever you do, be the best at what you do.

[00:47:21] Hala Taha: It sounds like you're a mastermind reader. You're also a master networker. That's really, really clear. So let's talk about body language and then stick on that for a moment. So I'd love to understand just a few things with body language that we can use in business. For example, how can you tell if somebody is lying or telling the truth?

What are the cues that they give off? 

[00:47:43] Oz Pearlman: It's a really tough question because everybody wants like a formula. If A, then B, then C. And the problem is that everyone's different. So when you ask me how do I come up with when certain people live versus others, it's because they have a benchmark. Everyone kind of does their own thing and you can see what they do different between, you know how a lie detector works, right?

They strap you in and they always ask you questions, telling the truth first, so they can see what your benchmark, your levels are. The same way that they do, they check doping now blood doping, they take your blood and they test your blood against your blood. Because they can't test your blood against other peoples.

Cause some people have naturally high testosterone. Somebody might seem like they're taking steroids who isn't because they just have naturally higher testosterone. Do you see the parallel? Yeah. So I can't give you hard and fast rules, but I think that a lot of people, they have a spidey sense. You have a sense in you that can detect deception, that you'll talk yourself out of it.

Think about people in relationships when they smell smoke. There's usually fire you can feel when something's off with your partner very quickly. You can feel when something's off with one of your kids, like you know when they're lying. Most people I know when they have kids, they know their kids lying to them.

You can sense it like that. And so I think with other people, what you'll end up doing is you'll feel like they're lying to you, but you'll somehow in your brain talk yourself out of it and be like, oh, you know, that's not really a thing. And you will actually go against your instinct and you'll cause yourself to second guess yourself.

I have found that more often than not, I work on instinct. What I think first is what's generally right, and I have a statistical edge. When I look at you, I don't second guess. I go the first thing I thought, they just lied. And so trust your instincts in certain instances and then see if they work and then see if you can have somebody ask them a question that you know they're telling the truth on.

Be like, oh my God, I heard you guys went to this party. How is the party? And see their cadence when they speak to you, see how much they describe things. And then if you can ask the question that you think is a lie and see the difference, because some people will over, they'll be overly demonstrative when they lie.

They'll add all these details like, oh God, I was late because the subway and this. And then, and then the next thing they ask you, they tell you like one detail. You're like, they were totally lying. They added all this extra stuff they don't normally add. And so you can very easily sleuth it out. But like I said, I can't give you one tactic because everyone's different.

It's what's different between when they tell stories and that's when you can detect it. Did they answer quickly or slowly? Did they pause and take longer? And then when they told the truth, how did they do at that time? It's the differences that tell you what they're doing. That's why in my show I have to kind of feel people out.

[00:50:23] Hala Taha: Yeah. And I can imagine that that goes with everything. Another question I was gonna say is, how can you tell the difference between somebody being engaged or bored? It's, it's the same thing. You need to understand their baseline and then understand 

[00:50:34] Oz Pearlman: engaged and bored is a lot easier because that's a body thing that's not so much speaking.

For example, if someone's engaged, they almost always will lean in if you speak lower. So it's, it's an old trick is to just slow down and be a little quieter. See how I did that? And so will somebody instinctively move inwards or are they still staying out? If they're staying out, they're not that interested and they're not like trying to get, they're not, you don't have them captured and you can tell, you can also tell the look in people's eyes when they're thinking of something.

Always. You can see the distracted look when their eyes are moving around or their eyes freeze and no longer move. You can see when someone's no longer listening to you. They're thinking of something else or they're thinking of what they're gonna say next. You can see it. I use it in my show all the time because I kind of wanna wipe people's memories At certain point, I want you to forget things that I did that I don't want you to remember, and I want you to remember things sometimes that I did or didn't do, kind of changing your memory inception style, and so I can see those things as to when you're remembering and when you're forgetting because your, your memory is completely malleable.

That's, everybody knows that. Like advertisers, subliminal messages, marketing 1 0 1, putting a product in front of you in a social media ad does not work anymore. We're too hip to it. But having something in the background, product placement, seeing it three times, subtly, subtly, subtly sticks in your mind, you're more likely to buy it later.

People have learned that over the last two decades. 

[00:51:58] Hala Taha: Yeah, this is all like super, super interesting stuff. I know that you can walk into a room and it must feel like you have a superpower like. You probably see little things that nobody else sees. Like you were, you were seeing what I was rolling an R in my mouth and my mouth closed, like, so, I can't imagine your brain probably must be going crazy whenever you walk into a room of people.

What are the things that you, like, if you walk into a room of strangers, what are the things that you observe right away, or what are the typical things that you observe or, or that catches your eye? 

[00:52:28] Oz Pearlman: Well, when I'm not working, I kind of turn it off. So it's ki it's one of those things where it would be irritating to do at all times.

It's not like you kind of think of it as it would just be on, but it's more like a gymnast. Like, I gotta limber up, get ready, and you know, do my flips and stuff. So day to day I notice certain things, like I will be able to tell if somebody's lying to me or if they're interested, not interested certain things.

If someone's BSing me, I have a pretty good sense of it very quickly, but, I'm not doing everything involved. See how I told you I would need to get a benchmark and see how people behave? I don't usually get that instance in day-to-day life. When I'm doing a show, there's a framework for it. It makes sense for me to be like, think of the name, count the letters in your head, watch me look at me in day-to-day.

That'd be a really weird thing to say to somebody, right? Yeah. Yeah. Look at me for a second. Okay. Think of which cafe she'd be like, what are you doing, dude? I just get your coffee and go. So there's a framework for why I can do that under the guise of entertainment. But I definitely noticed things about people in social settings, like you said, interest indicators of interest.

Whether somebody I think is likely to book or not book, whether somebody's kind of lying. Honestly, it's very helpful and I think a lot of you can learn those same things. It's they're principles that are not out there. You probably know them. We internally learn them from the time we're one year old. You start learning that when I smile I'm a baby, people smile.

When I laugh, it gets people to smile. We find ways to get that attention and kids from a young age learn it. We start unlearning things as we get to be adults because we don't believe in ourselves. You've gotta trust your instincts. A lot of the time. Your instincts are very strong, and I think we spent years, decades for a lot of people having a voice in your head that telling you, oh God, I don't know.

And becoming insecure. I think a lot of that confidence is trusting your gut. 

[00:54:15] Hala Taha: Yeah. I think that's a big point of, uh, our discussion today is this fact that you really need to trust your instinct, trust your gut, and not second guess yourself. Because we learn these things from when we were children, and to your point, sometimes we'll try to talk ourselves out of it to create whatever situation that we actually want or whatever, but we need to be honest with our first reactions.

Most of the time, 

[00:54:37] Oz Pearlman: test it. Try it for a week or what your gut reaction is, write it down or do something like actual. Analytics or due diligence and see, oh my God, how often did I, when I really trust my gut, did it turn out to be correct? It's not gonna be a hundred percent of the time, but if it's much higher than you're getting now, that's positive results.

That can be in sales, that can be at home. Try it. Try it with friends and family. Just see in this could be, you know, again, not reading people's minds, but things that will help you in your life. 

[00:55:05] Hala Taha: Okay. Before we move on from body language, any other tactical information for life or business related to body language that you wanna share with my listeners?

[00:55:14] Oz Pearlman: The stuff that's been most useful to me, body language wise is just knowing if people are focused and listening to you. It's such a key indicator in all parts of life, right? Like with your spouse, with your kids, with your friends. And if you're not interested, what can you do to stimulate that? Like what can enhance your relationships?

And I think a lot of it is much more open communication, learning to turn off your mind when you're talking to somebody and you're trying to listen and try to give them more things like. A great example is if you're online dating. I helped somebody recently make their online profile and it's kind of like when you're doing comedy improv, yes and yes.

And give people things that they can continue with. Give them topics of conversation. The same way I told you. If I'm doing a trick, I'm not gonna make it about me. Let's say I really like card tricks or I really like to do a trick with numbers cuz my mind is very left brain analytical. I like to guess numbers.

If somebody's not into numbers, I'll say What intrigues you? Like, do you love art? Do you love travel? What do you love? How often do people ask you that question? I find very infrequently. Like somebody says to me, when you were 10, what did you wanna do? What excited you? And like, how do you feel about it now?

And let people delve into themselves a little more because as soon as you do that, they feel kind of special. They don't get asked about themselves as much or about people they care about. Try to make the conversation more about them. I'll give you a quick story. I met Steven Spielberg. I did a party for Steven Spielberg.

I was fanboying like crazy. And after the party, Steven Spielberg walks up to me and we talk for like 20 minutes. And do you know hollow What happened? I didn't get to ask him a single question like, do you know how insane that is? I spent 20 minutes answering all his questions. I just wanted to be like, pause, pause, pause.

Dude, I have a million questions for you right now. You're Steven Spielberg. And what I learned at that point, and I've learned with a lot of people who are visionaries, icons, people that I've met that are like started major companies, billionaires, people that are the world famous, they always wanna hear more about you than they want to talk about themselves.

And that's not a coincidence. I think that's a causality, like literally that's where they've gotten to where they are because they're always interested, always curious, and they're learning from others at all times. And I've tried to emulate that and learn from that, which is try to give a other people the spotlight and let them shine and see what you can glean and they will love to talk about themselves.

[00:57:31] Hala Taha: I love that advice. So, uh, last question before we do another, uh, performance trick with you and close out. Today's interview is about implanting information. So you say that you can actually implant information in people's heads. Talk to us about that in how you do that. 

[00:57:48] Oz Pearlman: So it sounds nefarious. It sounds like I'm like, you will wire me $10,000.

It's not in that manner for me again. So remember what I told you, like, define in your mind what is your unique selling proposition like. I think everybody should have, almost like Jesse Itzler, who's amazing. A buddy of mine, he just put a thing like have a mission statement for who you are. So I've decided it's kind of a unique selling proposition.

What do I do? I at one point decided what's my job? Is my job guessing stuff? Is my job fooling you? And that's when I really realized, no, what I'm selling people is memories is really amazing memories that you're gonna talk about hopefully for a long time. Giving people memorable moments, which doesn't happen free frequently in life.

So define what it is that you do and then lean into that. And so for me, since I realized I want memorable moments, I want a good story. And a good story always revolves around what's important to you. And like I just told you, if that's you're a pet person and you think of your dog when you were six years old, that like you just have this amazing story and my dog did this, and you and I find a way to tell you that you will now connect me with that memory and you'll see this guy, hopefully you'll remember my name, but Oz told me about my dog when I was six years old.

It's such a more powerful thing than any other trick I could think of. What I'm implanting is I'm implanting like, it's not even implanting the person is giving me the thing I want. It's imagine I had a treasure map and you're drawing the X for me on the treasure. You're giving me the thing that I want, which is what's gonna be the most memorable thing that I could possibly tell you about.

So I think for me, what I implant. Is I'm putting in there that memory. What I want you to remember, so if you're in some sort of business, you gotta decide what's my elevator pitch? But what do I really, what defines what I'm doing or what I want someone to remember about this interaction? And a lot of the time, you're too kind of all over the place.

If you have a product, figure out what it is. Like when you go on Shark Tank. I love watching the pitches that I leave and I go, oh my God, I need this. They explained it perfectly. They showed me what void it fills in my life, and I know how to describe this to my six year old kid. Like, that's what you want.

What's the most simple distilled message you can have? And find a way to craft it effectively. And if you can connect it to something emotionally, something that matters to that person. Then you're like leagues and bounds ahead and that that works across the board. That works with my kids. I try to figure out what is it that they love?

What's their passion? Not just what do I love that I wanna instill in them. I wanna know who they are as a person. And I think a lot of the time we don't take the time to do that. We think more about what's our message? What are we doing? See what you can do to connect with the person around you if you're an entrepreneur.

So important to listen to your clients, listen to that feedback because they're gonna tell you things that might have you shift your product. Ha might have you pivot entirely. 

[01:00:32] Hala Taha: Well, I'm ready to make some memorable moments. Let's do it. Maybe we can do some sort of our performance. I'll let you take it however you wanna take it.

[01:00:40] Oz Pearlman: Yeah. Let me ask you a question on your phone, do you use your face ID primarily or a passcode? Passcode? And let me ask you that passcode, is it four digits or six digits? 

[01:00:52] Hala Taha: Six and I, I hope I'm allowed to, I know you asked me directly, but 

[01:00:57] Oz Pearlman: I like how she's like, oh my God, are you gonna tell, you know what, six digits?

How many times do you think you've typed in your phone passcode? I bet you do it at least 20 or 30 times a day. Minimum times how many years, right? 

[01:01:10] Hala Taha: Yeah. So many times. 

[01:01:12] Oz Pearlman: Okay, it's muscle memory. Here's what would anybody else know that code? 

[01:01:16] Hala Taha: Yeah, maybe. I mean it's not like 

[01:01:18] Oz Pearlman: No, no. Switch. Switch. Let me ask you a different one.

Okay? You go to your at m, you swipe your your code. Would anybody know your at m PIN code? No. Ooh yes. See, look, I like how hollow is like, and I don't want anyone to, I like how it got intense. The phone code. The phone code, like significant other nos. Maybe like friends. No, it's, it's, yeah. Okay. Hold on.

Here's what I want you to do. Think of your ATM PIN code and lie to me, right? We talked about earlier, how do you know when someone's lying to you? Well, I know you're gonna lie to me cuz I'm asking you to, so I want you to give me a fake series of numbers. I assume your ATM code is four digits. No, your ATM code at the bank is not four digits.

[01:01:56] Hala Taha: I have two. So I can give you the four digit one if you want it. 

[01:01:59] Oz Pearlman: No, I don't wanna know what it is. I want you to make up a fake four digit code. 

[01:02:03] Hala Taha: Okay? I have multiple banks, so some of them are eight, some of them are four. I'll go with the four.

[01:02:08] Oz Pearlman: Hala's like, you don't know how deep I roll, making it rain.

There's so many banks, but F, D, C, insure everything. Alright? Use one that's four digits and I want you to give me a fake code that's not your real code. And don't just do 1, 2, 3, 4 cuz that's the most, you know, that's like password 1 0 1 management. Don't do it. And don't just do a repeat. So don't just do 9 9 9 9.

Give me a fake code that's not your real code. Say it. 

[01:02:34] Hala Taha: 5 6 96 

[01:02:35] Oz Pearlman: 5 6 9 6, 5 6 9 6. Okay, I'm gonna show you one thing you did right off the bat. Which is a common lie, which is you did 5, 6, 9, 6. Did everyone hear that? She repeated one of the digits, which is fascinating cuz most people, when they repeat a digit, they repeat digits in their real code too.

That's the proclivity. Lemme ask you a question. Tell us the truth in your actual a t pin code. Am I right in saying that there are digits that repeat, not all of them, but I think two of the digits repeat. Am I correct? 

[01:03:02] Hala Taha: Correct.

[01:03:03] Oz Pearlman: I knew it. Cc you didn't. You don't realize. But that's like people always think they're unpredictable.

They're like, I could have said anything. People are predictable in their unpredictability. Now also what's funny is the six was the second number. 5, 6, 9. Six. The second and the last were both the same. I wonder if they're the same and then you did 5, 6, 9, 6. The five is smaller than the nine. I need to know if you're okay.

If I were to reveal your ATM pin code right now, are you okay with it or no? 

[01:03:29] Hala Taha: Yeah. Nobody's gonna know how to like, there's no way to do it. 

[01:03:32] Oz Pearlman: Yeah. Okay. I think the first number is ***********, am I correct? 

[01:03:37] Hala Taha: Yes, you freaking psycho. 

[01:03:40] Oz Pearlman: And then I wanna write this down because people are gonna think that you're just acquiescing.

I'm gonna write this down. Is that okay? Because I want people that are watching this on video to not just say, oh, Hal's just pretending. Close your eyes please. Okay? Please cover them up with your hands so you cannot see. So for anyone watching this on video, I'm showing you this right now. Don't look holla so that you guys can see.

I've written this down before we even did it. I have written this down. I'm hoping everybody that's watching this on video just saw, I have committed, I can't change this. Open your eyes. Love the nails. 

[01:04:10] Hala Taha: Thank you.

[01:04:11] Oz Pearlman: 5, 6, 9, 6, 5, 6, 9, 6. The five and the nine were smaller, so the number got smaller. The two sixes are **********, I think the number is *********, isn't it?

[01:04:20] Hala Taha: Yes.

[01:04:21] Oz Pearlman: And that's exactly what I wrote down. 

[01:04:23] Hala Taha: Oh my gosh. I can't even believe it. Like how it's so incredible. You're so good. Like it's just so incredible. I will never forget this. That's what I like to do. I'm down to do more. 

[01:04:36] Oz Pearlman: Like, Hala's not gonna forget this because I'm cleaning out all of her bank accounts right now.

That's why she's never gonna forget it. 

[01:04:43] Hala Taha: I'm like, I'm gonna have to air this, but change everything before I air it. But it's okay. It was worth it. 

[01:04:49] Oz Pearlman: My definition of profiting is stealing her at m pin code and all of her money afterwards. That's it. 

[01:04:55] Hala Taha: Yeah. Wow. You could really do a lot of damage. Thank God you're like a, you know, a sound person.

[01:04:59] Oz Pearlman: But I'm on the good side. I'm on the good side. 

[01:05:01] Hala Taha: Yeah, you are. Well, this was so interesting, Oz. It was really interesting to learn everything that you do and, and see how we can translate it in real life and business. So I end my show with two last questions, unless you wanna do some other fun performance thing.

[01:05:16] Oz Pearlman: No, no. And not a high note. 

[01:05:18] Hala Taha: Okay. What is one actionable thing our young and profits can do today to become more profitable tomorrow? 

[01:05:25] Oz Pearlman: I think define your market. I think that's the key thing I did at one point is I used to just think, oh, I want everyone to see me perform and that, and I realized at a certain point, no, I think I know what I'm really good at and I like to play to my strengths, but also improve my weaknesses.

But playing to my strengths, realized my background's in finance, my background was in corporate America. And so I deliver a very unique, weird product, which is mind reading, which most people are like, what? How can that possibly be something that will sell well? And I figured out here are the people that I'm targeting.

And I did this from a young age. Like I went to restaurants and I didn't just go to kind of FUD rockers or Chuck E. Cheese. I found what is the restaurant where people would be most likely to hire me for parties? Cuz that's what I figured out. And so the same thing. Decide who is your market? Are you selling to everyone?

Are you selling to a small subset? And then define them as granularly as you can and target them mercilessly. Like, look, exactly how do I get in front of them? And make sure they're aware of my product or my service or whatever I'm selling. And I think that's been one of the secrets to my success, is knowing exactly who I'm targeting and doing a great job of it.

[01:06:23] Hala Taha: It's very smart and simple advice. So I, I really like that. What is your secret to profiting in life? And this can go beyond just financial. 

[01:06:32] Oz Pearlman: The crazy thing is, I think every year that goes by the, you know, this, this story is that every decade that goes by goes faster because it becomes less and less of your life in essence, you know, like from the age of 10 to 20 is half your life, but 20 to 30 is a third.

So the years are just flying by. Like, I remember being 14 and walking into that restaurant and I'm 40 now, and I have, you know, I have a three kids and a fourth on the way. And I realized like, health is wealth and you can make more money, but you can't get more time. Doesn't matter if you're like Elon Musk.

That's the case. So I've learned more and more that, yeah, business is important, but take time to savor. The people around you, your friends, like those points of gratitude. And when you're in a bad mood and you're having a crap day, you've gotta find things and realize how lucky you are in so many ways. In so many ways.

If you're alive and breathing, you're luckier than billions of people that have already died and don't have that. And I try to tell myself that cuz you know, we all get into a funk. We all have crappy days. We all have days where like, we lost this or we didn't do that, or somebody irritated us. And I try to dial it back and you might have a different way I like running, but I will find that center and realize I am so fricking lucky and all of us are lucky in different ways.

I get to do what I love for a living, healthy, I'm alive. And I really daily tell myself over and over how lucky I am. And I think, uh, that's an important thing. Cause everyone should do. 

[01:07:49] Hala Taha: I agree. Gratitude is so important. Oh, this was so incredible. One of my funnest interviews of the year by far. Very fun conversation.

I really, really enjoyed it. Where can our listeners learn more about you and everything that you do? 

[01:08:01] Oz Pearlman: Honestly, I think like social media is the best. I post all my tour dates, uh, all my TV clips at, it's at Ooz, the Mentalist. My name is super weird. It should be Oz, you know, blame my parents. I love them. But it's an Israeli name.

So it looks, it's spelled O z, the Mentalist. It's actually, yes. So it's like Ooz The Mentalist, but I'm Ooz. And then if you wanna go to my website, O Z p e A r l m a n.com, ooz perlman.com. You, I guarantee you, if you go watch one video, it's like Pringles, you will not be able to stop. You'll be going down a rabbit hole and I promise you'll be pretty freaked out and amazed.

[01:08:34] Hala Taha: Amazing, and we'll stick all those links in the show notes to make it super easy. Again, thank you so much for joining us on Young and Profiting podcast. 

[01:08:41] Oz Pearlman: Thanks, Hala. Thanks so much. I had a great time,

[01:08:48] Hala Taha: man. Oh man. This episode was definitely one I'm never gonna forget. It is one for the books. I mean, O'S was such a treat. I knew he was talented when I was researching him, but damn he blew me away with the tricks that he performed on me. And I have to say like those were a hundred percent legit. I gave him no clues.

This guy guessed my bank account number. He guessed my first crushes from when I was a kid. Literally, nobody knows that information. It was just insane. Like it was just a really spectacular experience. I didn't even know that was possible. I didn't know it was possible that somebody could literally read my mind, and I didn't know that.

I somehow was communicating such specific things just through my mannerisms, like the way that I move my eyes. So the way that I move my mouth, it is crazy that he's able to read people's minds or mannerisms like that. It's just insane. And I know most of you aren't in the business of reading minds, but you can still apply his mentalist strategies in everyday situations.

Much of O'S talent comes from gaining his audience's trust, which is the foundation of any successful sale or negotiation. So let's recap some of Oz's top tips for reading minds so you can gain more influence and have an impact on everyone you meet. One central theme in this episode was the importance of listening.

A lot of his popularity comes from his ability to remember key details about a person's life, even years after they've met. He encourages us to write everything we know about a person down after we first meet them, so we can recall that information when we cross paths with that person again. And it may be daunting at first to try to remember all of these details even after reviewing your notes, but he says that our memory is muscle and we can strengthen it through repetition and storytelling.

For example, if you're trying to remember somebody's name, repeat it back to them several times during the conversation and come up with a mental story to associate with their name, like their hair color or their sense of style, or you could even just make something up. He also says that we should focus more on what people are saying to us in that conversation, and less about what our response will be.

When another person is talking to us and all we're thinking about is how we're gonna respond, we'll definitely miss some crucial details and probably won't remember the conversation very well, and ask questions about what that person loves, what makes them tick, what makes them emotional. This is the information that holds the most power.

And when you remember somebody's insecurities or passions or specific stories that they've shared with you, they're gonna feel seen and understood by you, and how you make somebody feel is what they'll remember about you most. Thanks for listening to this episode of Young and Profiting podcast. If you listen, learned and profited from this episode, be sure to share it with your friends and family and drop us a five star review on Apple Podcast or your favorite podcast platform.

Writing a review is super important for social proof, and if you guys leave an Apple Podcast review, it's gonna make my day. I read all these reviews every single day. If you like watching your podcast videos, you can check us out on YouTube, and you can also find me on Instagram and Threads at Yapp with Holla or LinkedIn by searching my name.

It's Hala Taha. Also wanna shout out my amazing Yapp production team. You guys work so hard. Thank you for hustling and for all that you do. You guys are really scrappy hustlers, like we say at Yapp Media. This is your host, Hal Taha, aka the podcast Princess signing off.