Digital Social Hour - Magic Meets Marketing: Why You Need THIS Skill | Rokas Bernatonis DSH #654

Episode Date: August 21, 2024

🎩 Magic Meets Marketing in this thrilling episode of the Digital Social Hour with Sean Kelly! 🎯 Tune in now as we dive into the astonishing journey of Rokas, a world-renowned magician and master card thrower. From opening for the legendary Penn and Teller in Vegas to crafting viral videos that captivated millions, Rokas shares his secrets to blending magic and marketing. 🎥✨   Join the conversation as we explore his incredible feats, like cutting celery with playing cards, and his adventures exposing scams around the world. 🕵️‍♂️🔍 Packed with valuable insights on creativity, persistence, and social media's role in magic, this episode is a must-watch!   Don't miss out on this magical journey! Watch now and subscribe for more insider secrets. 📺 Hit that subscribe button and stay tuned for more eye-opening stories on the Digital Social Hour with Sean Kelly! 🚀   #DigitalSocialHour #SeanKelly #Podcast #MagicMeetsMarketing #Rokas #ViralMagic #PennAndTeller #ScamExposer   #MagicSkills #PublicSpeaking #MagicPerformances #ContentCreationMagic #CreativeMarketingStrategies   CHAPTERS: 00:00 - Intro 00:32 - Fool Us 03:18 - LinkedIn Ads 05:00 - Enjoying the Moment 06:43 - Screen Time Management 08:25 - Finding Passion 09:35 - Rokas’s First Viral Video 11:58 - Rokas’s World Records 14:09 - Did Rokas Play Basketball? 16:56 - Cold Showers and Health Benefits 18:34 - Exposing Scams 22:59 - Scams in Italy 25:39 - Global Safety Concerns 27:58 - Fake Paintings Scam 29:20 - Understanding Mentalism 30:19 - Learning Magic Tricks 33:00 - Popular Podcasts 34:48 - Growing Up in Lithuania 37:04 - Adapting to Change 40:00 - How to Report a Scam 40:30 - Pelican Playing Cards 40:48 - Thanks for Watching   APPLY TO BE ON THE PODCAST: https://www.digitalsocialhour.com/application BUSINESS INQUIRIES/SPONSORS: [e-mail]   GUEST: Rokas Bernatonis https://www.instagram.com/rokas_magic   SPONSORS: Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/social Deposyt Payment Processing: https://www.deposyt.com/seankelly   LISTEN ON: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/digital-social-hour/id1676846015 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5Jn7LXarRlI8Hc0GtTn759 Sean Kelly Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmikekelly/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

faster higher more accurate so now i can cut a celery a cucumber by throwing a playing card you serious yeah dude i gotta see that in person oh yeah we can do that really wow i wish i knew i would have brought some celery or something that is so cool man i can cut your salary in half oh my god such a terrible joke i thought it would be funny what i'm just kidding oh took me a minute i I got you. I got you. All right, guys. We got Rockus here today. We got a magician.

We're in Vegas. Welcome, man. Thank you. Are you coming off a show performance last night? I was opening for Penn and Teller. Ooh. Penn and Teller. That's big time.

Yeah. And I know you go way back with them. You got some history with them, right? You originally fooled them a a big time. Yeah. And I know you go way back with them. You got some history with them, right? You originally fooled them a long time ago. Yeah. The first time I was on the show was 2016. It was, I don't remember how old I was. If I had to guess, I was like 24 years old.

I was just finished school, like college. I still live in Lithuania i was in lithuania i remember um i i i filmed a trick and i sent it to them and they're like yeah we want to see you on the show dude like it was one week before the show i couldn't sleep i couldn't eat i couldn't take a shower i was just so stressed because my english Because my English was like, my English, I hope you can understand me, but my English back then was my whole show I just memorized. I had no room for improvisation. I was just so scared. So 2016, I went on the show.

I did pretty well. I got really good feedback from them, but I didn't fool them. And I always felt like, ugh, I wish I fooled them. I really wanted to fool them. So this time, because I always felt like, oh, I wish I fooled them. You know, I really wanted to fool them. So this time, um, because I'm a car thrower, so me and my friend,

Rick's me junior, who's a car thrower from Cleveland, Ohio. Yeah. We combined the power of two of the greatest car throwers in the world. And we fooled them, uh, back in 2022.

Wow. That's incredible. And now, uh, yesterday we opened for them. Everything comes full circle right yeah so it was it was just great to perform at the rio with them and be in the green room talk to them that's amazing so have the best job in the world yeah that's a fun job right yeah yeah

see them on the billboards all the time yeah how often do they get fooled? I don't know. I don't watch the show anymore. I'm just too busy performing, honestly. I watch like the best of the best of the best ones because my friends are sending me the links. They're like, oh, you have to see this one. You have to see this one. But if I had to guess, maybe 10%, 5% of magicians fooled them but it's not

that easy to get on the show because they're looking for something that is extremely original but yeah because they've seen everything at this point the show's been around for so many years yeah and a lot of i noticed a lot of magic tricks are pretty similar actually it's very rare to see unique magic these days because of social media. Yeah. I was about to do a trick for you, but I just changed my mind. I've probably seen it already, right? Yeah.

Well, now they expose how they do the tricks on social media. So you really have to be doing something that is kind of rare. It is. And you know what? To develop magic, it takes years and years and years. And it kind of feels like social media is not it's social media it's not even documentation it's like the present you know what i'm saying i'm saying you can upload it in one video and then the next day people

are watching a second video people don't come back to see your content anywhere so you have to if you know being creative it takes a lot of time and if you're developing one trick a year or two years and then it's just like for one or two days so yeah that's why a lot of magic that you see is not original because it's already been done and then yeah yeah that must suck working a year on a trick and then you get no views right that's crazy so the easy way to do to solve this is don't do it for the views that's why i love theater magic to be honest i see that social media and and photos and all of the content that i'm making producing online is just to uh get like real gigs real shows because this is where when people really enjoy magic right and sometimes i do close up magic and people take out their phones and i'm

like put it down guys relax just enjoy the moment yeah a lot of shows won't let you use phones anymore no i saw kevin hart in dubai four weeks ago I was so surprised on the entrance. They put your phone in the back and they lock your phone. So you have no access to your phone, zero access. So you enter the arena, no phone. You can't, you're waiting for his show for one hour. You're just sitting. As a B2B marketer, you know how noisy the ad space can be. If your message isn't targeted to the right audience, it just disappears into the noise. With LinkedIn ads, you can precisely reach the professionals who are more likely to find your ad relevant with LinkedIn targeting capabilities.

You can reach them by job title, industry, company, and more. Stand out with LinkedIn ads and start converting your B2B audience into high quality leads today. LinkedIn ads allows you to build the right relationships, drive results, and reach your customers in a respectful environment. You'll have direct access to and build relationships with decision makers. A billion members are on their platform, 180 million senior level executives and 10 million C-level executives. You'll be able to drive results with targeting and measurement tools built specifically for B2B in technology. LinkedIn generated two to five X higher return

on ad spend than any other social media platform. And you'll work with a partner who respects the B2B world you've operated. 79% of B2B content marketers said LinkedIn produces the best results for paid media. LinkedIn has been a great platform for me to also find interesting podcast guests. If you're interested, start converting your B2B audience into high quality leads today. We'll give you a hundred100 credit on your next campaign. Go to linkedin.com slash social to claim your credit. That's linkedin.com slash social.

Terms and conditions apply. LinkedIn, the place to be. I was just by myself. Yeah. I had to talk to people around me. And it felt so nice. You see people just like being bored and it felt like, oh my God.

It was, Kevin hart show was amazing waiting for the kevin hart show was even even more amazing man it was just so beautiful nobody was taking pictures everybody was just enjoying it and after the show people were talking to each other i felt felt so special that's how it was back in the old days right our parents that yeah i'm i had to do that out here for Dave Chappelle too. Yeah. Those bags you couldn't even open. Oh, right.

Yeah. Because I tried when I got in to open the phone. Uh-huh. No, that's. You tried to open? Yeah. Some good technology. Why did you want to open?

You wanted to check your social? Because I'm so addicted, bro. Are you? Yeah. Are you scrolling right now? Not now, but I looked at my screen time. I spend like five hours a day on my phone. That's, you know what?

That's good. You think so? I think because five hours a day on my phone. You know what? That's good. You think so? Because five hours a day, but that's work, right? Mainly, yeah. I'd say 80% of it is work. Well, so that's a lot of people spend like seven, eight hours for entertainment. Yeah, that's true.

If you're working on it, I guess it's not as bad. Because you're telling like it's five hours, but if you check the details, like how many times, how many minutes of that you're messaging your friend, like, or texting? Yeah, I'm not texting just casually ever.

Yeah. Yeah, it's only business. I mean, that's kind of extreme, but yeah, I don't really just send texts to talk to people. Yeah. Unless it's like an old friend I'm trying to catch up with. Yeah, of course. I'm not asking my friend how your day was. Do you call? I'll call my mom. Okay. Yeah. Unless it's like an old friend I'm trying to catch up with. Yeah, of course. I'm not asking my friend how your day was.

Do you call? I'll call my mom. Okay. Yeah, that's about it. Do you miss that? Do you think like that? What, miss like personal life stuff? No, I'm just so lasered in on my mission right now of this podcast

that I know I'm putting that to the side a little bit. But I still balance it on the weekends. Yeah. You know, but I used to work seven days a week. I'm sure you used to do that too for magic. Yeah. You have to do it. And honestly, I love it because I'm so passionate about it. I don't, I don't care. You know, like it's not some people are like, Oh, you need to take a break. I'm like, no. Yeah. Because I like it so much. Right. And that's hard to find for people that genuine passion that they can monetize to the point you're at now. But the first years I'm like, no. Because I like it so much. Right. And that's hard to find for people, that genuine passion that they can monetize to the point you're at now.

But the first years, you probably didn't make money, right? Oh, no. The first like seven years. But I was not, I started when I was, I started, I got into magic when I was 14 years old.

13, 14 years old. I started, I tried to make money when i was 19 so from zero money to like a little money it was like three four years but also i didn't know you know like if i had the knowledge i have now that would be like probably six months yeah to i mean even a month to get somewhere but i just had no idea. So you're learning everything at the same time and it can be overwhelming. Yeah. And you were in Lithuania, right? Yeah. So that's probably a different type of culture. Were they big on social media over there?

So I'm 31 years old. That was 10 years ago. Okay. When I started, it was Facebook was the main platform for social media. And I was always into social media. I always liked that. And I would just write posts. I would do pictures, posts. So yeah, social media is big there. And it was big there. Okay.

What was your first viral video that blew up? Was it a card throwing trick? No, actually. And I'm very proud of myself because I was 19 years old and i created a viral video that it felt like it was filmed accidentally so this is what happened i'm driving a car my friend is sitting next to me and she's like hey rocus what you're doing i'm saying hey you know just on my way to a corporate gig,

you know, just, yeah, but I feel like I need to do a little trick, you know, to warm up, just to get in the mood. She's like, okay, you can do it now. And then I exit the car, go in front of it, start doing magic tricks,

and a police, like, pulls up from behind me, and the video stops. And it was before you could see the views on Facebook, but it was like 14,000 likes. And it was in Lithuania. A population of Lithuania is 3 million people. Not even that, it's like 2.7. It's like Vegas, right? So everybody in Lithuania saw it.

And I got like radio shows, TV shows, gigs just from that video. And I didn't tell anybody until like a few years ago that it was all staged. No way. I just staged it. And I think like now it's a common knowledge about viral videos, how to make it. But like 10 years ago, it was more niche, I feel like. Oh, yeah. I think, right? For sure. Now there's a lot of scripted videos. Oh, a lot. That's like what companies do. to make it but like 10 years ago it was more niche i feel like oh yeah i think right for sure

now there's a lot of scripted videos oh a lot that's like what companies do like their business base around that but i did it just off of the feeling i had i'm like you know it and then every everything that was in the video was scripted like even the thing that i'm on my way to a corporate gig so people watching this would know that I'm doing corporate gigs because that's how I was monetizing. Right. Not the views, you know. And I got gigs just because of that video. Because people found my Facebook channel and then they would check my other photos.

Yeah. And they would give me gigs. Wow. Yeah. So it all started from that. That was my first first viral video and that was before you even card throwing or it was before i knew how to throw a playing card but i didn't i don't think i had guinness world records at that time yeah

you got a lot of records now right i only have two okay what are the records for i have the the highest throw of a single playing card. Highest? The highest, yeah. So like throwing it up? Throwing it up. Okay. How many feet? Ooh, feet.

I'm from Europe. Okay. So meters? Yeah, meters. Okay. Can you do the... I can in my head, actually. Okay.

I don't know the ratio, but... So we can write it down right here. Yeah. It's 14 meters. 14 meters. That was the record. Now it's 22 meters. Holy crap.

So that would be like five story building. 14 meters is 46 feet. 46 feet. That was the record. Okay. And now my personal one is 22 meters. So I have my assistant right here. Tyus, do you know?

Your assistant? 72 feet. My manager, I'm sorry. 70, what? 72 feet. 72 feet is my personal record right now. That is insane for one playing card. And it's bicycle playing card made of paper, not a plastic one. Yeah. So does the wind

impact it at all? Are you outside? So when you're breaking the record, it has to be indoors. It has to be inside. Yeah. And then another record that I have is the most thrown playing cards with one hand in a minute. So I just shoot 2.5 cards in a second with one hand. Holy crap. Yeah.

So are you holding them in between each finger? Yeah. And then you're just... Yeah, just like this. So 122 cards, one minute, and each card has to fly 12 feet. If it doesn't fly 12 feet, it doesn't count. Wow. Yeah.

12 feet. That's probably the length of this table, right? Yeah. That sounds about right. That is crazy. And practicing for that must have taken a while. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

And I love it. It's so addicting just like when you throw a card, you want to go faster, higher, more accurate. So now now i can cut a celery a cucumber by throwing a playing card you serious yeah dude i gotta see that in person oh yeah we can do that really wow i wish i knew i would have brought some celery or something that is so cool man i can cut your salary in half oh my god such a terrible joke i thought it would be funny well i'm just took me a minute i got you i got you um you used to play basketball me yeah did you used to play sports oh not really i mean that was maybe chad gbd yeah it was no i actually tried to do chad gbd i say who's who is Rakes Bernatones?

For some reason, he says I'm a basketball player. I have a feeling that Chad Gbd was following me when I was like 12 years old, playing basketball with my friends. That's about it. Wow. That's creepy. It is really creepy. Or one of my friends was like AI.

Yeah. I never played basketball. know wow he was a computer spy reporting on your 12 year old activities yeah that is interesting um when did you leave lithuania i'm still in lithuania you're still there i live so i want to be everywhere to be honest and you have the same feeling yeah like oh you know la is amazing and then some parts of new york is phenomenal vegas you know like everything is so amazing but i found that lithuania is where i want to be right now and what gives me comfort is mr beast who's still in his home state which is north carolina yeah and people are like oh you should move to la why

you know if he wants to go to la he's just like one flight away so i feel the same i love lithuania it's such a beautiful beautiful country um it's not small not too big not too small we have everything there nature is amazing um i'm two hours by plane or three hours from italy spain england nice us is a little bit more tricky it's like 12 14 hours but on the way here i can watch a movie sleep you know answer some emails so i come here for like bigger shows if I want to film content if I have like corporate stuff if I want to spend some time just vacation you know

or I have a theater sometimes I have theater shows here like I'm performing for a month somewhere wow a month straight? that's crazy how many shows are you doing right now a year? so last year I did between 150, 180 shows.

Jeez, that's like every other day. It is, yeah. Wow. That is a lot of shows. So you're pretty much traveling just nonstop then. Yeah, but most of the shows are, I would say 80% of the shows are in Lithuania. Oh, okay. Some shows are, let's say like a of the shows are in Lithuania. Oh, okay. Some shows are, let's say, like a few weeks ago, I had a show in Spain.

So it's really easy. You just fly in, do a show, chill, come back. You know, two, three days, you're back to Lithuania. Got it, got it. Yeah. You take cold showers before your show. How do you know? Are you my AI friend?

That's crazy. It was on ChatGP gbt it was not it was was it yeah are you kidding no are you kidding i'm not kidding i never told this anybody i use it on every guest oh you get oh chat gbt or cold shower no i was like every guest yeah taking cold shower that's how you pick your guests i wonder wonder how it knew, though, if you never talked about it. That's interesting. It's crazy. I take cold shower.

I even took a cold shower today. Wow. Because I knew I'll be talking to you, and I have to have a different kind of energy. So you force your body to be uncomfortable? Always. I love it. I just love it. And one of my favorite things was last July,

I was performing in the theater here in the US one month every day except Sundays. Sundays for church because that was Arkansas. Don't ask me why. It's beautiful magic theater by Maxwell Blade in Hot Springs, Arkansas. Love it. And that little theater had an apartment in it.

Every single day before the show, I would take a cold, cold, cold shower. Yeah. And that just amps you up, gives you energy. Oh yeah. Yeah. I love it. I take them every day too. Really? Yeah. I'm used to it now, but the first, first few were difficult, very difficult, but now it feels amazing. It feels amazing. Yeah. It wakes you up, man. It's like, I don't even need coffee when I take a cold shower. Yeah. If you exercise, take a cold shower. That's yeah. You're set. Yeah. So you've been exposing some scams. What are some big scams you've been exposing? I, that's my latest thing. Like, so let me tell you the story. I working super super hard like last two past two

years i was just like hustling like crazy and my friends are like let's go to bali let's raqqas you need to take your you know time off just two weeks in bali have fun i'm like i don't really you know i'm gonna miss out on so many things. I have a show here. I want to work on this one and that thing. And they're like, no, you really need to take time off. Let's go. I'm like, okay, let's go to Bali. It was amazing.

I love Bali. But it turned out that those two weeks in Bali, I worked like one day. I filmed one scam. And that video went viral like insane. It was on all the platforms. It got more than 20 million views. And I was tagged on other profiles because they took my video, and they got like millions of views.

So if I had to guess, that video was seen by more than 100 million holy crap uh people and it was like on the news in cnn in indonesia because bali is an island of indonesia it was on the news in lithuania everywhere so what i did is i exposed a money exchange scammer and he made a mistake by uh he made a terrible mistake because he was counting the money. And the way the scam works is he has his money, while I'm counting my money, he drops some bills behind the table. But accidentally, he didn't drop it behind the table,

he dropped on the table and then raised his hands. And you can see the bill here. And he was like like and did that and that was the first shot of the the viral video i think i saw this is he's like oh yeah um and people some of the people they thought this is staged because he was so bad i mean he was actually really good but he made like a terrible mistake and and i like, people are interested in that kind of content. I'm interested because the reason I wanted to catch the scammer is I was at the party with some Lithuanians and one guy, his name was Tades.

He's like, yeah, I came back. I was $200 short. I didn't know where the money is. And I was asking him, how do you think he scammed you? Like, what was the technique? He's like, there's no way he could just like, there's no way I can know. Because he counted the money. I counted the money.

I came back and it was gone. I'm like, there should be something in between that you forgot, that you didn't see. Right. And I just, I was so curious to see. And I filmed it. And it was just so easy. He's just dropping the money behind the table. That's how it works.

Wow, that's it? He's just misdirecting you, asking you some questions. So while he doesn't give you all the money at once, he gives you pile by pile to count. And it's very confusing because the rupees, the local money is in millions. So you give $200, and it's like a couple of millions. So you could lose track.

Yeah. And you're like counting the money. He gives you another pile and takes the one that you already counted and then drops, like he drops some bills behind you. Yeah. And you don't see it because you're counting. So what I was doing, I have my sunglasses on and I'm counting. You had a camera in the sunglasses?

I had a camera in my pocket. Okay. And I'm counting and I have my sunglasses so he cannot see my eyes, but I'm watching what he's doing and just counting. And yeah. And I confronted him. Yeah. He's like, oh, I'm sorry.

And then he dropped it again. I confronted him. he dropped it again i confronted him he dropped it again he tried to scam me three times i was so tired i'm like dude i can see what you're doing just give me the money yeah and then after you confront and say hey i know what you're doing he's like oh yeah here's the fee of for uh what is it called for the fee for the transaction, for the service. So he adds like $2 fee or something. That $2 means he was a loser. He was not able to scam me. Yeah, basically. And that got me into, I was like, I got addicted to exposing scams.

So I went to Italy. Italy is full of scams. Really? Oh, yeah. That's good to know. I'm about to go there. Really? Yeah, what kind of scams. Really? Oh, yeah. That's good to know. I'm about to go there. Really? Yeah, what kind of scams go down in Italy?

So, pickpocket. You have to be careful with pickpockets. Always have your backpack in front of you. That looks funny, but if you don't want to lose your money wallet, I would have your backpack in front of you. Wow. never ever play games on the streets even if it looks like you're about to win 200 and it's going to be the best day of your life uh or your vacation in italy yeah never ever bet the money because this is how it works um you join a group of people that are

already playing and they're let's say they're all losing but you see where the ball is all the time is they have three shells one ball and they're just like shuffling it oh it's uh it's shell number it's shell number one and somebody bets $50 on shell number three. And you're like, oh my God, it was under number one. But they're all together and they're losing intentionally. So you think if you put the money, you would win easily. But when you put your money, the rules change because they just steal the ball and then put it somewhere else.

So it's impossible. It's just impossible to win. How do they get the ball from one cup to another one without you noticing? They use sleight of hand. They use magic. Interesting. Yeah. They just use sleight of hand.

There are so many techniques. There are just millions of techniques but the only thing you need to know is never ever do it even if it looks like it's just money laying on the table they probably fake the audience too they get 100 to be in the audience everybody's fake like you're the only one who's real that's crazy yeah yeah usually there's a group of eight people and they look different you know you have you have different kind of people you know the one is with big big backpack looks like a tourist one looks like a local guy another one is like it could be even like mother with a daughter they're all together

yeah that's that's insane yeah pickpocketing's big over there my mom got pickpocketed in greece in athens yeah i heard that's pretty common over there yeah spain barcelona thailand has some pickpockets i was in thailand just now tried to find scams yeah and you know what the world is actually so safe right now i was just talking with pen gillette the other day that statistically it has never been so good really but it feels like it's the worst yeah i thought it was the worst right now in terms of safety well social media social media interesting so you didn't get any pickpocketers trying to come at you ever i try to be to get pickpocketed like i try to how do you say that in english i try to be pickpocketed no yeah right yeah i try to be picked but doesn't sound right but i trust you i try to basically i try them to take my wallet two days i was walking on the street. Two days my pocket was in my back pocket.

And it just didn't happen. So I had to fake it for the video. And I mean, I said in the description that just to show how it looks, you know, how the big pockets works. So my magician friend did it so the audience could see how it works. But it's just, it's not that easy, you know? So I guess you have to be lucky. Yeah. So what do they do?

They just tap you on the shoulder, misdirect your attention, and then go for the wallop? So many techniques, but there are a few. So one, they just take it out from your back pocket. They can use a knife, just... Oh, wow. And just take it out from your back pocket. They can use a knife. Oh, wow.

And just take it out. They could unzip your backpack and just put your arm, put their arm and just take some stuff inside. So they usually use spots where it's crowded. Metro, you know, touristic places. Italy, I heard, what they do is kids actually are trained to pickpocket because they cannot put them in jail. Kids and pregnant... Yeah, because your guard is down too with kids and pregnant women you don't think they're going to steal. Exactly.

And you cannot, like, police cannot do anything. They're not going to put them in jail. So Italy heard that's the case. I haven't seen it, but I asked some local magicians and I did some research. So that's how it is in Italy. And another scam that not many people know, but I was looking for like pickpockets. I was walking on like next to the Coliseum in Rome, pickpockets, you know, three shell games, card games.

And I saw these paintings. I'm like, that looks very suspicious because a minute ago I saw almost exact same paintings, but it says that it's watercolor. Like it doesn't, it kind of looks like Chad Gbd, not Chad Gbd, but like AI generated drawings. And then I saw another spot that had same kind of thing. And then I've noticed that the guy's, you know,

making those like drawing, but he's not doing anything. He's just like pretending. So I asked him if this is real. And he's like, yeah, of course it's real. It's watercolor. So I took some water and poured on the painting. And of course, it was just the print. That's a clever one.

Yeah. Wow. I never would have thought of that. Same. I was like, wait, that's suspicious. And then I tried to find online. Nobody did that. Nobody exposed that.

And yeah, so I think I was the first one to just tell everybody. So now they're using AI to scam. Right. They're adapting with the times, right? Yeah. Yeah. That's crazy. You got any shows coming up in Vegas?

No, no shows in Vegas. Most of my work is corporate. So I do private shows a lot. I do a lot of private shows and conferences, business stuff. Yeah. What do you think about mentalists? I've had all of the magic that I do is I do magic, comedy, and mentalism. Everything I present is through comedy. So I use mentalism myself. I do mentalism magic. Oh, yeah? Yeah. Let's see it.

I love it. I'd love to see an example. Give me a number from one to ten. Go. Okay. Say it. Eight. Crazy.

Wait, what? No, you just changed it under the table i know thanks sherlock um no but there's some crazy mentors it is yeah i'll do a little bit magic after for you yeah like after we we we talk yeah we'll add that into the mural that'd be really cool awesome any mentors growing up that guided you or did you learn everything on your own i had a mentor in lithuania out of the stonies um he was uh local he's a local magician lithuania um yeah i was watching him on tv and i emailed him i was 12 13 years old i said hey i have this my name is rocas and i would love to learn magic and he just invited me to his, like a small class. He had five kids learning magic. So he was my first mentor.

Books, there's a magician called Jeff McBride. He's actually from Las Vegas. He lives in Las Vegas. I believe he's from New York State. Yeah, so he was a big, big mentor. But now just books, other magicians inspired by Penn and Teller show, other shows. Yeah. Cause I feel like back then it was before social media. So you had to learn in

person or from books, right? It was old school. It was old school. YouTube was a thing, but there were not a lot of YouTube tutorials, like magic tutorials on YouTube. So I had to buy magic DVDs to learn things. Yeah. So it's probably a lot harder to learn back then. It was. And it was, you have no idea how expensive it was. Let me just draw you a picture. So 10 years ago, let's, okay. 15 years ago, when I just started, if I want to learn something, I, let's say I want to learn some amazing card tricks right there's a dvd on card tricks which costs 50 dollars wow for dvd yeah 50 dollars or like let's say 40 dollars that's a lot for the u.s 15 years ago in lithuania the difference for the money was insane so that's like one-fifth of the salary like like average

salary of the 20 or like i'm probably minimum the wage one dvd and i'm 14 years old right but here's the thing when you work hard like a month you have a job like a summer job you make money and you get that one dvd you watch every single second of that true you cherish it a hundred percent and then you watch it again and then you watch it again and again and try to listen to every single word but if you get it for free you don't even watch all the way through you just watch like a couple of seconds if you're exposed to everything i kind seconds. If you're exposed to everything, I kind of feel like you're exposed to nothing because you don't even appreciate that.

It's too easy. Too easy. Yeah, I can relate. Yeah, there's definitely podcasts I watch where I'm kind of zoning in and out because it's just so easy to listen to so many different shows. Yeah.

What are your favorite podcasts? Depends on the phase of my life but right now right now i'm on a health and spiritual kick okay so andrew huberman joe rogan yes uh billy carson have you watched ossy wynton huberman he's a friend of mine magician yeah i think i've seen that one yeah such a beautiful part like that's a great show oh yeah yeah but i'm all like i'm all natural now yeah so i don't take any medicine or anything that's good and that's do you think that's rare in the u.s yeah i don't know the exact percentage but i'd say over 50 of people here are on some

sort of medication if i had to guess yeah like regularly you mean yeah which is crazy super crazy i mean i would say okay good for them but what about their kids yeah and kids of their kids the whole generation it gets worse and worse right like lifespan is dropping right it's 73 now for for males i believe used to be 78 is it average lifespan yeah okay are people in lithuania pretty healthy? They are. Yeah? I would say they are. We, you know, I have no statistics, so I can just tell you what I'm exposed to, what I can see. So I would say it is, and it's trendy to be healthy.

It's cool to be healthy. It's not cool to be overweight or be on drugs. It's a lot of our celebrities are like exercising, going on marathons and yeah. Nice. So it's not cool to be not healthy. Yeah, that's a great culture. I'd love to incorporate that here.

Yeah, and it's easier to change because look, it's a country of 3 million people. So easy to compare with what you have here in the US. You know? Yeah, 3 million. So your school must have been small growing up. It was actually 1,000 kids. Oh, that's actually not bad.

Yeah. That's not bad. 1,000 kids. Yeah, mine had 3,000, but... Oh, wow. Yeah, 1,000 is pretty decent. Yeah. Do you still like talk to a lot of people you grew up with?

I have friends from every stage of my life. So I still keep in touch. Not keep in touch. We're still good friends, you know, really close friends with a few kids from school, from, you know, college and magic early in the day. So I'm like, i keep people from each stage i'm you know yeah did your friends and your parents think you were crazy for wanting to be a magician they were yeah they were they were they thought i was crazy they didn't support it they

did okay but then after when it was about time for me to choose what i'm gonna do after school and i said i'm to be a professional magician. They're like, are you stupid, Rokas? Because when you're a kid and you're doing magic, it's one. And they love it. And they're like, oh, that's so good for you. You know, you don't have money for alcohol and cigarettes because you're doing card tricks and you need to buy all of that stuff.

And you're busy. You know, you're growing as a person. You're reading books. You're growing as a person it's you're reading books you're learning the language it's amazing but when it's you're 19 and you're like i'm gonna keep doing that they were scared for me they were scared and i understand if i had kids i still don't have kids i would really want kids but if i had kids i would be like you know what how about you try to be a doctor or i don't i don't know like i would i don't think i would want my friends to be my kids to be magician and magicians wow because it's it's not easy yeah statistically it's probably one of the hardest professions

yeah i would say there are like scientists probably like if you're in medicine but it's just like you have to be an artist you have to be a business person you have to it's just yeah it's my passion so I don't I like it I don't care too much but if you approach this career with logic that doesn't make any sense yeah you have to wear a lot of hats right you gotta adapt with the times yeah because i know a lot of the older school guys didn't like social media at first a hundred percent yeah it was like that with comedy too but now comedians are making a living off social media yeah and do you know any famous like super famous comedian that doesn't have social media

no they're they're all on there now i feel like even even chapelle but he he doesn't post much but i feel like they're all on there this yeah same with magic yeah i feel like like david blaine he's probably one of my favorites he's all over social media i see him all the time i want to see one of his shows he's in vegas sometimes yeah he's in vegas in may i believe yeah have you ever seen him? No, not yet. But I really want to see him. Yeah. I mean, the stuff he does is...

The balloon one was my favorite, I think. Yeah. And when he pokes needles through his arm or whatever. Yeah. That's crazy. That is crazy. That's a good word to describe what he was doing. Yeah.

And we have a lot of mutual friends. And I heard some inside stuff about him oh yeah he's like really crazy in a good way he's so dedicated he what i really admire about him if is that he spends hours and hours and hours to craft his art a lot of i see i feel like a lot of people are you know they do ro, return on investment. Okay, one hour equals that much money. He's like, no, I want to spend 20 hours and see what happens. Yep.

He's just so dedicated. I love that. I love it. Holding your breath for, what did he do, 15 minutes underwater? Yeah. He did the ice, being in ice for three days. He's just pushing the human limits yeah it is crazy he's crazy it's like almost a level past just magic

it's like its own category it is he does stunts and magic and he combines both of that that's why it's so crazy because you don't even know if that's magic or stuff and you want to believe it's magic because that means there's a secret. Because if it's a stunt, there's no secrets. Yeah, absolutely. And most of the time it's dangerous. Oh, yeah. I'd say almost every time at this point.

I mean, because he keeps having to level up the previous stunt. So it's at the level now where his life is on the line. And I think he says he wants to do one grand finale trick coming up. I'm scared to know it's grand finale it must be i was watching the balloon one live oh yeah on youtube yeah i watched i was so scared yeah because he was saying goodbye to his kids like right before and the emotion you just feel it through the screen i did it's interesting that you you found it like scary for me it's like it was so such a happy moment because it's balloons really yeah i was shitting myself really i mean because if the balloon popped i don't think there's any

way of saving him so and he he actually uh he said he got knocked out once he reached a certain level his brain started shutting off yeah that's crazy yeah that is scary man but dude it's been fun any anything you want to promote or close off with um if you were scammed if somebody that is listening were scammed or saw a scam that would be awesome if they could just write me a dm on instagram so it's at ruckus underscore magic that would be amazing because i really want to film more scams and maybe they have a footage and i can do something about it so that would be amazing because i really want to film more scams and maybe they have a footage and i can do something about it so that would be yeah that would be the best or and another thing i release my playing cards so if somebody collects if you guys like uh playing cards i have pelican

playing cards that i'm so proud of i'm yeah they're just beautiful it just beautiful. It's awesome. We'll link it below. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for coming on, man. That was fun. Thank you so much. Yeah. Thanks for watching, guys.

We'll link the site below. If you've been scammed, DM me on Instagram. Otherwise, see you guys tomorrow.