Nate Stanforth is a bit of an enigma.
Identifying as a magician and a writer really doesn't do what he's about real justice, because what truly fuels him is this fierce lifelong devotion to the pursuit of discovering and creating and evoking awe and amazement.
That kind of otherworldly state where you see and experience something that your brain simply cannot explain, and you immediately just drop into a place where you're kind of a child again, filled with joy and laughter and just straight up wonder.
And things were going great.
As he was building this career, he was touring nonstop, building a career as an acclaimed magician and illusionist.
But the years began to take a bit of a toll, and Nate eventually reached his own breaking point, his own moment of reckoning where the profession and the practice of magic had lost its magic for him.
He was pretty burned out and really questioning the one thing that he had lived for since he was a kid.
So he did something extreme, vanishing into India for five weeks in search of an indigenous 3000 year old tribe of indian magicians that would radically change the course of his career and his life.
He shares so much of this journey in his memoir.
Here is real magic.
And we dive deep into many of the magical and not so magical moments along the way in today's conversation.
So excited to share it with you.
I'm Jonathan Fields, and this is good life project.
Growing up, what's your first exposure to magic?
I mean, even before I knew there were such things as magic tricks in the world, I loved the experience of wonder and amazement.
I mean, whatever it is that we talk about when we talk about magic, I loved that experience.
When I was a boy.
I remember my parents took me out to see a meteor shower one night.
And, you know, even a midsize city in the middle of Iowa has enough light pollution to make it hard to see the milky Way.
But 10 miles outside of town in the cornfields, it's just pitch black.