I have got friends that I have got to know and found out that, the first few times I was with them, they were just thinking that everything I was doing was some kind of weird mind game, which is hysterical, really, because I couldn't be any less like that.

Derren Brown

Time Wit Which

We go through life owned by the stories we tell ourselves which are often historic and charged narratives - things we've learnt since childhood that we don't even consciously realise are going on.

Derren Brown

Life Which Us

For every moment of concentration there is an equal moment of relaxation.

Derren Brown

Mom Men Very

Guilt's too strong a word, but there is this niggling worry that I'm a grown-up doing a childish job and it would be nice to do something more useful and to reach a number of people with an idea you think is important.

Derren Brown

You Would Worry

In terms of self-esteem and confidence I think I'm generally quite healthy.

Derren Brown

Health Thy Think

A magic trick of any sort works because you tell yourself a story about what you see. And politicians use this all the time in their own way by throwing a load of statistics at you when things don't quite follow and then saying, 'So therefore blah,' and you believe that 'blah' thing because of the confusion that's come before.

Derren Brown

Work Time Yourself

Psychic, illusionist... I'm just doing the things that I find interesting and worthwhile.

Derren Brown

Worthwhile Worth While

The Stoics appear during a huge time of constant wars and real political strife. And it became very popular, I think, because it's a way of distancing yourself from strife and keeping your centre of gravity within you.

Derren Brown

War Time Yourself

I went to a party when I was a student and they had a mynah bird up in the bedroom where people put their coats. I was completely captivated - I just sat there all night talking to it. The next day I passed a pet shop and they had a conure - it's a little parakeet - in the window. I bought it, not knowing what it was or how to look after it.

Derren Brown

Pet Art Wing

Magic has both feet planted in cheap vaudeville and childish posturing; in dishonesty and therefore not in art.

Derren Brown

Art Vaudeville Therefore

I have a couple of dogs and I live with my partner. We just like to sit and read and I'm generally quite quiet.

Derren Brown

Art Wit Us

You have to realise that hypnosis doesn't exist: it just works on people's natural suggestibility, their expectations and capacity to unconsciously role play. You can't make someone do anything they don't want to do.

Derren Brown

Work You Works

I was allowed to do whatever made me happy. I can't think of a better or more worthwhile approach to parenting.

Derren Brown

Parenting Worthwhile Worth

I'm finally having my TV removed and replaced by a tropical fish tank, which I hope will provide more interesting viewing.

Derren Brown

Hope Wing Win

Magic's quite a solitary pursuit - a thing you can do for hours and hours, getting better and better.

Derren Brown

You Tin Thing

The people who are most susceptible to hypnosis - the rugger bugger types - were also the ones who intimidated me most at school, so on an unconscious level I suppose I'm turning the tables on them.

Derren Brown

Who Were USC

I really liked 'Heist,' and that seems to be a popular favourite, but I think my personal favourite was 'Hero at 30,000 ft,' about the guy who ended up landing the aeroplane.

Derren Brown

Who Up Think

When you're with your partner, I think, does everyone else sing and do the stupid voices and all that stuff that I do and always have done?

Derren Brown

Art Your You

Not everything is about causing controversy. That would be a very boring way to go.

Derren Brown

Would Way Very

I've got a house full of taxidermy. It's like a museum. I have about 200 pieces in total, all ethically sourced.

Derren Brown

Use Us Total

Magic should get under people's skins.

Derren Brown

UN T Skin

I'm probably a little shyer than people imagine.

Derren Brown

Since turning 40 I happily moisturise - I have what's called a regime - but I'm always in two minds because I have no idea if I'm completely wasting my money. They feel nice when they are on but I can't stop wondering, 'Am I succumbing to the same nonsense I try to fight against in other areas?'

Derren Brown

I'm very interested in how we take ownership of our own stories and our own lives.

Derren Brown

I came across the idea of running towards the things that frighten you. Once you go and do it, you realise that the fear of it is far more powerful than actually doing it.

Derren Brown

I had a natural aptitude for wanting to be the centre of attention and a definite skill for annoying people.

Derren Brown

Kindness and compassion aren't political qualities even though they get politicized.

Derren Brown

I don't like big spiders in the house.

Derren Brown

Feeling we have to be constantly updated about the lives of our friends and that everything we say has to be out there leads to frustration, anger and jealousy much more than it leads to anything else.

Derren Brown

The stuff that I do and enjoy is normally quite similar to a lot of the stuff that psychics and spiritualists would enjoy themselves. I just have a different approach to wanting to find out how things really work, or a sense of, I guess, responsibility about honesty and so on.

Derren Brown

If you aim to be controversial for the sake of it you'd end up with a very thin and meaningless show.

Derren Brown

The big, fun, ambitious ideas tend to come out of the frustration of talking for too long about the smaller, weaselly ones.

Derren Brown

I was part of a very uncool group. It was a group that liked classical music. They were known as the Music School Gang or, less charitably, the Poof Gang.

Derren Brown

In real life, when I can avoid anything stressful, I do.

Derren Brown

And the nature of magic is all in the person's experience. Whether the magician is using a highly complex sleight of hand or he's just got two cards that are the same, it doesn't matter: it's how it's sold and how magical it is for the person that matters.

Derren Brown

A lot of unconfident kids do tricks because it's the quickest route to impressing people. You can stand behind something amazing and people think you're amazing.

Derren Brown

A bedrock of insecurity made me want to impress and want to be the center of attention.

Derren Brown

If you're a comedian, it's a bit of a choice whether or not you want to be funny when you're not performing because it might feel disingenuous. In the same way, I don't show people magic tricks in social situations any more.

Derren Brown

Things I've done in the past always make me cringe a bit. When I think back to being a Christian. Proselytising to people, that makes me cringe.

Derren Brown

I'm not very sociable. If I get invited to a glamorous event I probably won't go. That world does not really appeal to me.

Derren Brown

For a long time, I couldn't just sit and have a conversation with people at a table without showing them a trick. I thought you just had to impress, it was about impressing, which of course is what you do if you don't feel very impressive.

Derren Brown

Yes, I've had a slight feeling of wanting to reclaim some of the lifestyle I had in my 20s, which means poncing around in what amounts to pirate clothes.

Derren Brown

Hypnosis is just suggestibility; you see it in certain people.

Derren Brown

I don't want to be some extreme therapist. Although seeing someone's life change for the better is a really moving thing.

Derren Brown

When I was at University I had a sort of fear about going to the gym and that kind of blokeish environment, which was rooted in a feeling of total inadequacy, which is what fear is.

Derren Brown

Taking up magic was a distraction from my sexuality. There is that 1970s cliche of the gay man as hairdresser, interior decorator, fashionista... and all of those things are about arranging surfaces in a very dazzling way - and magic is all about how you arrange surfaces. I got very good at deflecting people from things I didn't want them to see.

Derren Brown

Glenn Close is my favourite actress and she came to see the show in London once which was giddying.

Derren Brown

If something's stressful I've always tended to just find ways of avoiding it rather than rising to meet it or try to change it.

Derren Brown

The joy of doing the TV or something like 'Sacrifice' isn't really the process of doing it; the joy is going through this real-life experience.

Derren Brown

If people have very big personalities, I find myself feeling I have nothing to offer.

Derren Brown

Relationships are very good at making you more conscious of yourself. Especially as you get older, you develop a crust around your madnesses and shortcomings that take someone else to recognize them.

Derren Brown