I'd always wanted to do these types of things - pieces of magic I could put out not as illusions, but really doing it.

Basically, I was a kid growing up with a single mother in Brooklyn.

I thought instead of burying myself under dirt, I'd bury myself under water so everybody could see that you're there.

I just believe that the feeling of wonder is amazing. I am pushing myself as far as I can humanly push myself... I can only hope for the best and expect the worse.

My mother encouraged it so much. She was so supportive. Even if as a kid, I would do the dumbest trick, which now that I look back on some things, she would love it, she would say that's amazing, or if I'd make the ugliest drawing, she would hang it up. She was amazing.

I was obsessed with the idea of fasting and isolation.

I'd go to Coney Island to hang out, and I saw a magician doing a rope trick on the boardwalk. I was fascinated. I guess that's how it started.