Magician Nicole Cardoza Reclaims Inherent Magic
More than Just Sleight of Hand
Words by Jessi Devenyns Photos by Eric Morales
What is magic? Nicole Cardoza, the 33-year-old who fields this question, is warm and welcoming as she explains that magic happens when a person is well and happy within their mind, body, and emotions. As a yoga nonprofit founder turned investor turned magician, she is plenty qualified to advise on maintaining balance and well-being despite life’s twists and turns. Achieving this balance is hard. However, Nicole believes that everyone deserves to be well. After all, to do well, you must be well. Implementing wellness in her own life and sharing her practices with her community through various creative endeavors are the heart behind Nicole’s work.
Nicole argues that wellness should be rooted in the choices of an individual, not limited by the narrow options they’ve been given by corporations but rather by conscious decision-making. She believes that, in part, this is done through mindful health practices but can also be accomplished through supporting the construction of a healthy community. “The wellness industry has really catered to able-bodied, thin, white, affluent, cis-woman, right?” she asks rhetorically. Furthermore, Nicole is not one to let those constrictions dictate her life or the lives around her.
Her unrelenting push for inclusion is supported by her belief in holistic wellness for all individuals. She believes health is a bit like a magic tonic. If people are whole and well, both mentally and physically, then their future becomes brighter.
To manifest her vision into reality, Nicole founded Reclamation Ventures, a venture fund that invests in companies cultivating leadership and collective community wellness, whether that be through medicine or access to outdoor spaces.
While Nicole spends a majority of her day leading Reclamation Ventures, during the evenings, she tends to the imaginations of eager audiences who come to see her perform a sleight of hand or stage a disappearance. As a performing magician, she aims to bring holistic wellness not only for others but also for herself.
“Magic is really about creating a space where we can suspend disbelief or imagine new possibilities. And we need that now more than ever,” she says. “Sometimes we talk about imagination as inspiration — like this spark, like lightning striking in a storm. But I actually think that we need to invest in imagination as a discipline and a practice in the same way that we do other aspects of our well-being because it’s as important, if not more important, for us to dream. Without that, we don’t even know what we’re trying to create,” Nicole explains.
“We need to cultivate a practice of imagination as a society because everything we’ve thought of, that we’ve been implementing so far, has certainly fallen short of what we deserve.”
And what everyone deserves is to be well. After all, to do well, you must be well.
Contact:
nicoleacardoza.com
@nicolecardoza
