I present my magic until it is being performed...
I cannot, and have never been able to, sit down and think of patter for a trick. When I tried, it ended with faintly (read: utterly) crap performances that I wasn't at all happy with, subsequently causing me to drop the pretences and be left with patterless tricks. Of course, I didn't stop doing magic because of this, I went out and presented what I had to the world regardless. When I said something, and it worked, it stuck and I used it again. When it didn't, I dropped it. Slowly, in this way, my tricks built themselves up to something I am happy with. I will now confidently say that I perform the best part of my repertoire, and am allowing the rest of it to build itself up to this performance standard in the same way. Now whilst this may not be the best way for many people, I find it gives me the most realistic and enjoyable performance, for both me and my audiences.