How to be creative

A lesson from hunger

Creativity is an elusive beast. But are there things we can do to snare it? Read on to find out.

What makes us hungry?

Two things: Not eating (including fasting and more extreme starvation) and exposure to information about food.

A man who has just eaten a bit meal is less likely to be hungry than his twin, who hasn’t eaten in days.

And a man locked in a sense reduction chamber is less likely to be hungry than his cousin who is constantly bombarded with Instagram photos of food, Youtube videos of people munching, and smells and tastes wafting out of the neighbourhood bakery, .

But what has food and hunger got to do with creativity?

All forms of creativity have one thing in common. You start with simple building blocks (like words, notes, or commands). You combine them in imaginative and interesting ways to build complex structures (like novels, symphonies or complex computer programmes).

“Complex” is important, but “imaginative and interesting” is even more important. Not all complex things are creative. But all creative things are imaginative and interesting.

We can “induce” creativity, the same way we induce hunger. By a combination of fasting and exposure to the simple building blocks.

Too abstract? Let me explain with a concrete example.