From 600+ conversations with the world’s leading thinkers.
I started writing fiction because I was lonely. I was an only child, a solitary child, raised by a single working mother, which was very unusual at the time in Turkey. Literature gave me a sense of continuity, coherence; it kept my pieces together. It helped me to connect even when I felt like I didn't quite belong.
People often talk about life hacks, but for me, the real 'hack' is simply to remain curious and willing. It's about living in a space between willingness and curiosity, embracing discomfort as you pursue questions without clear answers.
Comedy delivers the cerebral and the hyperbole, it can be funny and serious. You can see that ability for the pendulum to swing both ways when you watch the best comedians perform.
This essence is an inner necessity that yearns to be expressed. When you allow this essence to shine through, it rejuvenates you. It fosters creativity, energy, and imagination. However, when you suppress it, feelings of depletion, exhaustion, and burnout take over.
I don't really think about legacy, I'm more interested in my next thing, my next project… my writing is driven by a love of music, and an affection for being around music, and for telling stories… I don't have a grand plan; this is my life.
In this industry, whether you're learning to act or write, you often develop skills in isolation. It's easy to see your own discipline as encompassing the whole creative universe. However, once you're on set, the reality of the collaboration involved becomes apparent very quickly.
To me literature was, and still is, an existential need. Books and stories have been that gateway for me. I wanted to find a gate to an 'elsewhere', to another land, a Storyland.
I urge everyone to channel their inner teenager. Think back to those fearless days brimming with creativity and ambition. As we age, societal rewards for 'playing it safe' can stifle our innovative spirit.
Business problems are idea problems because like most other problems we face, they do not have one answer. The reality is, for any of the problems we face, there are a thousand possible answers.
In improvisation on instruments, I feel creation is going a new path with every note, somewhere you haven't been before. You discover things, you're the adventurer in music. That leads to new songs and nice adventures.
Comedy chips at people in power, particularly those who use tyrannical power. It strips their fake respect, and destroys the fake fear they create; and these are people who rely on being respected, and being feared.
Being creative is about being a collective. It's not something unique. That's why we can nurture each other's creativity.