The Fifth House — Creativity

If I am honest about creativity, I would like to believe my whole life has been a creative experiment — though I have never done anything anyone would call artistic. No paintings, no poetry, no music. What I do by default is creatively solve problems. I don't look at a problem through metrics alone. I look at it in the current moment and ask what makes sense, right here, with what is actually in front of me. For most of my life I would not have used the word creative for any of this. This essay is the story of how that word found me anyway.

Two Children, Many Babies

In the physical form, yes — I have two children. But I have come to believe the energy of being a father does not stop at them. I carry it into rooms. When I meet people, something in me wants to hold space the way a parent does — not above, just alongside, with attention.

And then there are the other babies. I gave birth to the technology at Enchanting Travels. I gave birth to the technology scaling at Travelopia. These projects are used across the companies I have worked with, and I can say without embarrassment that they are my children — conceived, carried, delivered, and then handed over to the world to grow without me. I am also proud to be associated with a creative company: a friend of mine runs a creative studio, and I serve as an advisor there. Even when the making is not mine, I like being near the delivery room.

Detective Thinking, and Dad's Machines

There are, properly speaking, three kinds of reasoning: deductive (rule to result), inductive (results to rule), and abductive (the leap to the most likely explanation from incomplete clues). When I first told this story I called my favourite mode "detective thinking" — a phrase I half-invented. It turns out I had a real thing by the wrong name: what I enjoy is abduction, inference to the best explanation. It is exactly how a detective works — not proving from axioms, not generalising from a spreadsheet, but sniffing out the likeliest story from a handful of clues. That, and the freedom to simply sit and wonder, is where I am at home. Deductive and inductive rigour I can summon, but they are a learned register, not a native one.

I saw this quality first in my dad. He had a unique ability to look at a challenge, turn it over, and creatively apply problem solving — building machines, rigging fixes, making things work that had no business working. I have a feeling I do the same thing in my own medium. I have an interesting way of looking at a problem statement and arriving at a solution — not by following the manual, but by sniffing around the edges of it until something clicks.

No Writer's Block

Here is something I have noticed: writers talk about writer's block — sitting in front of the page, not knowing what to say. Put me in any situation, with any stranger, and I can strike up a conversation without thinking twice. For most of my life this has been true. Is it a great quality, to be in reactive mode, constantly talking? Probably not. But the skill has come in handy, because underneath the talking is something better: I always stayed curious. I always wanted to know the other person's story.

That is the entire architecture of my YouTube channel. It is all conversation. The creativity was never in a script — it was in the curiosity, in the willingness to sit across from someone and pull the thread of their story until it unspooled.

Giving Voice to Others

If I count the things I have actually made, a pattern shows up. I built a podcast channel on YouTube out of pure conversation. I built this website for myself. And then I started building them for others — my partner Sripriya's sripriya.me, Rotem's rotem.coach, the page I am building with my Rakhi sister Arpitha, Padmalaxmi's page, the Conscious Leadership Circle. With a colleague, I made aila.fun — a playful experiment in expressing our thoughts and ideas in a bold, powerful way.

I don't think I would have spotted this pattern if I hadn't sat down to write this house.

The Nerd Who Wasn't

For most of my life I thought I was a nerd, and not very creative. That was the label and I wore it without checking the fit. What I am recognising now is that I live in a rather healthy intersection — between creativity, intellect, and body awareness. None of them alone, all of them at once.

I should be honest about what I am not, too. I am not yet an original-idea creator. The idea of writing my life into twelve boxes came from my mentor — it was not mine. But when I see something I like, I take the inspiration and develop it further, push it somewhere it hasn't been. I have not yet seen anybody else write their life stories into the twelve houses like this. The seed was borrowed; the garden is mine.

Taste, Acknowledged

As I write, another question surfaces: do I have my own taste? I am a connoisseur of good things — when somebody organises their house beautifully, arranges an offering with care, I recognise it instantly and I appreciate it. Do I have that innate skill myself? No. I am acknowledging that. I am aware of it, but it is not yet fully developed in me.

But here is what I know about myself: if I truly, honestly understand the intent behind something — if I acknowledge that it matters — I start adopting it. It becomes a matter of staying open with the person who has the gift, exploring alongside them, and finding ways to integrate it deeply. And I generally find creative ways to do exactly that.

Moving House — Her Plan

I have shifted houses many times within Bangalore, and once across cities — and an earlier version of this essay quietly took the credit for it. My wife read that and corrected me, rightly: the planning of a house move is her ability, not mine. Sripriya is the one who holds the whole choreography in her head — what goes where, in what order, on what day. The design is hers. What I bring is support: the carrying, the improvising around the edges when something doesn't fit, the figuring-out on the fly. The creativity in a move is real — but the plan behind it is hers. I am the hands; she is the map.

That is the same muscle I use everywhere: creatively using what is given to me. If I have certain things in my hand — people coming my way, technology coming my way, constraints coming my way — I will use the best of what I have and find a way to maximise its potential. And if you hand me a sketchbook and a pen, I can draw something up. Not world-class art, but I can translate what I am thinking into a few scribbles and lines. The thought makes it to the page. That counts.

This Page Is the Experiment

Do I put deliberate effort into developing my creativity? I don't. And as I write this, I am acknowledging both halves of that sentence: I am creative, and there is an opportunity to develop it further. It is a humbling thing, writing these stories one by one — this is a path of inner discovery, and I have taken up the writing of these Bhavas as a way to explore myself. This essay is itself another creative experiment I am running on me.

I imagine this will be an evolution over time, not a static site. The fifth house, after all, is about what flows out of you and keeps growing after you let it go.

Not yet an original-idea creator — but hand me a spark, and I will build it a home.