In the writing world, creativity is often confused with complexity. Flowery prose that marches on for years, knotty metaphors so strange there’s a reason they’ve never been used before, and dense paragraphs that require a tweezers to get through – that, to certain writers, is success.

I once had a professor who thought reading should be a mental cardio session, a humbling experience that wasn’t complete until you threw the book against a wall in frustration. I never did well in that class; partly because I couldn’t stop myself from thinking he was an egotistic asshole and therefore skipping his assignments, but also because I subscribe to the TLC theory of creativity.

The more to the point you are, the more likely people are to listen.

TLC is a television station that’s not afraid to lay it all out on the table. They’re also not afraid to dedicate about 60% of their airtime to little people, obese virgins, and the occasional show that makes you wish you weren’t eating a burrito while watching.

With episode titles like “What Not To Wear”, “The Little Couple”, “I Didn’t Know I Was Pregnant”, “Raising 16 Children”, “Ghost Intervention”, “Dr. G’s How Not To Die”, “Born Without Arms“, and my personal favorite, “The 650 Pound Virgin“, TLC is clearly illustrating a succinct understanding of the human psyche: if you tell us what we’re gonna get, we’re gonna stick around.

Obviously, TLC has figured out another human trait, which is our fascination with strange and weird medical issues, but the point of the matter is that my twisted interest in freakish medical issues is more likely to be aroused by a show titled “Born Without Arms” than something like “Jacob’s Story: A Struggle for Independence“. I’m a busy person, but if I’m absolutely certain that the next thing I’m going to see on TV is a show about someone who doesn’t have freaking arms, I’ll put my life on hold for 30 more minutes.

The same type of thinking can be applied to the writing process. If we want an audience to understand, identify, and get interested, let’s just be obvious. Say what we mean. Crowding pages with unnecessary fancy pants language increases the chances of someone putting our stuff down and deciding to eat a sandwich instead – because at least with a sandwich, you know exactly what you’re going to get.

Being clear and obvious doesn’t mean boring people to death. Forgoing the two-page sentence doesn’t mean metaphors, similes, and out-of-the-box craftsmanship have to be sacrificed, it just means standing out in the open and saying what we gotta say with plain conviction.

Some people will probably disagree with the TLC method, and that’s fine. They can write their long-winded masterpieces and I can watch a show about a guy who’s 650 pounds, 35 years old, and still a virgin. Everybody wins.