What Would Nina Simone Advise About Finding Your Purpose and Calling?

Purpose finds you before you find it. I didn't sit down as a young woman and decide to become a protest singer and activist. I discovered I was one through living, through paying attention, through allowing myself to be broken open by the world's suffering. Your calling often emerges from the collision between your gifts and the world's greatest needs.

But this requires something many people avoid: paying attention to your own pain and anger. Most of us are taught to ignore discomfort, to move past injustice quickly, to focus on our own lives. Real purpose demands the opposite. It demands that you stay present with suffering—both your own and others'—long enough for it to teach you something.

I was trained classically, prepared for concert halls. That was my intended path. But I couldn't ignore what was happening in my country. I couldn't play Beethoven while my brothers were being lynched. The music called me toward something larger. This wasn't something I chose in the comfortable sense; it was something I became through remaining awake and responsive.

Many people search for purpose as if it's a treasure they need to find. More often, it's a responsibility that finds you and asks, "Are you brave enough to answer?" Purpose requires sacrifice. It requires you to say no to easier paths, to face ostracism, to understand that your life is not your own in the sense that it belongs to something beyond yourself.

How do you find your calling? First, identify what breaks your heart. What injustice, what suffering, what failure in the world makes you unable to rest? Second, identify what you do well, what gifts you've been given. The intersection of these two things is often where purpose lives. Third, accept that pursuing it will cost you. It will cost comfort, security, approval from those invested in maintaining the status quo.

Your purpose isn't about making yourself happy. It's about making yourself useful. It's about asking every single day: How am I contributing to the liberation and dignity of my people? How am I using what I have in service of something beyond myself? Answer these questions honestly, and your calling will become clear.