I love the series of podcast available from the New York Public Library. Last week I listened to this dialogue between Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Zadie Smith. Chimamanda in particular blew me away with her humour, her groundedness, her intelligence.
"When I was 25 I didn’t think in those terms. I didn’t think in that language of ‘I want to find my purpose’. I would advise very strongly that you not think in those terms. It just clouds your head, and you start thinking ‘I have to find my purpose’. I think you should just live. Life is short, do your thing, you just never know, follow what you love… follow what can give you a job so you can eat. There’s something about our culture, everywhere in the world, that makes people think about ‘find your purpose’ and it’s just – why?"
[Listen to the full podcast here]