Sis, I cannot tell you adequately how much this post blessed me today...tears dripping down my nose as I try to type. Because surely the calling that you describe here is what keeps me moving between media to continue my genealogical work. Even when the funding is very iffy. Even when all kinds of activities and expenses pull me hither and yon. Those ancestors keep calling to me, begging me to bring their existence into the light. So I persist. Thank you for validating that feeling, when few others understand why it just won't leave me be. And I will continue to watch your work, seeing myself and my people in all of our multifaceted glory that you convey.
Sis! I’m sending you so much love. And thank you for sharing this so openly and vulnerably.
What you described feels very familiar to me. There are certain callings that move beyond career or ambition and begin to feel like something unfinished asking to be witnessed, remembered, carried forward.
And I think genealogical work holds such deep emotional and spiritual weight because you are restoring visibility to lives that history often tried to reduce, distort, or erase altogether. That matters immensely.
I also know how lonely that kind of work can sometimes feel, especially when the practical realities of life keep pulling at you from every direction. But the fact that the work keeps calling you back says something powerful in itself.
Please keep going. 💛
And thank you for seeing yourself and our people inside my work. I’m honored! That means more to me than I can properly express.
Sis! I’m sending you so much love. And thank you for sharing this so openly and vulnerably.
What you described feels very familiar to me. There are certain callings that move beyond career or ambition and begin to feel like something unfinished asking to be witnessed, remembered, carried forward.
And I think genealogical work holds such deep emotional and spiritual weight because you are restoring visibility to lives that history often tried to reduce, distort, or erase altogether. That matters immensely.
I also know how lonely that kind of work can sometimes feel, especially when the practical realities of life keep pulling at you from every direction. But the fact that the work keeps calling you back says something powerful in itself.
Please keep going. 💛
And thank you for seeing yourself and our people inside my work. I’m honored! That means more to me than I can properly express.
Oooooh this is so real! I started writing my pilot about 15 years ago and we go into production this summer. And rereading my old drafts is fascinating. I had to live out the arc of the character I’m playing before I could truly write it.
"I had to live out the arc of the character before I could truly write it."
I think that's exactly what I'm talking about in the piece.
Sometimes we assume we're waiting on the work, when in reality the work is waiting on us. Waiting on more life, more heartbreak, more wisdom, more joy, more understanding, more becoming.
And congratulations on going into production this summer! What a beautiful testament to trusting a story long enough to grow into it. I know rereading those old drafts must feel like reading letters from a former version of yourself.
this reached me at a critical time in my creative & personal life. this line is going to hold me: “We often tell stories with an ancestral dimension, stories connected to something larger than a single life or a single moment in time. That kind of story takes as long as it takes.” thank you 🤎
That line stayed with me too while I was writing it.
I think many of us carry stories, dreams, and callings that are connected to something larger than ourselves. When that's the case, the timeline can start to feel less like a measure of productivity and more like a measure of preparation.
I'm grateful the piece found you at the right moment, and I'm wishing you patience with whatever story is asking for your attention right now.
Thank you my sister and friend so much for shedding light on this subject, for encouraging and validating my own experience and thoughts surrounding “Calling”, and confirming what the spirit and the ancestors have been saying all along to me and urging me to trust. Day by day. Year by year. 🙏🏾
One of the things I've been learning is that trust is rarely a single decision. It's a practice. Day by day. Year by year, as you said.
There have been moments in my own journey when the path made no sense at all. Moments when ambition said one thing, timing said another, and the work itself seemed to be asking for patience.
But I've found that the stories, dreams, and callings that truly belong to us have a way of remaining. They keep calling us back until we're ready to hear them.
"That kind of understanding does something to a writer that craft alone cannot do. It deepens your patience, steadies your commitment, and reminds you that some work belongs to a timeline larger than your ambition or urgency."
this message hit me right in the chest. I have a script of my own I have been working with/on since 2022. there isn't a clear way forward but the story remains on my heart and spirit. inspired by you, Jordan Peele and Haile Gerima. I will keep working, living and evolving this story.
And honestly, 2022 is not a long time at all when it comes to work that is deeply personal, spiritually connected, historically rooted, or creatively ambitious. Some stories resist speed for a reason.
Keep living alongside it. Keep evolving alongside it. Sometimes the life you are living is quietly shaping the depth, clarity, and emotional truth the story will eventually need from you.
If it’s still sitting on your heart and spirit, there’s a reason for that!
I receive that! I do feel so much more connected to the characters, world and so much clearer on what the message is. I am becoming who I need to be to tell this story. Thank you for these beautiful truthful words! Also, looking forward to your being able to watch The Return!
This piece emerges from your deepening process. It moves beyond reflection and enters the realm of realization. There are many beautiful gems here, but what lingers with me is your use of the phrase "cultural document." A cultural document is writing that endures through time and generations. A calling, then, is something inspired by a people's collective consciousness, yet it demands a singular intensity. Such a person becomes a gatherer—a role that requires both passion and patience. Why? Because one is engaged with a ritual story that holds many voices within. This is the nature of Get Out and Sankofa (and also "Sinners"). As Ben Ori puts it, “the highest kind of writing—which must not be confused with the most ambitious kind—belongs to the realm of grace." To reach this realm, one must recognize that this is the work in which your whole life sings. And great singing, as always, requires more than talent. This is the kind of writing you can never leave behind, for it drifts quietly in your soul. When you try to run, it runs with you. You hurl it to the mountaintop, only to find yourself ascending, bruised along the way. Yet the higher you climb, the more sights you witness that would otherwise remain unseen. You hear sounds unlike those in the valley. I look forward to "The Return," because it is being crafted with whispers, with aches, and with a deep midnight. Thank you for this piece. Thank you for the gentle reminder to those of us who carry a story that lives in our bones and is woven by our blood.
This is one of the most beautiful responses I’ve ever received to my work. Truly.
Your reflection on calling, gathering, ritual story, and the difference between ambition and grace moved me deeply. Especially this idea that certain stories cannot simply be “written,” but must instead be carried, listened to, endured, and lived alongside over time.
“And great singing, as always, requires more than talent.”
Whew.
That line alone stayed with me.
And I think you’re right: there are certain works that never fully leave us because they are attached to something larger than productivity or career. They move with us quietly through the years. They change shape as we change shape.
Thank you for reading the piece with such care and generosity. And thank you for speaking about The Return with such tenderness before the world has even seen it.
Such a powerful reminder. I don't know whether my project is such a calling, but I find that writing itself has been a calling for me. Over the last couple of decades, I've given up on writing a few times, always to come back to it.
Thank you so much for this. I really believe that sometimes the clearest sign of a calling is that even when we walk away from it, something in us keeps finding our way back.
Maybe the project changes. Maybe the form changes. Maybe we change. But the impulse remains.
If writing has kept returning to you across decades, that feels deeply meaningful. I’m grateful the post met you in that place, and I hope you keep honoring the part of you that still wants to make language, story, and meaning out of what you’ve lived.
I don’t have words beautiful enough to thank you. You just called my soul and I’m in tears. I know I’m not the only one who’s been despairing at how far their work is from what the story deserves -no, *demands*- it to be, and didn’t even know how bad they needed to hear this right now.
I think so many of us know that feeling—the painful distance between the story in our hearts and our current ability to fully realize it. We can mistake that distance for failure when, in reality, it may simply be an invitation to keep growing.
I'm so grateful the essay found you when it did. Please don't give up on the work. The fact that you can feel what the story deserves is a gift, even when it hurts.
This. This is exactly what I needed to hear right now, today, to confirm what deep in my heart I know to be true: my authentic expression cannot be forced by some arbitrary industrial commercial timeline. My work matters beyond mere content creation intended for mindless consumption. Having the courage and conviction to pursue in the direction of my True North, while also allowing for “trusting right timing” are where my priorities must and shall reside. Thank you for the reminder and the backup!🌟
I think so many artists feel the pressure to create on a timeline that was never designed with their work in mind. But some stories, ideas, and creative journeys require something more than speed—they require trust.
I love what you said about following your True North. The work that matters most often asks us to trust the direction before we can see the destination.
Wishing you courage, conviction, and patience for the journey. 🖤
The Fall is proof that some visions take years to fully arrive. Fourteen years is an incredible act of faith, and you can feel that commitment in every frame of the film.
Extraordinary work often takes exactly as long as it takes. 🖤
This was beyond incredible to read, I need this so much more than you know. As a multihyphenate creative with different passions, I often find myself conceiving and dreaming up so many news ideas and projects, on top of juggling existing projects, my mind is always going bc. It leads me to a point where I start to question and even doubt the reason why I’m doing “all of this” when the external validation only appears in small numbers or rarely. But something in me tells me - shouts at me, actually, to keep going. It was gratifying reading this and seeing it so clearly as a shared experience so many other creatives go through.
I think many creatives know exactly what you're describing—the tension between the inner certainty that keeps calling you forward and the external metrics that don't always reflect the value of what you're building.
What I've learned is that numbers can tell you how many people found the work. They cannot tell you why you were called to make it.
The fact that something in you keeps shouting "keep going" is not a small thing. It's often the very thing that carries us through the seasons when the validation is quiet.
Thank you for sharing this. You're definitely not alone in that experience. 🖤
Sis, I cannot tell you adequately how much this post blessed me today...tears dripping down my nose as I try to type. Because surely the calling that you describe here is what keeps me moving between media to continue my genealogical work. Even when the funding is very iffy. Even when all kinds of activities and expenses pull me hither and yon. Those ancestors keep calling to me, begging me to bring their existence into the light. So I persist. Thank you for validating that feeling, when few others understand why it just won't leave me be. And I will continue to watch your work, seeing myself and my people in all of our multifaceted glory that you convey.
Sis! I’m sending you so much love. And thank you for sharing this so openly and vulnerably.
What you described feels very familiar to me. There are certain callings that move beyond career or ambition and begin to feel like something unfinished asking to be witnessed, remembered, carried forward.
And I think genealogical work holds such deep emotional and spiritual weight because you are restoring visibility to lives that history often tried to reduce, distort, or erase altogether. That matters immensely.
I also know how lonely that kind of work can sometimes feel, especially when the practical realities of life keep pulling at you from every direction. But the fact that the work keeps calling you back says something powerful in itself.
Please keep going. 💛
And thank you for seeing yourself and our people inside my work. I’m honored! That means more to me than I can properly express.
Sis! I’m sending you so much love. And thank you for sharing this so openly and vulnerably.
What you described feels very familiar to me. There are certain callings that move beyond career or ambition and begin to feel like something unfinished asking to be witnessed, remembered, carried forward.
And I think genealogical work holds such deep emotional and spiritual weight because you are restoring visibility to lives that history often tried to reduce, distort, or erase altogether. That matters immensely.
I also know how lonely that kind of work can sometimes feel, especially when the practical realities of life keep pulling at you from every direction. But the fact that the work keeps calling you back says something powerful in itself.
Please keep going. 💛
And thank you for seeing yourself and our people inside my work. I’m honored! That means more to me than I can properly express.
Oooooh this is so real! I started writing my pilot about 15 years ago and we go into production this summer. And rereading my old drafts is fascinating. I had to live out the arc of the character I’m playing before I could truly write it.
Whew. This right here.
"I had to live out the arc of the character before I could truly write it."
I think that's exactly what I'm talking about in the piece.
Sometimes we assume we're waiting on the work, when in reality the work is waiting on us. Waiting on more life, more heartbreak, more wisdom, more joy, more understanding, more becoming.
And congratulations on going into production this summer! What a beautiful testament to trusting a story long enough to grow into it. I know rereading those old drafts must feel like reading letters from a former version of yourself.
Wishing you an incredible production. 🖤
this reached me at a critical time in my creative & personal life. this line is going to hold me: “We often tell stories with an ancestral dimension, stories connected to something larger than a single life or a single moment in time. That kind of story takes as long as it takes.” thank you 🤎
Thank you for this. 🤎
That line stayed with me too while I was writing it.
I think many of us carry stories, dreams, and callings that are connected to something larger than ourselves. When that's the case, the timeline can start to feel less like a measure of productivity and more like a measure of preparation.
I'm grateful the piece found you at the right moment, and I'm wishing you patience with whatever story is asking for your attention right now.
You should read The Implied Author by Orhan Pamuk. Thanks for the nice article.
Thank you for the recommendation.
Thank you my sister and friend so much for shedding light on this subject, for encouraging and validating my own experience and thoughts surrounding “Calling”, and confirming what the spirit and the ancestors have been saying all along to me and urging me to trust. Day by day. Year by year. 🙏🏾
Thank you, my sister.
One of the things I've been learning is that trust is rarely a single decision. It's a practice. Day by day. Year by year, as you said.
There have been moments in my own journey when the path made no sense at all. Moments when ambition said one thing, timing said another, and the work itself seemed to be asking for patience.
But I've found that the stories, dreams, and callings that truly belong to us have a way of remaining. They keep calling us back until we're ready to hear them.
Thank you for reading so deeply. 🖤🙏🏾
I really appreciated this!
"That kind of understanding does something to a writer that craft alone cannot do. It deepens your patience, steadies your commitment, and reminds you that some work belongs to a timeline larger than your ambition or urgency."
this message hit me right in the chest. I have a script of my own I have been working with/on since 2022. there isn't a clear way forward but the story remains on my heart and spirit. inspired by you, Jordan Peele and Haile Gerima. I will keep working, living and evolving this story.
This means a lot to me. Truly.
And honestly, 2022 is not a long time at all when it comes to work that is deeply personal, spiritually connected, historically rooted, or creatively ambitious. Some stories resist speed for a reason.
Keep living alongside it. Keep evolving alongside it. Sometimes the life you are living is quietly shaping the depth, clarity, and emotional truth the story will eventually need from you.
If it’s still sitting on your heart and spirit, there’s a reason for that!
I receive that! I do feel so much more connected to the characters, world and so much clearer on what the message is. I am becoming who I need to be to tell this story. Thank you for these beautiful truthful words! Also, looking forward to your being able to watch The Return!
This piece emerges from your deepening process. It moves beyond reflection and enters the realm of realization. There are many beautiful gems here, but what lingers with me is your use of the phrase "cultural document." A cultural document is writing that endures through time and generations. A calling, then, is something inspired by a people's collective consciousness, yet it demands a singular intensity. Such a person becomes a gatherer—a role that requires both passion and patience. Why? Because one is engaged with a ritual story that holds many voices within. This is the nature of Get Out and Sankofa (and also "Sinners"). As Ben Ori puts it, “the highest kind of writing—which must not be confused with the most ambitious kind—belongs to the realm of grace." To reach this realm, one must recognize that this is the work in which your whole life sings. And great singing, as always, requires more than talent. This is the kind of writing you can never leave behind, for it drifts quietly in your soul. When you try to run, it runs with you. You hurl it to the mountaintop, only to find yourself ascending, bruised along the way. Yet the higher you climb, the more sights you witness that would otherwise remain unseen. You hear sounds unlike those in the valley. I look forward to "The Return," because it is being crafted with whispers, with aches, and with a deep midnight. Thank you for this piece. Thank you for the gentle reminder to those of us who carry a story that lives in our bones and is woven by our blood.
This is one of the most beautiful responses I’ve ever received to my work. Truly.
Your reflection on calling, gathering, ritual story, and the difference between ambition and grace moved me deeply. Especially this idea that certain stories cannot simply be “written,” but must instead be carried, listened to, endured, and lived alongside over time.
“And great singing, as always, requires more than talent.”
Whew.
That line alone stayed with me.
And I think you’re right: there are certain works that never fully leave us because they are attached to something larger than productivity or career. They move with us quietly through the years. They change shape as we change shape.
Thank you for reading the piece with such care and generosity. And thank you for speaking about The Return with such tenderness before the world has even seen it.
That means more to me than I can say.
I NEEDED to read this today. "What you are living in the time between drafts is not wasted but gathered." Thank you.
Yes indeed sis! Thank you for reading and sharing your thoughts.
Recognizing that timing is truly everything. Real creatives know this!
Absolutely!
Such a powerful reminder. I don't know whether my project is such a calling, but I find that writing itself has been a calling for me. Over the last couple of decades, I've given up on writing a few times, always to come back to it.
Thank you. This is a precious post.
Thank you so much for this. I really believe that sometimes the clearest sign of a calling is that even when we walk away from it, something in us keeps finding our way back.
Maybe the project changes. Maybe the form changes. Maybe we change. But the impulse remains.
If writing has kept returning to you across decades, that feels deeply meaningful. I’m grateful the post met you in that place, and I hope you keep honoring the part of you that still wants to make language, story, and meaning out of what you’ve lived.
I don’t have words beautiful enough to thank you. You just called my soul and I’m in tears. I know I’m not the only one who’s been despairing at how far their work is from what the story deserves -no, *demands*- it to be, and didn’t even know how bad they needed to hear this right now.
Thank you for this. Truly.
I think so many of us know that feeling—the painful distance between the story in our hearts and our current ability to fully realize it. We can mistake that distance for failure when, in reality, it may simply be an invitation to keep growing.
I'm so grateful the essay found you when it did. Please don't give up on the work. The fact that you can feel what the story deserves is a gift, even when it hurts.
Keep going. The story chose you for a reason. ❤️
What a fantastic piece of work this is. I can only imagine the beauty your film will hold. Thank you for sharing our truth. My truth.
Thank you for the kind words! ❤️
This. This is exactly what I needed to hear right now, today, to confirm what deep in my heart I know to be true: my authentic expression cannot be forced by some arbitrary industrial commercial timeline. My work matters beyond mere content creation intended for mindless consumption. Having the courage and conviction to pursue in the direction of my True North, while also allowing for “trusting right timing” are where my priorities must and shall reside. Thank you for the reminder and the backup!🌟
Thank you for this.
I think so many artists feel the pressure to create on a timeline that was never designed with their work in mind. But some stories, ideas, and creative journeys require something more than speed—they require trust.
I love what you said about following your True North. The work that matters most often asks us to trust the direction before we can see the destination.
Wishing you courage, conviction, and patience for the journey. 🖤
One of my favorite movies, The Fall by Tarsem Singh, took him 14 years to make. It is one of the most visually appealing movies ever made.
Such a great example.
The Fall is proof that some visions take years to fully arrive. Fourteen years is an incredible act of faith, and you can feel that commitment in every frame of the film.
Extraordinary work often takes exactly as long as it takes. 🖤
This was beyond incredible to read, I need this so much more than you know. As a multihyphenate creative with different passions, I often find myself conceiving and dreaming up so many news ideas and projects, on top of juggling existing projects, my mind is always going bc. It leads me to a point where I start to question and even doubt the reason why I’m doing “all of this” when the external validation only appears in small numbers or rarely. But something in me tells me - shouts at me, actually, to keep going. It was gratifying reading this and seeing it so clearly as a shared experience so many other creatives go through.
I felt this.
I think many creatives know exactly what you're describing—the tension between the inner certainty that keeps calling you forward and the external metrics that don't always reflect the value of what you're building.
What I've learned is that numbers can tell you how many people found the work. They cannot tell you why you were called to make it.
The fact that something in you keeps shouting "keep going" is not a small thing. It's often the very thing that carries us through the seasons when the validation is quiet.
Thank you for sharing this. You're definitely not alone in that experience. 🖤
Needed this something serious. The messages always find us ✨ Thank you.
I'm grateful this one found you when it needed to. Thank you for reading. 🖤✨