Callings: The Purpose and Passion of Work

StoryCorps founder Isay culls and collects wise words and powerful stories about searching for meaning in work from the more than 65,000 stories recorded in StoryCorps booths across America over the past 12 years. Every one of the stories in this inspiring collection reveals the deep love that motivates the storytellers as they discover and embrace their vocations. For example, Eric D. Williams, a reverand, admits that “he came into this work kicking and screaming... but my heart was pulled,” and he changed both the character of his ministry and his community by performing a funeral of young man who had died from AIDS when other churches refused to do so. Emergency medical technician Rowan Allen saved Brian Lindsey’s life after Lindsey was critically injured in a bicycle accident; the experience so transformed Allen that he became a nurse, and he and Lindsey’s family formed such a bond that Lindsey’s family showed up at Allen’s graduation from nursing school. Beekeeper Ted Dennard talks to his friend, Clay Culver, about the wisdom he’s gained from his work and the bees: “My favorite thing about bees is that they have this give-in-order-to-receive—or receive-in-order-to-give—way of living.” These wonderful stories reveal that work becomes meaningful to those who choose—or are in some cases chosen by—the calling that motivates, energizes, and inspires them. (Apr.)