KenyaOnAShoeString: Real Advice for Real Kenyans

"If the desirable is not available, the available becomes desirable." At first glance, it sounds like something you’d hear in passing — a casual truth dressed as wisdom. But sit with it long enough and it unfolds into something far more complex, a quiet philosophy of human adaptation and compromise. It speaks to how we survive the distance between what we want and what we have. Desire and the Desirable Desire and the desirable are often mistaken for twins, yet they live on opposite sides of the human experience. Desire is inward — a current that flows through us. It is the ache that drives us to move, to reach, to create, to hope. Desire is not moral or logical; it simply is. It’s the spark that makes a child reach for the stars, or a thinker question what everyone else accepts. The desirable , however, is external — something we name, shape, and assign value to. It is what society, culture, and history tell us we should want: beauty, wealth, recognition, safety, belo...

“Sometimes the most extraordinary lives are the ones lived most quietly.” – Unknown The other day, I found myself reading the obituary of someone I grew up around. We had gone to the same church, lived in the same neighborhood, but to be honest, I don’t remember him clearly. His face is vague in my memory, his presence faint. And yet, as I read the words written about him — especially the tribute from his two brothers — I was startled. Their words painted a picture of a life lived with meaning: quiet joy, steady love, and the kind of fulfillment that doesn’t always make itself visible to the world. I was shocked, though I didn’t fully understand why at first. Perhaps it’s because I had unconsciously absorbed the belief that a life worth remembering must look a certain way — marked by wealth , prestige , or visible achievements . We often expect fulfillment to carry recognizable markers: a celebrated career, material success , the kind of milestones that people point to with admiratio...