KenyaOnAShoeString

Words are powerful — until they meet history. No matter how eloquently we explain, justify, or charm, there comes a point where speech cannot undo what behavior has already written. We live in a time where words move fast — apologies trend, promises multiply, and image is currency. But behavior is slower, heavier, and truer. It’s the record of who we’ve been when no one is watching. And once behavior leaves its imprint — on people, on relationships, on trust — talk alone can’t erase it. The Illusion of Words We’re raised to believe in the redemptive power of speech. Say sorry. Explain yourself. Give reasons. Craft the right narrative. But words without changed behavior are like perfume over smoke — pleasant for a moment, but the air still burns. You can talk your way into admiration, even forgiveness. But not out of consequence. Behavior is a form of truth that language can only circle, never rewrite. The friend who always says they’ll do better but doesn’t. The leader who apolog...

"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...

This weekend, I watched a short lesson on learned helplessness , and it struck me how deeply it mirrors our daily lives as Kenyans — not just in politics or big systems, but in the small, ordinary spaces we occupy every day. The lecturer began with a simple exercise. Each student received a paper with scrambled letters and was told to form real words. She insisted everyone had the same set. What we didn’t know was that the first two “words” weren’t the same. One group got easy, solvable words like DOG and CAT , while the other got letter combinations that could never make sense — XQZ , PLT . As you’d expect, the first group solved theirs quickly. The second group struggled, then gave up. When the final round came, everyone had the same easy word. But by then, the second group didn’t even try. They’d already learned that effort was pointless. That is learned helplessness — when we’ve been stuck for so long that even when freedom appears, we don’t believe in it. What Is Learned He...

In Kenya, saving is almost sacred. From the moment you earn your first salary, there’s an unwritten rule: save as much as you can, because you never know what tomorrow brings. Jobs vanish overnight. Prices go up without warning. Rent can double, and so can your transport costs. Holding onto every coin feels like the only logical thing to do. For many of us, that habit becomes a way of life. We are constantly preparing for the next emergency, the next layoff, the next unexpected bill. We save, we tighten our belts, we delay the things that bring joy — because it feels safer that way. But what happens when life changes — when you move out, earn a little more, or finally start living more comfortably — and your mind still refuses to leave survival mode? When Survival Turns Into Stability A few months ago, I moved out of home. My rent more than doubled, and my expenses went up in every direction. My savings dropped drastically, and suddenly, I was doing the math for every small expens...

Everyone says they want the truth — until it disagrees with them. Then suddenly it’s fake news, bad energy, or “a hater.” We love truth the way we love kale smoothies: in theory. It looks noble from a distance, but up close, it tastes like discomfort. The truth is elusive because it knows where to hide. It’s been studying us for centuries. It knows we get defensive, that we protect our pride like property, that we prefer a comforting lie to an inconvenient fact. So it hides in plain sight — right behind the thing we don’t want to hear. We live in an age where opinions travel faster than facts, where outrage is a national hobby, and where every WhatsApp group has at least one self-declared expert. The internet was supposed to make us wiser, but it just made our arguments louder. You can Google anything now — except humility. Truth has learned to adapt. It used to live in libraries and classrooms, but now it’s forced to rent space between conspiracy theories and motivational reels. It...

  There’s a line I came across that I haven’t been able to forget: " In some ways, wealth simply means paying attention to the prices you pay." It sounds simple, almost obvious. But when you really think about it — it’s quietly revolutionary. Because we Kenyans, like much of the world, are always paying. We pay in shillings, in time, in stress, in sleep, in borrowed peace. And most times, we do it without noticing. The tragedy isn’t that life is expensive — it’s that we don’t realize what it’s truly costing us. The Hidden Prices We Pay We live in a world that constantly tells us what we should want. The right phone. The right shoes. The right wedding. The right image of success. We nod along, swipe the card, take the loan, and promise ourselves we’ll figure it out later. Because everyone else seems to be doing the same. But everything has a price. That phone upgrade may cost you your emergency fund. That flashy lifestyle may cost you your peace of mind. That “soft ...

Inspired by Martin Niemöller’s haunting poem “First They Came…” , this article explores how silence and apathy shape Kenyan society — and why empathy and moral courage matter more than ever. The Poem That Still Speaks There’s a haunting poem that has echoed through decades, written by a German pastor named Martin Niemöller after World War II. It’s a poem about silence — about how people stand by as others suffer, believing that what happens to someone else doesn’t concern them. "First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—Because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—Because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me." Niemöller’s words were born in a dark time, but they still ring true — even here, even now. Because in many ways, we Kenyans have mastered the art of looking away . ...