I learned how to read time, especially on a wall clock, at a pretty early age. I spent most of my childhood with my grandfathers in the village, and he had this not so big but a fancy classic clock on the wall. I found it fascinating. Around the age of six, I would spend hours just staring at it, though I didnât know how to use it. I enjoyed listening to it, tic toc…..tic toc…..
My grandfather noticed my interest in the clock and so one day, as I stood watching it, he stood before me pointing at it and said: âThis is twelve, this is three, this is six, and this is nine. Once you know that, the next thing is to understand the hands: the short one tells you the hour, the long one tells you the minutes, and the longest one keeps moving it tells you the seconds.â At 6 years, I didnât fully understand it, but I was really happy about it. I spent the next few days telling out loud the time. And every time I got it wrong my grandfather could correct me and say no it’s half past seven not seven half. Hahaha đ I was learning. And within a few months I was able to use terms like, “quarter to”, “half past” “few minutes to”, and I didn’t look back anymore.
My interest was practical as well. We had schedules to followâ 7:00a.m to go to the farm, 5:00p.m to the posho mill. Sometimes we would take maize to the millers to make flour for the nightâs maize meal. On some days I would wake up in the morning, check the clock, and figure out how much time we had before getting the goats needed to be out to the field. The clock was always important.
My grandfather was extremely disciplined. He loved being punctual and had specific times for everything: eating, stepping out to church, sitting down for night prayers, and going to bed. Watching his routines fascinated me. Iâve always been curious about people and their habits, and my grandfather provided a perfect example.
On my motherâs side, my other grandfather had a different but equally strict routine. He worked at the Mombasa port after the colonial period, and his life had a very military character. He would iron his clothes sharply, polish his shoes meticulously, and follow a strict schedule for every part of his day. People born before the 1960s often lived like thisâdisciplined, organized, and routine-driven.
Both grandfathers taught me the importance of time. I saw the same precision repeated daily: meals at fixed hours, waking and sleeping at exact times, and strict adherence to routines. Through them, I learned to read a clock and understand time in a way that many adults today still struggle with.
Even now, seeing a wall clock reminds me of my childhood of curiosity, discipline, and the simple lessons my grandfathers taught me. What memories do you have of your grandfather ? How did you learn to read the wall clock especially the 12 hour clock ?
Weâve all grown up inside a system that teaches us certain expectations about life. I like to call it the reward system. Itâs that silent formula society passes down: if you do A, then B will follow. If you study hard and go to school, you will succeed. If you stay disciplined, work hard, or settle down, then happiness and stability will surely come.
On the surface, this system makes sense. After all, effort and discipline often do bring results. Education can open doors, and responsibility can lead to growth. The problem isnât that these values are wrong â the problem is in the guarantee weâre made to believe. Weâre rarely told that life is much more complex, that doing âAâ doesnât always guarantee âB.â
You can spend years in school and still struggle to find opportunities. You can commit to family life and find that the weight of responsibility is heavier than anyone ever warned you about. You can work harder than most people around you and still fall short because circumstances outside your control shift the ground beneath your feet.
This mismatch between expectation and reality is what quietly wounds so many people. When the promised reward doesnât come, we start to think something must be wrong with us. And thatâs how discouragement, shame, and depression take root. Not always because life failed â but because our expectations were built on a fragile foundation.
So maybe what we need is not to throw away effort, school, or responsibility â but to challenge the rigid reward system narrative. Life isnât a transaction where your input guarantees an equal output. Itâs more like a journey, one with detours, delays, and unexpected turns. And those turns donât mean youâve failed. They mean you are living.
We should start telling each other a more honest story: Itâs okay if your life doesnât look like the picture you once imagined. Itâs okay if you havenât arrived at the milestones that others told you would define success. Your timeline doesnât have to look like anyone elseâs. What matters is that you keep moving, keep learning, and keep redefining what success means to you.
Because sometimes, the real reward isnât what society promised â the degree, the job, the family, the âperfect life.â The real reward is resilience. Itâs growth. Itâs discovering who you are becoming in the process of navigating all the unexpected turns.
So donât beat yourself up if âAâ didnât lead to âB.â Life doesnât always work like that. And maybe thatâs not a flaw in you â maybe thatâs just the way life unfolds.
Hunger comes in many forms. Sometimes itâs the ache in your stomach, sometimes itâs the longing in your heart, and sometimes itâs the thirst in your soul for something more than what life has offered you. In those moments of deep emptiness, desperation whispers, âTake whatever you can, wherever you can find it.â
But even then â no matter how hungry you are â you never take another manâs last bread.
Because that last bread is not just food. It is survival. It is dignity. It is the final piece of hope someone is clinging to. To take it would be to strip them bare, to leave them with nothing, and to silence the little voice that still tells them, âMaybe tomorrow will be better.â
We live in a world that often celebrates taking, where strength is measured by how much you can accumulate. Yet true character is shown not in what you can grab, but in what you can resist. Restraint is not weakness â it is wisdom. It is recognizing that your hunger should never cost someone else their lifeline.
And hereâs the paradox: when you choose not to take another manâs last bread, life finds a way of placing bread in your own hands. Sometimes not immediately, sometimes not in the way you expect, but always in a way that proves kindness and integrity are never wasted.
There is a bread that is yours. It may not look like anyone elseâs, but it will come at the right time, in the right way. Until then, let your hunger teach you patience, compassion, and the kind of strength that does not destroy but protects.
Because real abundance is not found in taking â it is found in trusting, in giving, and in knowing that what is meant for you will never require you to take away the very last hope of another soul.
Weâre often told that the best thing you can do in life is win.
Win the race. Win the role. Win the crowd. Win at all costs.
And for a while, that sounds right. Achievement is addictive. It gives you something to show, something to prove, something to hold up like a badge.
But hereâs the question nobody asks: What happens when you winâand still feel empty?
Because it happens. A lot.
The truth is, winning isnât always the peak. Sometimes itâs just a chapter. Sometimes, itâs even a distraction from the deeper things weâre meant to experience.
The best you can do in this life? Itâs to live well. Fully. Honestly. Meaningfully.
To become someone youâre proud of in quiet moments. To learn from loss, not fear it. To let growth speak louder than ego. To build a life that makes sense when the spotlight is off.
We forget that not every race is ours to win. Some are here to teach us. Some to stretch us. Some to strip us down and rebuild us into someone more aware, more human.
Itâs okay to want to win. But if thatâs all you want, you might miss what really matters: The people you become through the process. The integrity you choose when no oneâs looking. The peace that comes from knowing you didnât just play to winâyou played to grow.
So no, winning isnât the best you can do. Living with clarity, courage, and conscience? That just might be.
Everyone has a cycle or a pattern in their life. Once you get to know or realize the patterns that are in your life, it becomes so much easier for you to overcome them.
In some families, people don’t go far in education. Some drop out, or even when someone is just about to graduate, something always happensâthey fall sick, lose funding, get unexpected responsibilitiesâand they never make it. No matter how much effort is put in, education never seems to cross a certain line. It becomes a generational ceiling.
In other families, people donât really succeed in having children. They get married, stay for years, and even when they finally conceive, it ends in stillbirths or repeated miscarriages. Itâs emotionally exhausting and spiritually draining. And often, thereâs no medical explanation that satisfies the soul.
Some families have a consistent pattern of failed marriages. People either get divorced over and over, or just when they are about to get married, the relationship suddenly ends. Youâll hear things like, âI donât know what happened. We were fine until two months before the wedding.â
And in some families, this pattern is evident in children having different fathers. Not to offendâbut that can sometimes be a silent sign of a deeper generational issue: failed unions, sudden deaths of spouses, abandonment, or unhealed soul wounds passed on across generations. As T.D. Jakes once said, âIf you donât deal with your demons, they go down to your children as inheritance.â
One of the worst patterns Iâve personally seen is in families where, after a fixed number of years, someone just dies. I know someone close whose family lost a member every six years. It became a silent calendar of grief. No matter how healthy or successful someone seemed to be, death came knocking right on schedule.
Now, hereâs the truth: ignorance is not an excuse. These are not random events. They are cyclesâspiritual and psychologicalâand they always have a source. In most cases, that source lies deep in the past.
I know you’ve been told, âThe past is behind you. Just forget it.â But the reality is this: the past will affect you if you ignore it. Patternsâespecially the spiritual and generational onesâdonât die with time; they die with intentionality.
Spiritual vs Genetic Patternsđ
Some of these patterns are geneticâtheyâre passed down biologically, through DNA and heredity. For example, if a family has a history of diabetes, high blood pressure, or depression, these traits may be inherited. This is science. But some patterns are not geneticâthey are spiritual. These are the ones that donât show up on any medical test, but they manifest clearly in how people live, what they suffer, and the invisible limits they can’t seem to break. And in many cases, older people in the family know why they exist, even if theyâve chosen silence over solution.
The Butcher Story â Uncovering the Curse
a true story from my village.
There was a family that didnât eat meat at all. And I mean, not even a bite. At first glance, it seemed like a choiceâmaybe they were vegetarians, maybe for health or religion. But if you dig into their history, youâd find that their grandfathers were the most successful butchers in the entire region. They were known. People would walk long distances just to buy meat from their stall at the market.
But one day, during a busy market, a conflict broke out between two relatives over meat. One accused the other of short-changing him in a shared business. Words escalated. Then came threats. Eventually, in a bid to âbring peace,â both families visited a local elder. To settle the dispute, they were told to swear an oathâthat from that day forward, no one in their bloodline would ever eat, sell, or touch meat again. This was done with rituals, witnessed by the community, and sealed by ancestral curses.
Fast forward decades later: generations grew up in that family without ever knowing why they didnât eat meat. It just became âour family doesnât do meat.â No one asked questions. But the consequences didnât stop at food. Their family business collapsed. Other forms of livelihood failed. Some tried to secretly open meat-related businesses but fell ill, lost everything, or suffered unusual misfortunes.
Why? Because the pattern wasnât brokenâit was inherited. Until you confront the root, you cannot change the fruit.
This is why itâs important to ask questions. To dig into your past. To go beyond whatâs normal and investigate whatâs been normalized. Because whatâs normal to your family might be abnormal to destiny.
The Human Design â Spirit First
As a human being, you exist in three parts: the body, the mind, and the soul (spirit). They must work in harmony for you to live fully.
Your body is governed by your mind. In the mind are thoughts. These thoughts give birth to desiresâand those desires originate from the soul. When a desire matures, it sends a signal to the body to take action and fulfill it.
This is why scripture says, âAs a man thinketh in his heart, so is heâ (Proverbs 23:7). Your body does what your soul believes and your mind permits. Thatâs why transformation begins in the mind and healing begins in the spirit.
(Iâll explain this more in the next article.)
You Are a Spirit in a Body
Now let this sink in: Life is spiritual.
You are not a body with a spiritâyou are a spirit living inside a body. You are a walking spirit on a physical journey.
When you are born, by default, you are meant to be a saviour. Every new generation is designed to be a lightâstronger, more awake, more aware. You are not just a continuation; you are a correction. A chance to break what has been broken for too long.
If you’re keen enough, you’ll notice the patterns that exist in your life. And once you notice themâdonât be ignorant. Decide to break them.
Because you can. Because someone must. Because healing starts with awareness, but transformation starts with decisions.
How Do We Break These Patterns?
What patterns or cycles do you think exist in your life?
How have you managed to break existing patterns in your life?
In another life, I didnât leave my country to chase green pastures across distant lands. I stayed homeâ with family, with friendsâ we built something of our own, brick by brick, dream by dream. And it grew. It thrived. We thrived.
In that life, I didnât miss birthdays or weddings, didnât scroll through photos of laughter I wasnât part of. I danced to the tunes of my favorite childhood artists, stood front row at concerts instead of watching clips online. I was there. And I was the happiest ever.
In another life, I didnât count hours just to earn enough to chase the next paycheck. There was no end-of-month exhaustion, no cycle without pause. I traveled the worldâ not alone, but hand in hand with the people I love.
In another life, I followed my dreams like a river meets the ocean. And those dreams bloomedâ not in secret, not in silenceâ but in color, in song, in the light of a beautiful future.
In that life, I didnât have to change my tongue just to be understood. I didnât shrink myself to fit in someone elseâs mold. I didnât question my being, or apologize for my difference.
In that life, certain words didnât exist: exile, sacrifice, distance, longing. They were never needed.
That life was peace. That life was full. That life was mine. And in itâ I was the happiest ever after.
In the streets, they call it “Aura”. In the spiritual realm, it’s called “An Anointing”. Lose itâand you’re done. Because it intertwines with your personality; it becomes part of your presence, your identity, the very essence of how you move through the world. Itâs the invisible signature you leave behind when you walk into a roomâa vibration that speaks louder than your words ever could. Itâs not about shouting for attention; itâs the quiet confidence that commands respect without needing validation. This version of you is built in silence, in the moments when no oneâs watchingâwhen you choose whatâs right over whatâs easy, when you sacrifice temporary pleasures for a deeper purpose.
Your aura is the light that remains after youâve walked through darkness. Your anointing is the oil pressed from your pain, refined through consistency, obedience, and grace. And once itâs activated, people donât just see youâthey feel you. They may not understand what it is, but they know somethingâs different. Not because of how you dress or speak, but because of what you carry. Thatâs why you must protect it. Feed it. Honor it. Because this upgraded version of youâthatâs the you the world has been waiting for.
How do you protect it?
1. Stay aligned with your purpose. Know why you were called, and stick to it. The moment you start drifting into people-pleasing or comparison, you dilute your essence. Purpose anchors your aura.
2. Be consistent in private. Your anointing grows in the darkâwhen no oneâs clapping, watching, or affirming. Guard your private disciplines: pray, meditate, read, reflect. Thatâs your fuel.
3. Watch your circle. Not everyone deserves access to your energy. Some people drain it, others dim it. Surround yourself with those who sharpen your spirit, not those who silently compete with it.
4. Protect your peace. Peace is not weaknessâitâs power. Avoid unnecessary drama, gossip, and chaos. Your aura thrives in stillness and clarity.
5. Obey divine nudges. When your spirit says âdonât go,â or âdonât speak,â listen. Protecting your anointing means honoring divine boundaries, even when your mind doesnât understand them.
6. Stay humble. Anointing without humility leads to downfall. Remember, you carry the oilâbut youâre not the source. Stay grounded.
7. Heal what hurt you. Unhealed wounds leak energy. Protect your aura by facing your pain, forgiving deeply, and letting go of what was never meant to stay.
Protecting your aura is a lifelong practice. It’s not about perfection, but awareness. Because once you know what you carry, you live like someone who’s been trusted with fire.
Iâve been thinking a lot lately about what it really means to be a man. Not the textbook definition, not societyâs expectationsâbut something real. And one thing keeps coming back to me: maybe part of being a man is having fewer apologies and more actions.
We all say things. We all make promises, set goals, give our word. But the real challenge is following throughânot just talking the talk, but walking it, even when itâs inconvenient or uncomfortable.
If you say youâll do itâdo it. If you say youâll show upâbe there. It doesnât always have to be perfect or grand, but showing up consistently is powerful. It speaks louder than any excuse or apology ever could.
And sometimes, itâs the little things that make all the difference.
Like on birthdaysâdonât just send money or a gift. Be there if you can. Your presence will mean more than the most expensive present. Donât just send flowers with a delivery guyâshow up with them yourself. Let them see your face, hear your words, feel the effort. If your kid has a football match or a performance at school, try your best to show up. Even if itâs just for a few minutes. Theyâll remember that more than theyâll ever remember a toy or a snack. If your friend is going through something, donât just say âIâm here for you.â Sometimes just showing up with a coffee, a meal, or even just quiet company says it all. If your partner is drained or anxious, it might not be about fixing anythingâit might just be about sitting with them and being present.
None of us have it all figured out. Life gets busy, and responsibilities pile up. But Iâve learned that making time for the people who matterâreally being thereâgoes a long way. Not just physically, but emotionally and mentally too.
Itâs not about being flawless. Itâs not about being a hero. Itâs about tryingâhonestly and consistently. Itâs about meaning what you say and doing what you can to stand by it. And yeah, weâll mess up sometimes. Weâll get tired. Weâll forget. But when we do, letâs own it. Not hide behind reasons. Just take responsibility and try again.
That, to me, is where the strength lies.
So maybe being a man isnât about being hard or always in control. Maybe itâs about being real. Being present. Being accountable. And above all, being someone the people around you can count onâeven in the small ways.
As a man under 30, itâs essential to set healthy boundaries when it comes to relationships with younger women, especially those who are seven or more years your juniorâaround 22 and under. In my experience, after hearing numerous stories and giving advice on this topic, I’ve come to see the wisdom in caution. While I once believed that love has no age limits, Iâve come to realize that relationships with a significant age gap, particularly when one partner is still in their early twenties, can lead to challenges that are often overlooked.
Think about it: at 22 and below, most young women are either fresh out of high school, in college or just starting college. Theyâre stepping into a phase of self-discovery and newfound independence, which I like to call the “curiosity years.” This is the stage where they’re exploring their identity, values, and boundaries. Theyâre like a bird thatâs just been freed from the nest, eager to see and experience the world. In contrast, as a man in your mid to late twenties, youâre likely at a different stageâyou may be considering settling down, advancing your career, or planning for the future. These differing mindsets can lead to conflicting expectations, making it harder for the relationship to stay balanced.
Itâs also crucial to acknowledge that true character often reveals itself when people gain freedom for the first time. College, internships, or even short courses present new experiences and sometimes challenging situations, all of which help mold someoneâs values and maturity. If she can go through these formative years while upholding her morals and building a solid foundation for herself, itâs possible she could be ready for a serious relationship. But in the beginning, fresh graduates or young adults often prioritize self-exploration over commitment, and they may not have the stability you might be seeking.
Moreover, while you may be focused on establishing a stable relationship, many younger women are just beginning to navigate adult relationships and may not yet understand what they truly want. Theyâre learning, experimenting, and discoveringâoften figuring out through trial and error what type of partner is best for them. During this period, they may be less likely to recognize or appreciate the depth of a mature relationship. Itâs common for someone in this phase to be drawn to new experiences, sometimes at the cost of commitment, which can lead to misunderstandings and unmet expectations.
Another critical factor is the disparity in life experience. As someone further along in age, youâve likely gone through those “curiosity years” already, and you know the value of stability, communication, and self-awareness in a relationship. But for her, these are still areas of growth. Unless she shows signs of maturity, self-awareness, and a genuine willingness to learn, it’s unlikely sheâll have the stability or life experience youâre looking for in a partner.
Ultimately, relationships with age gaps arenât always impossible, but for a man under 30, getting involved with someone significantly younger can often be an uphill journey. If sheâs truly ready and willing to learn, and if you both share compatible goals and values, then perhaps it could work. But more often than not, itâs wise to exercise caution and recognize that while the heart may be drawn to the idea of love without limits, the reality is that maturity and shared values often come with time and experience.
