Purpose

This evening I had a Mia Thermopolis moment. Let me explain.  Mia, for non-diehards of the Princess Diaries series is the princess of Genovia. She wasn't always a princess, she was your typical nerd, dork,whatever you may call her; she had that big poofy hair, thick framed glasses and named her Mustang, 'The Stang'. As you would expect she wasn't the most popular girl in high school, so much so, once while siting down to have her lunch, somebody sat on her. So besides being a dweeb she also was, invisible. So invisible in fact, she told her best friend Lilly, "Somebody sat on me again," this incident was borderline, a norm. I wouldn't describe myself as a nerd, dork or dweeb, neither would Mia,but tonight when waiting for my bus, the air humid and wet, I could feel the 4c hair on my scalp awaken  its inner frizz which only spells trouble come tomorrow mornng. Life isn't an all the way bust but it's getting there. Three very giddy folks decided to have a whole conversation not beside me, not behind but smack dab in front of me, complete with shrill laughter I am convinced that I might as well be her 2K18 update. Whatever happened to social cues? If that's too much to ask for, maybe let's scale down to good manners. Everyone has those right? However with each passing day I can't help but reel in the presence of my self awareness which has been on a recent come up. To get myself out of that uncomfortable situation I simply took a step to the side, and wham! no longer a problem .

On the real though, let's talk about purpose. I never can help but feel just a tad bit jealous of people who have it figured out. People who have sieved their wants from their don't wants and are tirelessly working towards their wants no matter the cost. See, today I had to troop my little self to school to follow up on some not so fun stuff. I met with a friend who was in the same shoes, probably even larger, but that is besides the point.

Now this individual is confident. So yeah, we all want to graduate and get out of this so-called world class institution, who doesn't?  But she couldn't be stressed over the elephant in the room, Kenya School of Law. Her resolve? She isn't going, its something she thinks she will do much later in her life.

At this point, you are probably thinking, so what? Well, hers is a resolve of purpose. She said she prayed to God for purpose and sure enough she can't help but sit firm and upright on her decision. Besides purpose she's married the drive that comes with that , throwing herself in to her newly found passion.

I can't help but wonder, at what point is God, at least in my life, going to bless me with a crystal clear sense of purpose? Has he already and now we are both posted up just waiting for me to take the plunge? Is there a period that I should have been praying for purpose, so that it struck just at the right time? When was this time? Shouldn't there have been some sorta grace period between the grand revelation that I simply don't enjoy this field and the  resolve? 

All this mental back forth just to amplify that I am still going to be that predictable human who will take the path that offers the widest safety net.

Thanks for listening!

Second thoughts

In true human narcissistic fashion I went through my own blog and wouldn't you know it, last year I had a whopping 38 blog posts go up. Ironically, that may have been when  I was at my busiest. I had assignments coming at me left, right and centre most, if not all  of them being group assignments which are always "double the fun",work, exams, sit-in tests. Life was a continuous ball of stress yet somehow I refused to go down without a fight. By somehow, I mean there were a bunch of unprecedented school breaks, code for, lecturers' strikes which had me sitting around with a lot of free time in my hands.

Fast forward to 2018, we sure are nowhere close to 38 posts, I don't even think we are in the double digits. Explanation? I had this grand post-fourth year plan; I would be writing every day, delve into the world of Youtube with a couple of hair related videos, possibly booktube, embark on a couple of crafts sewing, knitting,embroidery the whole nine yards. Now that I think about it, the free time that I had as a first year in university and the free time I have as a possible university graduate, though still ideally free time, could not be more different. For one, I now have a job and there just isn't as much leeway as I had once imagined. The long and short of it, I haven't been quite the spot I imagined I would be, possibly because I didn't factor in my new normal, plain and simple I am a self confessed lazy bone and for a scalding hot minute, nearly all my devotionals have had the verse,"Be still and know that I am God" which is, I don't know, God trying to get me to pump the breaks on my plans and have a little sit down with Him. It is getting a little hard to discern which voice is which, am I holding myself back  and masking it in all manner of excuses? Is there a greater purpose to this lull?

For now, I do know that for sure that this period of nothingness, dare I call it idleness is making me question a whole lot especially around the great career debacle.

It is safe to say that for a long time the legal world, at least to me lost its pizzazz, in fact I can hardly remember the last time that it had that je ne sais quoi, that thing that would make all the all-nighters, all the frustrating group assignments, all the hot afternoon lectures worth it. I started going through the motions sooner than I intended, as hard as it is to admit maybe this law degree was not written in the stars for me.

A great source of my drive was my grades, if they were good, I knew that even the Chief Justice had nothing on me, I was a power house. If they were bad and trust me, I have seen a fair share of bad grades I thought of throwing out the  whole damn degree, all of it. Mostly though, they have been mediocre, on the real, who aims for mediocrity in the first instance? On the flip side there are units that for sure, I knew I would come out on the other side with either a very strong E or by the mercies and graces of the Lord a D but have come out unscathed with a C. Worse still, I have been reduced to praying for Ds because just the thought of failing a single unit and having to restart from square one with course facilitators who are far from fine and dandy, is enough to have me laying prostrate on the ground begging for academic mercies.

So my passion is at an all time low, my grades are barely hanging in there, by my standards at least, the only legal experience I have is a two month compulsory stint at the law courts, could things be looking any worse? The answer is, well, yes.  If all goes according to plan and the first Friday of December sees me donning a cap and gown, then the obvious course of action is Kenya School of Law of course I am jumping the gun here. I first have to have all my results, then apply to Kenya School of Law, get accepted, then on February 4th it all begins again.

The reality is, my world is not going to shatter into a million little pieces if everything doesn't  go according to plan, don't  get me wrong now, graduation 2018 just has to happen and if everything else falls into plan ... I'll be a happy camper. However, everything else outside of my field of study couldn't be glistening any brighter and chile, 2018 is the year of shooting your shot, not only in the DMs but also on the career front. I am sending my resume to positions that spike my interest in Naija Twitter spirit,"Whatever e hit, e hit" though I have gotten nothing but auto-response emails, there's something liberating about non conformity, veering off the tarmac and roughing it. Of course there can only be one happy ending here anything outside of the positive will be heartbreak.

Only the course of time will tell,

Thanks for listening!

'What is your relationship with money?'

asked Fran, one third of The Friendzone trio.

Sometimes you are living a perfectly normal life, going about your daily grind, feeling alright maybe even good, for the most part and then its mid week,the Friendzone podcast latest episode goes up and that wellness section often has you questioning if you are in fact living life right.

Side bar, The Friendzone goes down in my books as one of the best podcasts on my radar. When I first started listening to it, it was out of the excitement of having an Apple device which as consumerist as it sounds was a 'life long ' dream of mine. 'Life long' because we all know Apple products haven't been around a lifetime and the prestige associated with the Apple brand only cropped up with the dawn of these fangled things, apps; Instagram, Snapchat, Musical.ly (for the children) and the reality on the ground these only became 'it' things in the second decade of the 2000s. I guess its safe to say that, life long would be pushing it.

While we are on the topic of podcasts that are on my radar, while maintaining that The Friendzone holds down the number one spot, to flush out earworms and get you on some wholesome vibes; Jesus and Jollof is hilarious, Dax Shepherd Armchair Expert is a good listen, Oprah Super Soul Sundays? Come on, you see the name Oprah, you give it a try, Where Should We Begin? is straight up juicy. Of course there are a tonne of other podcast that are out there, whole genres in fact on crime and life behind bars for instance , that, at least for me, have since shone a whole new perspective on a bunch of things over the past year.

On one of their past episodes, in Fran's wellness section, she posed a question to the listeners and of course Dustin and Assante. What is your relationship with money? It was either that or how do you view money or what is your view on money maybe even your attitude towards money. Dustin and Assante pretty much had the same answer, they view it as a means of getting by, no more, no less. They don't glorify it, they don't associate with problems, its just a means that allows them to meet their wants and needs. Interestingly, I said, of course I wasn't on the show, but if I could I would prefer not to think about it, its a rather uncomfortable topic for me especially when we have to label it with hardcore, rigid numbers.

If you think about it, money is all about labels, quite literally price tags with numbers that I often think I can't afford, it  tends to define a person and their choice of life be it the type of education they have, the clothes you wear, the car you drive, where you live, no matter what you look at, more often than not, you will find money playing the background. I look at it as a restriction, the more you have the better placed you are. Of course, the less you have...

What is the point of all this wittering on and on about a cringe worthy topic? Turns out, women, are more likely to have a skewed outlook on money than men. Quite frankly, that isn't surprising after taking Gender and the Law this past semester. Looking at it from a gender and labor perspective relating it to the world today, which is a far cry from yesteryears, women and men's pay are not equal, women in most developing nations are often the bread winners and even where households have more than a single income, women, are often the ones tasked with stretching a coin as far as it can go.

Maybe then, women do have a right to have a bit of an attitude problem towards money. Fran, however, is on to something, changing your whole perspective on your outlook towards money could be a game changer. So I guess for me the first step would be separating self worth from  money, after all is said and done it is first and foremost a means to an end not vice versa, there's so much more in between, dare I say more worth my while than thinking about that pesky constant, money. Once it plays its role, that's as far as my financial thought process will go. Creating all the theatrics around it,only does more harm than good to my mental health, and who in the hell wants a musty brain? I sure don't.

Have a good one!

Let's Talk

This past Friday I was feeling rather down on myself. I hate to start this post on a Debbie Downer but I need an outlet and this is it. I think reality just hit me like it never has before. It got me thinking, when I was eighteen if someone would have told me that within five years a lot of drastic changes would happen; my mom retiring, my dad following suit soon after, my sister getting married, logically, I guess I would have believed them. I mean technically speaking, the only way is up, progress if you will;  you work then you retire, you go to school, graduate then if all goes according to plan, first comes love, then comes marriage...you know the drill.

What I don't understand is why inner me is acting sidelined by all this. There was no blind spot,  no sharp left turn yet here I am feeling all, well, unprepared. I feel entitled to be figuring out the unchartered path of my twenties but my current and future responsibilities just, will not let me be great.

See, the way I am looking at it is once my sister gets married, life changes significantly for the both of us. She will have her share of responsibilities and so will I. Once shared house bills, in my case will fall solely on my shoulders. Given, the refuse and trash collection, security and water bill all come down to 1300/-, not too bad if you are holding down a stead hustle with a steady income. Kenya, though is the land of the unexpected, I know this year for instance one of those bills went up by one hundred shillings. I get the whole inflation argument, however the gag is late last year there was a ban on plastic bags, now some refuse collection companies may be providing bin liners as part of the package deal, while others are operating  under the assumption that provided the liners are not biodegradable, its bye-bye bin liners and hello creativity of the consumer on how they will line their bin. Pray tell then why the bill should go up by a hundred shillings. Yes, this purely could be a rant stemming from bitterness that gives bile a run for its money, from a person who pays a bill that is under a thousand shillings, an expense no matter what angle you look at it from but I am not exactly getting ,'a world class service in return' .

Do not get me started on the water bill. I see Nairobi Water personnel faithfully coming to read the metre, I see them cornered by residents in my neighbourhood, my mom included asking why they even bother with the monthly rounds yet only provide a few hundred litres of water tops to a neighbourhood with a few hundred homes. And that isn't even the half of it, because we are human, with basic human needs, need I mention food, water and shelter nearly everyone has been forced to dig even deeper into their already empty pockets, I am speaking for myself here, and outsource a water supply. Water companies are making an absolute killing in some parts of Nairobi all at the expense of desperate taxpayers.

There used to be talk of feeling the pinch and darned it, I never thought I'd see the day that the pinch would have its way with me.#Adulting.

This year I started it on a high of sorts. Sorts because my festive season was spent with my nose in books, studying for exams, writing research papers and gearing up for a semester which little did I know would be the hardest yet, riddled with strikes, moody lecturers, failed units(yes, that did happen), untaught units, name an academic misfortune and you can count your lucky stars that somebody in a public tertiary institution was on the receiving end. I did look forward to the fact that it would all be over soon, all of it, school come mid-June and work in December.

I refuse to let go of this plan, rather, refused to let go. I was literally holding on to the work plan by a split hair strand. When things got tough at work at least in the first quarter of the year, my happy place would be just the thought of December and pressing send on that resignation letter. This plan was leak proof, probably even air tight, I had even slotted in a month's worth of rest before I joined KSL. Man, I was dreaming big, this may have been my idea of a perfect world.

The more familiar I get with the year, the more vivid the realities of finances become. Now that I think about it, I've been tooting my horn a little bit too much and a little bit too loud about how financially,  I got this. I've got a bit stashed here, a bit stashed there enough to tide me through the 18 month process of becoming an Advocate of the High Court. I may be dead wrong.  January me didn't take into account that a lot of variables would change absolutely everything. Present me on the other hand is almost certain that a rush decision is definitely going to have me singing a different financial tune.

Now, my mind is bouncing of the walls thinking of a future that with the wrong move may have in a bit of a pickle. Since venting out these frustrations, I don't think the problem is the money, the responsibilities or the new normal that will be my everyday routine if everything goes according to plan, I think it's the anxiety leading up to these things.

There are a couple of solutions; wait it out, see how things pun out, after all I've got an okay thing going for me. The only problem with this solution is that I have just about had enough of myself not looking forward to clocking in, feeling like I am shortchanging myself and sometimes even overlooked. The next best thing then clearly would be, buckling down and besides doing the bare minimum of bookmarking jobs that tickle my fancy, go the whole nine yards and send out applications. Pretty taxing I'll admit and I can think of a whole load of cons to this solution but I don't want to be one to shoot down an idea even before its taken flight considering the circumstances.

Its not all black and white, and I doubt if it ever will be. Unfortunately, I can't say that I feel even a little bit lighter but I do know that the problem is anxiety, the only thing I can do, deal with what can be dealt with now and as for the future we will figure it out when we get there.

P.S The Notebook quotes are still coming , until then

Have a good one!

  

Book Review: The Notebook

I thought that I would be on a roll since I am in this uncertain in between of not having any academic tie-downs, I thought that the blog posts would be dropping on the daily, well, I thought wrong. I am not sure what it is, but its been just over a month since I wrote  my last exam, of course, it didn't hit me until I walked through the gates of my neighbourhood that the reality of what seemed to be a far-fetched wrap was here. Now a little older, a  little wiser, I didn't expect anyone to make a national day out of it neither did I expect a firework charade or something of that calibre, however its only dawned on me that making a time, occasion or celebration out of it would have been instrumental in marking a smooth transition into all this free time I have.

Enough about me and my over-the -top thoughts  we haven't had a book review on this space for eons. Excited though unprepared, but excited, lets?

Nicholas Sparks has his works strewn all over Nairobi, at least by the outdoor book vendors. Last Friday this couldn't have been more apparent. I got to town insanely early, too early for my shift at least and I was determined to kill as much time as time would allow for. Even after running errands that I thought undoubtedly would keep me busy as can be and ordinarily would have taken long, wouldn't you know it, the one time I did have the time to wait in line, the service on  the other end of the line was on a record breaking high, efficient as can be. I was still determined to clock in at my prescribed time, any earlier? Uh, I think not. What better way to waste time than reading blurbs of books with no intention of making a purchase. I made my way to my little oasis, 'Lit. Street' as I like to call it, not really, but it does have a cool ring to  it and as lack would have it(it was also the end of the month) there was a sale and a good one at that, 50% off. I managed to score A Raisin in The Sun, some book about Chinese women and radio interviews during the height of Communist China (the title escapes me for now so we are just going to have to bare with that spectacularly vague description)  and The Notebook which though not on sale I just had to have.

It is coming across that I am a die hard Nicholas Sparks superfan when in reality I find him rather cheesy. But, answer me this would you ignore the guy that tinsel town seems to be head over hills in love with, writer of Dear John, The Last Song and of course The Notebook all cult classics in their own respect? Thought so.

I had watched The Notebook a handful of times at the on set of my teenage years, I hardly remember it although I like to think that I have alternate recollections of it. With such a 'solid' foundation I was only reading it for formality purposes, or so I thought.


The book begins in the sunset years of one elderly man who has since transitioned into a senior citizens home. Despite knowing that it is only a matter of time before he and life can part ways he finds purpose in poetry not as a poet himself but as a reader of poems of poets of the yesteryears. His true purpose however lies in reading a story found in a notebook that is heavily centered around a 1940s summer love,the lives of these lovers after and a love never lost to his love, everyday as long as he can help it.

Right out the gate, besides being quite the page turner, picked up on Monday finished on Wednesday, my eyes welled up quite a bit so yes it was a beautiful read. However, it was a rather fictitious read, a bit, too good to be true. In the book the only gaps in their love were the rich girl-poor boy conundrum, unfortunately I was looking for an argument, some discord here and there, it was all just a little bit too fine and dandy for me, not too sure what that says about me as a person, should I lay off The ShadeRoom for a minute since I am always scouting for tea? But that is beside the point.

Yes, I realize that the years spent apart were meant to be the, go figure, gap in the relationship and there is a lot that changes within those years; deaths, new love and lust, forgotten passions.

I might as well throw it in there that my teenage self was all the way giddy because  I knew that once the rain would come the sex scene would come with it or as Nicholas Sparks would say, make passionate love. It is a good three maybe three and a half pages long, would I say it hisses steam? Yes.  I have read steamier, we probably all have, but something out of the 1940's and 1950's I mean a millenial description today would probably be scandalous then.

If you ever have an uneventful couple of days ahead of you like a long weekend or that period between Christmas and New Years where you really don't know what to do with yourself, you thought it was a bit too early to be talking about Christmas yet we are on the eighth month of 2018 huh? This I would a 100% per cent recommend to curl up to and just entirely lose yourself in especially in the Kenyan winter that was/is, you and I both don't know what the Mother Nature has up her sleeve for the Nairobi weather.

Since I enjoyed this book as much as I did you can bet that a couple of quotes are soon to follow,

Have a good one!

What's next?

I seriously thought that I would  be writing everyday post senior year but as per usual, whose rolling on the floor laughing? The universe at yet another well played situation. On the real though, just like about every creator that's on my radar I am feeling uninspired. There was this grand scheme of things post academia where I was going to write about this and about that and the thought of anything not related even remotely to books had me, now in retrospect, unreasonably excited,

The intention was that the first week I would get in touch with my zen side, just ride the wave of non-commitment and just vibe as the kids say nowadays. All the while knowing that I had an assignment due, a paper to write and get little old me back on the job hunting scene. Here we are on week three,with two out of those three things done which by all means is commendable but hold your applause just a minute longer.I am going to ask you to put your detective hats on and on closer inspection you will see that I am getting in to  the habit of half assing more than I should.That assignment, was done in a  literal last minute rush, the paper? Sent out yesterday, late by a week and say two days and the job hunt? I may have stuck my toe into the vast pool of job applications, felt the temperature, flicked some water into the air which  is code for, all I have so far done is bookmarked jobs that may be right up my ally but as for sitting behind a desk and giving the old keyboard a whack with tweaks done here and there to my resumeI have not even  come remotely close.

Sick to the bone of all the time I continue to waste, I can't help but ask why? Four years ago, I would have been up probably by 8 a.m, on my workout routine and chores by 9 am and scouring the internet for job openings all while on my much anticipated academic break .Given,  at the time I was barely in my twenties, unemployed with time from here to Timbuktu to do all these things and them some. Also, I had a pretty solid unwavering future ahead of me; finish my degree program and add a feather or two of co-curricular programs to one of my many hats and if there was a possibility to rake in a few shillings while at it slap me silly and call me Sally,  in the words of Cardi B,where's my pen, &*%$^ I'm signing.

Now, I live in a world where I let myself be distracted. I am failing to distinguish between what I want because its what I see and what I actually want. I am also constantly on a comparison spree, feeling entitled to things, situations, experiences that I never even had the slightest desire for or straight up passed up the opportunity.

I have also grown; in age, just about settled in my twenties, I may just have a degree (you never know until you wear that cap and gown and have the said degree in your hands, especially with UoN) and in my ambitions and aspirations. The hard truth is, working behind a desk as a front office assistant, while being the potential holder of a law degree is not the end game. It could be pride speaking here, it could also be logic, heck, it could just be me allowing myself to dream beyond the confines of the front desk I have faithfully held fort over for the past three years, one thing is for certain just because it started here doesn't means it ends here.  Might I add that my Dad did not spend a few hundred thousand shillings on four years worth of tuition neither did I put a whole lot of hard work and effort for four plus years... you get the drift, the whole front desk thing? Reason and a season.

 Now, let's talk the future. This sounds like a conversation in a relationship that wouldn't exactly fit the description of music to my ears but just like the hypothetical relationship I need to come to terms with what my future holds.

The elephant in the room is if the plan is to have a useful law degree, Kenya School of Law has to be in the picture whether I like it or not. From the look of things KSL isn't exactly a breeze. Here is where the rubber meets the road; having seen my fair share of academic despair which I can't help but owe it all to my negligible balance between school and work, I question whether:

it would be worth it to look for another job knowing the path before me wouldn't exactly be described as a walk in the park,

stay in my current position purely for monetary purposes even though I hear the voice telling, well, yelling, it's time to leave,

or throw in the towel altogether and hope that all the coins gathered over the past few years can sustain me over the year and six months of KSL which also means letting go of all the finer things I have gotten so accustomed to; all the impulse Mr Price buys, thrifting, junk food just the thought gives me a case of the shivers.

There's also the whole question of logistics and commuting. If I stay, school and work will no longer be a stone's throw away from each other, schedules which will undoubtedly conflict and most importantly stress levels will soar to never before seen heights.

And if that isn't enough on my plate, both my parents are retired, in fact we are a month in to this new lifestyle which really isn't any different from their former working girl, working boy situation but the chances of that changing, possibly slowing down are looking up, which is a downer for me. Tuition is not the problem, thankfully, but what about my infamous, 'lifestyle'.

Then there's this whole new job thing; so say I do follow through with this thing, and send out my application here, there and everywhere, as the process goes I get a response, well in the spirit of optimism a load of responses, what happens when I'm seated there, suited up, fingers interlocked pulling all the stops when they ask where do you see yourself in the next five years? Where do I explain the part that I may not be able to give my 100% because of this little old thing called KSL  and worse a year after that roller coaster I kinda sorta have to give my undivided attention to being a pupil at a law firm so this position will have to be second to second fiddle.

There's the option of telling alternative truths but this is not adventure time where over a series of episodes we see how things will pun out. This is someone's payroll I would be messing with. It all just seems like a very predictable script with a not so unpredictable end.

All signs are flashing that sending out applications would be a waste of my time and most importantly a waste of time for the person on the receiving end, but why do I still feel so inclined to do it?

My maker also seems to be of a different school of thought. See, I have been doing a devotional centred around ambition and your work where a lot of focus has been put on  careers and how selfish we are not supposed to be in them, back on my Bible In A Year Plan this week its all remembering God before my plans and not vice versa and wouldn't you know it that this week's sermon on Transformation Church had a little segment on following through with your plans that often are not God ordained and how the repercussions often involve having to stick through with these, bluntly put, selfish decisions. I for one have had, I'm having and if I continue on the track I'm on will have to be on a downward trajectory and there's a high chance that this job search thing will be highly instrumental in my regression.

Yes,this post is a whole lot of gibberish but those are the unfiltered thoughts that have been sprinting through my head over the past few days. Hang tight for the next post which will hopefully have a bit of structure to it and if it doesn't allow me to use this as an outlet. Cool?

Have a good one!

 






 

Dear Nairobi Girl

I've gotta say there is nothing as intimidating as a blank canvas. All I can say  is playtime is over. The past one week, I have been reveling in my newly found, 'free time'. My morning routine consisted of drifting in and out of sleep simply because I could and who can forget, the fact that  I don't exactly have any academic commitments.It's unreal, so unreal in fact that in the past seven days I have watched maybe five movies; Jason's Lyric, Beyond the Lights, The Incredible Jessica James, Step and Juice. I have two and three quarters series under my belt; Netflix's Everything Sucks and On My Block and I am currently watching NBC's Rise. I realize this isn't a healthy amount of time to be spending in front of a screen, but that's all it is a realization, will I switch things up, only time will tell...oh, the anticipation.

However, I think its about time I tapped into my creative outlet. The urge has been there to write a piece or two but submitting to a keyboard hasn't come as easy as it used to. I figured I might as well just do it, and write about things that matter to me in the moment which might be trash in a few hours or may reckon with me, maybe even you in the years of yonder.But isn't that what makes life exciting,  the uncertainty?

Last week, there was this post going around on Kenyan social media, let's dub it, The Pressures of Being a Nairobi Girl.

It was...what's the word? Relatable. It made me take a waltz down memory lane of my young, naive, amateur college days. Of course now I can poke fun at that period because of the tremendous growth I've made as a human; from watching a lot of watered down possibly shallow content over the internet and being a conformant to the height of consumerism.

Let's  go back in time, way back, I am talking fresh out of high school,back. That was just when Instagram had started claiming its seat at the social media table. Possibly even before the genesis of TheShadeRoom, before Instagram had an algorithm for posts, Instagram stories? Please those fangled things were  for a certain demographic on a whole other different platform, better understood by the children, Snapchat.

My head was in a whole other different space. It all started with wanting the nicest threads and  bags to top it all of. Going into a post high school program with a dress code, I simply didn't fall into the fashion ideal  I wanted. You would think a dress code would dial down the fashion aspect but no, restrictions to young adults only propels them to unfathomable heights of creatively staying within the boundaries adding a flare of their own in tow.

Of course things only further escalated. My wants were beginning to become unreasonable, at least now that I look back on them; I saw people drive to school for the dreaded 8 a.m classes and I wanted that despite living an hour away from school if I chose to walk and fifteen minutes tops on a good day, code for no traffic. I wanted to look a certain way so that I could be looked at a certain way.

I craved to be perceived a certain way when in reality that perception would have been far from the truth. It took me a few months to get over the fact that if you looked up the-bomb-dot-com, it wouldn't be my face you would see beside it. That and my diploma program was amping up the intensity by the semester, having not even the slightest knack for computer programming, something had to give. Exit stage left craved perceptions, enter the reality that was coursework.

When I started my degree program, it was more or less a case of same script different cast. I wanted to buy lunch not have to carry it, I wanted to  make an impulse buy, don't get me wrong I did, but I wanted the nonchalance that complements it. This time though I was a little bit older, possibly even a bit wiser. I didn't get over it but found my way I round it by scouring the internet high and low for a job. Soon the paper would start rolling in and my hearts desires would have been met. Needless to say, it did not quite work out like that.

Now a long way from the teenage years much has changed. Okay, so yes, I still want to be perceived a certain way, I mean who doesn't? But that's just it.  I have irrational wants just like the next guy and now I list them down, stick 'em against my calendar, what I choose to do after that is up to me. Its normal to want something you cannot have; you can get a sick thrill out of it, an enormous drive and ambition to get it or you can get down on yourself.

Another thing that has come with age is deciphering what I  actually want from wanting simply and purely because others have. It would be nice to look polished 24/7 but with a two hour commute nearly everywhere I'll settle for slobby chic for utility purposes.

It's just as okay for you to be 'just' you as it is  for somebody else to be themselves.Be comfortable in your own skin and aesthiticity or lack thereof. If you are going to change you might as well do it for you because, wouldn't you know it? No one's looking.

To the Nairobi girl who feels the pressure, scrolls their time away, don't I have news for you? Start by putting the phone down,and your blinders on. There's a whole world beyond the four corners of your screen, beyond a fire Instagram post. Block out the noise and just live for you and eventually you will have it figured out.