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The Worst Thing About Prolonged Unemployment

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Unemployment is often spoken about in terms of numbers. Politicians and economists debate percentages, job creation figures, and growth projections. Reports highlight labor force participation and unemployment rates as though human lives can be reduced to neat data points. But behind the statistics lies an unspoken truth: unemployment is not just about lacking a paycheck — it’s about slowly unraveling as a person. The worst thing about prolonged unemployment is not simply the financial hardship. It is the slow erosion of dignity, identity, and hope. It’s the way society treats you, the way your own fire dims, and the way you begin to accept a lower version of life as “normal.” It’s the way you’re subtly, sometimes not so subtly, reduced to someone who exists only to serve, not to thrive. This article explores four of the most painful aspects of prolonged unemployment: Being advised as though you are stupid. Losing your spark. Watching the lows become the new normal. Being...
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When Sorry Is not Enough: On Hurt, Responsibility, and the Humility of Love

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The Fragility of Human Contact One of the deepest paradoxes of human existence is how easily we can wound one another, even without intending to. A single word, a gesture, a tone carried in frustration or carelessness can land like a stone on someone else’s heart. What for us may feel like a fleeting moment often leaves in another person a mark that is slow to fade. Human connection is fragile, not because we are weak, but because we are open—our lives are lived in relation, and to be in relation is to risk being touched, shaped, and sometimes hurt by others. It is within this reality that one of the most humbling truths emerges: if someone tells you that you hurt them, you do not get to decide that you didn’t. You do not get to write the story of their wound from the comfort of your perspective. You cannot measure their pain against your intention and declare them wrong. Love, humility, and humanity demand something harder: the capacity to listen, to accept, and to change. This is no...
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How Technology and Pressure are Stealing Youth’s Innocence

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Childhood has long been imagined as a sacred stage of life: a period of wonder, play, exploration, and innocence, relatively shielded from the demands of adulthood. But in today’s world, this vision feels increasingly fragile, if not entirely illusory. From toddlers swiping tablets to teens trapped in cycles of academic competition and social media performance, the boundaries that once protected children’s innocence are eroding. Technology, economic pressures, cultural shifts, and parental anxieties are all colliding to collapse the very idea of “childhood” as distinct and sheltered. What emerges instead is a generation of young people thrust prematurely into adult concerns — a vanishing childhood shaped by forces far larger than themselves. The Digital Tether: Growing Up Online In earlier generations, play meant running outdoors, inventing imaginary games, or reading stories. Today, childhood is mediated through screens. For many children, the first toy is not a stuffed animal but a s...
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Compassion Fatigue in a World on Fire

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  A World Too Heavy to Hold The 21st century has given us unparalleled access to the lives of others. With a single swipe, we witness a war in one country, a flood in another, a school shooting somewhere else, and a viral story of injustice closer to home. The connective power of digital media means we are never without knowledge of the world’s suffering. And while awareness has long been hailed as the first step toward justice, it is also proving to be an unbearable burden. Increasingly, people are reporting a profound weariness when faced with the endless stream of crises. Psychologists call this compassion fatigue : the emotional numbing, cynicism, or withdrawal that comes from overexposure to others’ pain. Once associated mostly with caregivers, aid workers, or medical professionals, compassion fatigue has spilled into everyday life. In an age of constant global emergencies, ordinary people are now reaching emotional burnout. Here, I explore how compassion fatigue emerges, w...
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The Illusion of Choice: How Consumer Culture Shapes What We Desire

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  The Myth of Freedom in the Marketplace Modern life is saturated with choice. From the moment we wake up, we navigate a sea of options: which brand of coffee to brew, which outfit to wear, which streaming service to watch, which app to scroll. Supermarkets dazzle with thirty kinds of cereal; online stores boast millions of products; dating apps promise infinite matches with the flick of a finger. On the surface, this abundance of options represents freedom — the hallmark of modern consumer culture. But look closer, and cracks appear in the story. Many of the “choices” available are superficial variations of the same product. Most platforms that claim to empower users are engineered to guide attention toward particular outcomes. Even our desires — what we think of as deeply personal preferences — are shaped, nudged, and in many cases manufactured by advertising, algorithms, and a culture that equates consumption with identity. The central paradox of consumer culture is this: the...
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The Tyranny of Productivity: Why Rest Feels Like a Crime in Modern Life

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The Cult of Constant Doing In today’s world, rest is no longer simply a natural human need — it has become almost scandalous, a guilty pleasure that must be justified, monetized, or explained away. The modern economy runs on an unspoken but deeply entrenched belief: that productivity is the highest measure of human worth. From corporate boardrooms to university lecture halls, from social media influencers to gig workers, the message reverberates across societies — if you are not producing, you are not valuable. This obsession with constant efficiency has reshaped the very fabric of daily life. Sleep is sacrificed, vacations are shortened or skipped entirely, and leisure time is often rebranded as “self-improvement.” We track our steps, our emails, our calories, our hours, and our side hustles — until even the moments meant for rest are swallowed by the logic of performance. Yet the consequences are becoming impossible to ignore. Burnout, anxiety, depression, and physical exhaustion hav...
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Tribute to My Grandfather

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  Today I say goodbye to my Grandfather, and while my heart is heavy, I am deeply thankful for the life he lived and the love he shared with all of us. To me, Grandpa was more —he was a teacher, a storyteller, and a constant reminder of what it means to live a life anchored in family, hard work, and faith. I remember the times we would sit together as he shared stories of his youth—how he left Nyeri as a young man, the struggles he faced while working for white settlers, and the lessons he carried from every season of life. His stories were never just entertainment; they carried wisdom, courage, and humor in equal measure. What I admired most about Grandpa was his quiet strength. He had faced many trials in life, yet he never allowed bitterness to take root. Instead, he chose peace, unity, and love. He showed me the importance of never wasting energy on trivial issues, of keeping family first, and of working consistently for the people you love. I will always remember the way he...
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