TopicTangle by Jack

This year, choose yourself first.......  The world will adjust. It sounds selfish at first. That’s usually the accusation. We’ve been trained to flinch at the idea, to soften it, to explain it away before anyone misunderstands us. Because many of us were never taught how to choose ourselves critically. We were taught how to be available, agreeable, dependable. How to carry weight quietly. How to be patient, understanding, hardworking, even when it costs us peace, time, money, or direction. So when someone says “choose yourself,” it feels disruptive. Almost irresponsible. But choosing yourself does not mean you wake up one day and abandon people. It means you finally stop abandoning yourself. In 2026, choosing yourself is less about bold declarations and more about quiet decisions. It looks ordinary from the outside, but it changes everything on the inside. It looks like saying no without writing an essay to justify it. It looks like outgrowing rooms where your value is o...

There is a quiet shift happening in journalism, and it is one we in Kenya and across Africa cannot afford to ignore. For a long time, our newsrooms have been built around production. File the story. Beat the deadline. Fill the bulletin. Publish again tomorrow. That rhythm has shaped generations of journalists. But the world has changed, and the old logic is beginning to strain. Today, information is everywhere. News breaks on social media before it reaches the newsroom. Artificial intelligence can summarise press statements in seconds. Audiences are overwhelmed, confused, and often exhausted. In this environment, producing more content does not automatically mean serving the public better. This is where the idea that newsrooms should begin to act more like consultancies becomes both useful and uncomfortable. A consultancy listens before it speaks. It studies problems before offering answers. It works closely with people to understand their needs. When applied to journalism, thi...