The 57-Kilometer Lesson: What Raphael Tuju Taught Me About Reinvention and Resilience. [Engage Series]
Some stories quietly enter your life and reshape your thoughts. Others arrive like a guest who refuses to knock — bold, dramatic, filled with life lessons. My encounter with Raphael Tuju’s journey was of the latter kind. Not just because he is the eloquent voice I grew up hearing on the radio and TV, or because he shaped national conversations, but because his story made me reconsider something we often overlook: the daily miracles we call everyday life.
I grew up in a backwater town called Nanyuki in the late
’80s, when Mountex Textile Industries hummed like a giant mechanical heart, and
the skies were filled with both military helicopters and the occasional
scandalous rumor from the barracks. It was a town full of character — and
characters. As a young boy, I only knew AIDS as the “strange disease” that the
grown-ups whispered about. My mother, a nurse, talked about it, but childhood
ears conveniently edit things.
Until the day I found “colorful balloons” in a trash heap
and proudly inflated them, only for my mother to nearly faint at the sight. The
beating that followed turned me into the unofficial anti-garbage ambassador of
Nanyuki. That moment has stayed with me for decades: sometimes life teaches
through pain, and the lesson sticks not because of the pain itself, but because
of the truth hidden within it.
That same lesson resurfaced while listening to Tuju. And
this reflection — this anchoring truth — is the heart of today’s message:
Resilience is not found in
heroic moments. It is built quietly, through habits that honor survival,
gratitude, and intentional reinvention — even when life breaks you into pieces.
Tuju’s story at Engage was dramatic, yes. But its true
power lies in what it teaches us about how humans rebuild and how we can
choose to show up when everything familiar falls apart. Let me outline three
powerful lessons I observed in his journey — lessons deeply connected to habit,
identity, and reinvention.
Lesson 1 — The Habit of Gratitude: Seeing What We Usually
Overlook
When Tuju described feeling completely powerless — relying
on his wife and daughter for basic tasks like feeding, toileting, and turning —
something inside me shifted. Here was a man who once commanded rooms, led
national conversations, and handled crises with precision… now unable to move,
let alone lead.
It reminded me of a truth we often forget:
Your abilities are gifts, not guarantees.
Walking, seeing, talking, sleeping through the night, and
having a body that obeys simple instructions—these are things we believe belong
to us. We rarely stop to imagine life without them—until a story like his makes
us look.
Gratitude, in habit coaching, isn’t about “counting
blessings” like a motivational poster. It’s a discipline—a way of training the
mind to notice what is working instead of obsessing over what is missing. As in
my childhood balloon incident, gratitude is sometimes triggered by a brush with
danger, embarrassment, or pain. But once you learn it, it never leaves you.
For Tuju, the plane crash might have taken his life. The car
accident nearly did. The foreign missionary doctor who had just arrived in
Kenya and was a specialist in trauma care could easily have not been there. He
was told to expect nothing—neither survival, nor healing, nor a future.
Yet he lived, and through living, he reminds us: gratitude
is the foundation of resilience.
Lesson 2 — The Habit of Reinvention: Rising When Life
Resets You Completely
Many people face tragedy and remain trapped in the rubble,
whether emotionally or physically. But what caught my attention about Tuju was
simple: he refused to let catastrophe define the final version of himself.
Remember, this was a man with vertebral injuries and 18
fractures—a man who left the hospital in a wheelchair, which was considered a
success. A man told that walking might no longer be part of his future. Yet he
didn’t just walk again — he walked 57 kilometers.
Let that number sink in. Not 5.7. Not 7. Fifty-seven. How
many kilometers have you walked lately?
And why? Certainly not for bragging rights. Not as a PR
stunt. Not because he had something to prove to skeptics. He did it to honor Kijabe
Mission Hospital, to say thank you not with words but through action — the
very action he nearly lost.
This is where habit psychology intersects beautifully with the
human spirit: When your identity shifts, your habits must shift with it —
otherwise you remain trapped in your old limitations.
The walk was symbolic of something more profound:
- Reinvention
- Ownership
of his healing
- Transformation
- A
refusal to settle for surviving when he could thrive
- Gratitude
turned into action
- Pain
turned into purpose
And yes, the matatu driver responsible for his accident
joined the walk. Indeed, Tuju publicly forgave him, because reinvention isn't
just physical. It includes emotional, spiritual, and relational aspects.
And this leads to the third lesson.
Lesson 3 — The Habit of Servant Leadership: Turning
Personal Pain Into Collective Healing
There is something truly Kenyan about how we handle
hardship. We joke, we laugh, and we carry scars as reminders. But Tuju changed
the story: he turned his accidents into a public service mission — raising 11
million shillings to improve trauma care at Kijabe.
Consider this: he could have quietly moved on, healed
privately, and closed that chapter. But he didn’t.
He chose to give back. When we reflect on trauma, it is not meant to be an
individual’s event but a community crisis. Even historically and traditionally,
some communities that emerge from trauma have handled it collectively.
Community-based interventions, such as those in Rwanda and Sierra Leone, foster
resilience and a collective identity of strength. For us in Kenya, busy
highways, limited trauma capacity, and high accident rates are issues that
affect all of us. Tuju’s walk wasn’t about heroism. It was about
responsibility.
And this is where the habit coaching lesson deepens: Every
pain you overcome becomes a tool to help someone else — if you allow it.
Your survival isn't just for you. Your recovery can motivate
others. Your scars can guide someone else home. That's why reinvention matters.
That's why resilience spreads. Therefore, practicing gratitude daily is
valuable. And this is why Tuju’s story stayed with me long after he stopped
speaking.
Conclusion: What This Means for You
Whether you are rebuilding after loss, health struggles, job
challenges, financial setbacks, or emotional exhaustion, the message is simple:
You can reinvent yourself — not because life is easy, but because the human
spirit is wired for renewal.
You have survived things you thought would break you. You
have endured nights that felt endless.
You have walked through storms you didn’t think you’d outlive. And if you’re
still here, breathing, reading this, feeling something stir inside you — then
you still have chapters left to write.
So let me ask you:
What is your 57-kilometer walk?
What gratitude have you not yet expressed?
What reinvention are you postponing?
Who becomes stronger because you survived?
Call to Action
If this reflection stirred something in you, don’t let it
fade. Start a new habit today — a tiny one — that honors the resilience already
inside you.
Your new chapter begins with one decision. Make it now.
1.
Join my LinkedIn Habit Coaching Newsletter: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/habits-with-coach-edwin-7399067976420966400/
2.
Join my Habit WhatsApp Community at https://whatsapp.com/channel/0029VbAmKkOBvvsWOuBx5g3L
3.
Alternatively, sign up for my 6-month
Personal Transformation Coaching Program by sending me a message on
WhatsApp at +254-724328059.
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