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One of the biggest problems in life for all is the black mountain of social life. People of all ages, in every stage of their life, all face the same problem, which involves the black mountain of their social life. In the life of many, it causes the most pain–emotional, financial, and/or otherwise.
Here is a small example. Most of us do not understand the difference between friendship and relationship. We often prematurely declare relationship victory at the start of a friendship. Such attitude often leads to a failure in both.
Whatever is going on between a friend of yours and you, that is fine and good. The next question is, “do you want to make it a relationship?” Asked Nickatony Quach during the 21st minute in the video Relation vs. Relationship, which is Episode 5 in Season 8 of the YouTube series NDBaker93.
“If you want to make it a relationship,” said Nickatony, [the next step is to] “add a new relation.”
“Exactly,” agreed Nickatony.
“So that’s why so many friend groups fall apart after graduation,” concluded Alec.
A few weeks after the above conversation took place, Jairson Ascencao (pictured) independently identified the problem and gave it a name. He did so in this video here, which is the first episode in the YouTube miniseries Coalmont. At the time, Jairson did not realize, and Nickantony did not remember, that Alec had already described what the problem was.
You’re facing a black mountain of social life when you’re unable to keep others in your circle of friends as long as you want. Here are other examples of the same type of problems we all face. Friend groups are fragmented after a while. There are not enough friends. Or there is too much unwanted drama in life. Problems such as these are all referred to as the black mountain of social life.
Both Alec and Jairson were so moved by the identified problem that they later composed the following open letter. It expresses their understanding of the issue.
Dear People of Providence,
We are two friends from the Johnston and Classical High schools. One of us, Alec Mustafayev (born 2002) is wrapping up his senior year, while the other, Jairson Ascencao (born 1999) is still in the experimental stage of his life. We met by chance, but we felt it was no chance to discover that we faced the same challenge in life.
Though we didn’t realize it when we were younger, now we saw that we invested a great deal of time and emotion into the relationships with our schoolmates. Why should we spend so much time in building these relationships when all of a sudden our loved ones could leave? Especially when we love them?
There exists within us all a need for company. We often wish we could have the connections other people appear to possess. But something stands in our way. Something we call the Black Mountain [of Social Life], one of the biggest and darkest problems in life… Have you ever felt that you lacked a group to fall back on in hard times? Maybe that you had no friends at all?
This is an all-too-common dilemma for today’s younger generations. Survey after survey shows that most youth feel completely isolated from others. We personally can’t help but look around and see a world overflowing with loneliness.
Sources & References
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The above content is part of Chapter One in the Guidebook for the Thumos Love Challenge. In the guidebook, each chapter is kept in a separate document in PDF format. The link to the latest version of Chapter One is presented on this page here.
