"When fortune turns against you, even jelly breaks your teeth".
-Iranian Proverb
Essentially, this proverb states that when cruel events surround you, you are demoralized and when you are demoralized you are more likely to have cruel events happen to you, because you can not see a point to defending yourself. Most people feel this when they fail or feel humiliated, when you fail the natural reaction is to avoid what you failed at so it doesn't happen again, but many times we can't avoid something entirely, so we are forced to fail again and again. When a Hikikomori individual gives up on being a part of the "outside world", he becomes more and more distant from it, meaning he has less reason to return to it. I face this adversity when I make bad grades, it becomes less important for me to make good ones after I've made many bad ones.
"Isolation is the sum total of wretchedness to a man".
-Thomas Carlyle
Carlyle provokes that we are at our weakest and most desperate when we are alone, and that loneliness leads to desperation. The most "wretched" men are often those who worked alone. Those who are calculative and manipulative of people, not compassionate or helpful. Prisoners who are a danger to those around them are put into solitude as both punishment and protection. When I am home alone for even just a day, I often become slightly paranoid, projecting worst case scenarios in my head or idly wandering the house looking for something to keep my mind busy. Being in a situation where I see no one for years is almost incomprehensible to imagine. Paranoia of the outside world is logical if you decided you wanted to be alone for so long. Thus, Hikikomori could easily be damaging their mind further every day they don't inhabit the outside world.
