The Crash That Opened My Eyes Anonymous

In the vast transience of life, with incessant changes occurring in everything ranging from scientific theories to the behavior of friends, truths can be difficult to find, and even more complex to explain. As the world is based largely on perception, it is seemingly impossible to know for certain much beyond what one personally experiences -- a situation that has in turn provided the foundation for much philosophy and religion. What we can know and what we wish to know are seldom the same. However, there are rare moments in life via which we may be exposed to the perceptions of others, and, in even rarer cases, be able to learn from them. In these moments, the stark soul of a being, an essence at any other time indiscernible, is revealed.

For most of my life, I failed to understand this concept, never coming upon a moment that allowed me to truly examine the bond I shared with another. As such, I was hungry to know how others felt around me. Is it possible that I alone felt friendship was more than a relationship based on the mutual benefiting of both parties? Then, seemingly out of nowhere, my moment of enlightenment came. Unfortunately, I also realized that, with the many personas one exhibits, that moment must be full of...