According to the a person's state of well-being can be threatened by major life changes.

first, the romans stayed isolated because they had to defend their own territories from neighboring cities that were harassing them, like the etruscans. second, once the romans managed to defeat their neighbors, and started to expand their territory, they started to build roads and bridges. finally, now that the romans have covered their territory with roads functioning as highways, they could mobilize their legions faster to assemble larger military units in a specific place.

mali had been a state inside of the ghanaian empire. after ghana fell because of invading forces and internal disputes, mali rose to greatness under the leadership of a legendary king named sundiata, the "lion king." the songhai empire, already weakened by internal political struggles, went into decline.