Selected Paragraph (Plato, Republic Book VII, 514a-515c, translated by Benjamin Jowett): "Behold! human beings living in an underground den, which has a mouth open towards the light and reaching all along the den; they have been here from their childhood, and have their legs and necks chained so that they cannot move, and can only see before them, being prevented by the chains from turning their heads. Above and behind them a fire is blazing at a distance, and between the fire and the prisoners, there is a raised way; and you will see, if you look, a low wall built along the way, like the screen which puppet players have in front of them, over which they show the puppets." The world of ideas is rarely stumbled upon. It must be fought for, uncovered through friction, and often wrested from the structures that aim to obscure it. This is the sharper edge of Plato’s Allegory of the Cave—a text too often reduced to a feel-good metaphor for intellectual growth. While the common interpretation celebrates the human capacity to awaken from ignorance, the passage’s opening paragraph describes not a passive confusion but a carefully designed environment of constraint. With its architecture of chains, firelight, barriers, and orchestrated shadows, the cave is not merely a place of darkness. It is a system constructed to prevent people from recognizing that any other kind of light exists. Plato begins the allegory not with philosophical abstraction, but with a detailed physical image: people immobilized since childhood, forced to face forward, their heads fixed in place. These are not figures who have wandered into illusion—they were born into it. That distinction matters. The fact that the prisoners can only see what’s in front of them isn’t poetic embellishment. It is the condition of minds raised in isolation from the very possibility of alternative perspectives. What appears to be a limitation of knowledge is, in fact, a limitation of imagination. Their conceptual boundaries were shaped before they could choose for themselves, and over time, those constraints became indistinguishable from reality. The fire, placed “above and behind,” plays a crucial symbolic role in this apparatus. Fire produces light, but it does not enlighten. Its function is to cast just enough illumination to generate shadows—images that appear real only because they are all the prisoners have ever seen. Crucially, this fire is not sunlight. Plato specifically chooses a man-made flame, an artificial source of visibility controlled by those hidden from view. Its purpose is not to reveal but to conceal, by offering a convincing imitation of truth. In this way, the fire becomes a metaphor for the institutions or ideologies that control perception while disguising their influence as neutral or natural. What’s offered to the prisoners is a filtered reality with intent behind it, though it may appear as a simple mistake at first glance. This deliberate placement of the fire is a reminder that control of perception begins with control of what counts as light. Beyond the fire lies the raised path and the wall, which transform the cave from a place of ignorance to a site of performance. Plato introduces the puppet show explicitly, likening the setup to a theatrical stage where figures behind the wall manipulate objects to cast shadows. This decorated analogy reveals a calculated spectacle. The prisoners are not passively ignorant. They are the audience of a long-running production. The shadows they believe in are not mere distortions; they are curated, rehearsed, and displayed with purpose. This detail shifts the focus of the allegory away from individual misunderstanding and toward systemic manipulation. What the prisoners accept as reality has been staged from the beginning, not simply to obscure the truth, but to maintain control over belief. The structure of the cave is equally social. The prisoners sit together, side by side, watching the same images, affirming the same illusions. There is comfort in the collective, and over time, repetition becomes reinforcement. The cave is a physical setting as well as a culture—one that does not require violence to maintain power, because it fosters mutual agreement among those who are trapped. Plato anticipates the way shared beliefs can be shaped not through force, but through early exposure and group consensus. When a society teaches its members to question little and conform often, the system defends itself through routine and familiarity rather than force. This reading reframes the cave from a metaphor about internal confusion to one about external design—an ideological structure that maintains itself by conditioning its members to find security in sameness. This deeper reading of the allegory also alters the role of the philosopher. In popular interpretations, the philosopher is a solitary figure who escapes the cave and achieves wisdom. But in this version, their journey is not a personal triumph. It is a confrontation with a structure meant to suppress awakening. Escaping the cave requires not only awareness but disobedience. To see beyond the shadows is to violate the cave’s intended function, and Plato acknowledges the cost of this resistance. When the freed prisoner returns to the cave to share what they’ve seen, they are mocked, even attacked. This reaction is not incidental. It reflects a truth about power: systems built on illusion do not reward those who expose it. The philosopher’s insight, initially intellectual, now grows increasingly political. It threatens the coherence of the world as the prisoners know it. Even Plato’s word choices reinforce the nature of this captivity. The prisoners are described as “chained,” “prevented,” and “habituated”; these are all verbs that emphasize imposed constraint rather than voluntary ignorance. This overlooked diction matters because it suggests that the prisoners' condition is the product of systems acting on them, not a result of their own lack of effort. Plato offers a warning here: when limits are embedded early and thoroughly enough, they no longer feel like limits. They feel like truth. This understanding reshapes the purpose of education in Plato’s thought. If perception is molded by one’s environment, then real education must disrupt that environment. It is not simply a matter of acquiring facts or reading canonical texts. It is an act of re-seeing, an ongoing process of making the familiar strange again. Close reading, in this sense, becomes more than an academic tool. It is a habit of skepticism, a method for identifying the angles, filters, and patterns that guide what we assume to be obvious. By paying attention to the details—the fire’s placement, the prisoners’ positioning, the stage-like nature of the wall—we begin to grasp the mechanisms behind the illusion. Each element is a clue, and following them reveals not only the shape of the cave, but the forces that constructed it. These insights extend far beyond ancient philosophy. In a world where digital platforms manage attention and media ecosystems blur entertainment and information, the cave has become more sophisticated, not less. Many of today’s beliefs are not chosen, but absorbed: shaped by algorithms, reinforced by repetition, and delivered through channels that seem objective. What Plato described with chains and shadows now takes the form of curated content and data-driven persuasion. The danger isn’t that people know too little, but that they feel certain while navigating illusions they were trained never to question. What gives Plato’s allegory its lasting power is its precision. It does not merely warn about ignorance. It maps how belief can be constructed, sustained, and defended. The cave is not a failure of thought, but the success of a system designed to define reality in advance. Resisting that system is difficult and often painful, but necessary, because real growth begins not in disruption, but in certainty. Turning one's head requires effort, courage, and a willingness to see discomfort as a necessary companion to truth. Close reading, in this context, becomes the first movement toward intellectual freedom; it is a refusal to accept the surface as all there is, and a commitment to searching for the forces behind the image.

Do you know who made your clothes? Most people don’t. Yet behind every seam and stitch lies an invisible labor force—millions of workers in underpaid, unsafe conditions, many of them in Bangladesh, where my family is originally from. As the daughter of Bengali immigrants, I grew up understanding the human cost behind fast fashion. But I also grew up crocheting—watching my mother turn a single thread into something both delicate and strong. That tension between tradition, labor, and innovation is what fuels what I want to build: a machine that can crochet. Crochet pieces are everywhere—sweaters, accessories, lace detailing—but despite mass production, there is surprisingly no existing machine that can truly crochet. Machines today can sew, embroider, and knit, but crochet’s unique structure depends on a single hook and ever-changing hand motions. Because of this, most crocheted items are either hand-stitched or knit to look like crochet. It’s often dismissed as “impossible to automate” due to the unpredictable, three-dimensional nature of each stitch. But I believe that’s only because we haven’t prioritized it enough—maybe because us consumers benefit from the garment industry. If we can create prosthetics that mimic finger dexterity, could we not design a system that tracks and executes loops, tension, and error correction in yarn? Building a functional crochet machine would not only be a technical feat—it would also offer an ethical alternative to current labor practices. My extended family includes people who have worked in garment factories, where workers endure long hours for low wages, doing by hand what machines have yet to master. Automating crochet could increase efficiency, reduce exploitation, and allow artisans to work alongside machines, designing rather than producing under duress. To accomplish this, I plan to combine mechanical engineering with machine learning and robotics. I want to study the nuanced ways hands interact with yarn, collecting data on motion, torque, and tension to teach a system how to recognize patterns and adjust for errors. Crochet isn’t just repetitive—it requires intuition. My goal is to model that through simulations and use CAD software to prototype the mechanics behind the hook’s movements. I’ve already begun developing relevant technical skills through my work with Columbia Formula Racing and Robotics, where I’ve learned to troubleshoot under pressure and translate designs into motion. I also hope to partner with makerspaces to test prototypes and refine the device’s precision and usability in real-world conditions. The Let’s Aim Higher Scholarship would be instrumental in turning this vision into reality. Financially, it would relieve the burden of the student contribution I must pay to Columbia, giving me the flexibility to prioritize this project without constantly choosing between passion and necessity. It would also allow me to invest in materials, tools, and collaboration spaces necessary for prototyping. Beyond funding, receiving this scholarship would validate a goal that often feels too niche, too ambitious, or too ahead of its time. It would give me the confidence to keep building—both the machine, and the future I believe is possible.

“When will I ever need to use this?” I didn’t always love math. In fact, there were times I resented it. In my Bengali immigrant household, math was a measurement tool for intelligence and future success. From the moment I could read, my father would sit beside me every morning, drilling me on arithmetic problems before I could even think about playing. He kept at it until I surpassed his ability to help. Looking back, I’m grateful for those early lessons. They built the skills and intuition that helped me excel in advanced courses throughout high school. But for a long time, I wasn’t learning out of love—I was doing it because it felt expected of me. And the further I went, the more disconnected I felt from math. Studying polar coordinates or trig proofs, I often found myself wondering if it would even matter in the real world. That changed in my senior year, when I took calculus. Concepts like differentiation and related rates suddenly clicked—not just in theory, but in practice. I was working on a hydroponics project at the time, and I realized that the rate of change in pH levels directly affected nutrient concentration. Math wasn’t abstract anymore; it became a language I could use to explain the tangible system I had been trying to manage. I began seeking out related rates problems in my free time, fascinated by the way small variables shaped bigger outcomes. Calculus had given me a framework to understand how systems evolve. That, to me, is math’s greatest value. Whether applied to chemical reactions, climate change, or mechanical systems, it provides the tools to describe, predict, and shape the world around us. I currently study mechanical engineering at Columbia, where math underpins nearly every project I touch. It powers the simulations I run in mathematical modeling competitions and helps me analyze efficiencies as part of Columbia’s Formula Racing team. The more I study, the more I recognize how deeply math is embedded in physical systems—how heat, force, and motion are all connected through differential equations and computational models. I once asked, “When will I ever need to use this?” Now, the question I ask is, “What else can I use this for?” Math has become more than a subject I was pushed to master. It’s a way of thinking, a way of seeing—and a path I’ve chosen for myself.

Not many people wear clothes three times their size, but that was expected of me each year. My “back-to-school shopping” happened in my cousin’s closet, where my parents carefully picked oversized jeans and sweaters, saying that I would “grow into them.” Our family’s unspoken rule shaped every decision: “Don’t waste.” Growing up in a Bengali immigrant household, I saw what it meant to stretch every dollar. Ice cream containers became soup storage. Threadbare shirts became quilts. My parents had both lived with more than a dozen relatives under one roof, and they transformed their experiences of scarcity into a culture of resourcefulness. As a child, I didn’t yet understand that. I only saw what we lacked. I resented the patched meals, the hand-me-downs, and even the dusty books my dad insisted we read. But interestingly, books were the one thing my parents were more willing to invest in. We borrowed most of them from the library, but I noticed they were far more receptive to me wanting to purchase a book than a new pair of shoes. At the time, I didn’t fully understand why they treated books differently, only that they were always a “yes.” During the pandemic, when everything came to a halt, I found myself returning to those books—this time, not out of necessity, but curiosity. Personal memoirs offered both escape and clarity. When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi made me value time, not just productivity. One line—“Even if I’m dying, until I actually die, I am still living”—reshaped how I thought about purpose. The Other Wes Moore, Wes Moore’s story about structural injustice, had an even stronger impact. It challenged my privilege. Through the parallel lives of two boys with the same name, I saw how outcomes are shaped not just by choices, but by access to mentorship, resources, and safety. Someone’s future, I realized, could be dictated entirely by the ZIP code they’re born into. That painful understanding pushed me to reflect on what I had long overlooked—despite our financial limitations, I had healthy parents who both deeply valued education and gave me stability. This sparked my desire to make education, especially in STEM, more accessible to underrepresented students. Books shaped more than just my worldview; their lessons manifested through my actions. I began volunteering through the National English Honor Society to tutor students in reading and writing. Summers were spent supporting my local library’s reading program and helping organize community events. Volunteering as a library page deepened my appreciation for libraries as spaces of quiet empowerment. Each night, I read to my little brother, watching him develop the same joy I once resisted. Throughout high school, I also participated in the Teen Writers Guild, collaborating with children’s author Judith Kristen to publish my own stories and illustrations—transforming something deeply personal into something others could read and learn from. Literature helped me connect with others, but more importantly, it gave me the courage to express myself. As a mechanical engineering student at Columbia, I bring the lessons I’ve learned from books into every classroom, lab, and team. Engineering values open-mindedness, and reading has trained me to listen carefully, consider different perspectives, and think both critically and empathetically. I hope to design sustainable systems that improve people’s lives while staying rooted in the humanities that taught me why those lives matter in the first place. This scholarship would help reduce the financial burden of my student contribution, giving me more time and freedom to pursue both my academic goals and the things that bring me joy, like volunteering, creative writing, and of course, reading.

Do you know who made your clothes? Most of us don’t. That’s by design. Behind the sheen of viral microtrends and thrift hauls lies an industry built on erasure. Every year, American consumers throw away millions of tons of clothing made by underpaid workers, primarily brown women and children, in unsafe conditions. As the daughter of Bangladeshi immigrants, I distanced myself from that reality. However, the same community I come from is living through it right now. It wasn’t until I began learning about tragedies like the Rana Plaza Factory collapse that I realized sustainability must include centering justice in addition to reducing waste. This idea is embodied by Nabihah, a Columbia alum known for founding SSQRD, a startup that developed a search engine to spotlight ethical brands and expose exploitative ones. Like me, she has family affected by abuse in the garment industry in Bangladesh. Her work empowers users by shifting their focus from trend-chasing to conscious consumption. SSQRD’s software showed me how technology can uplift and introduced me to what inspires me most: machine learning (ML). Programming is often viewed as abstract or purely digital, but it has the potential to be integrated with physical manufacturing. I study mechanical engineering because I’m drawn to designing products that solve tangible problems, and I’m curious how ML can uncover patterns and streamline production processes that we overlook. My projects have laid the foundation for this interest. At Columbia, I work on controls and dynamics for our Formula Racing team, where we’re focused on building a more energy-efficient vehicle. Currently, I’m prototyping a device that can crochet—an intricate task deemed impossible for machines to replicate, and one reason workers remain essential yet invisible in mass production. By exploring how to model hand motions and stitch patterns as data, I hope to merge traditional mechanics with ML techniques. I’m excited by the possibilities at this intersection of hardware and algorithms, where innovation isn’t just about performance, but about solving pressing problems like resource waste and labor injustice. Technology is constantly wielded to exploit: from neglected laborers to young consumers manipulated by trends, algorithms are optimized for profit at the expense of people. Nevertheless, I believe the fusion of ML and mechanical engineering offers a better path forward—one that makes fashion and manufacturing less extractive. That vision motivates my work. With every prototype built, I’m working toward a future where humanity is valued.

"They're all dead." My jaw dropped. My friend’s words echoed in my mind, piercing through the silence of my failed project. After spending the past two months concocting masterblend, or liquid fertilizer, and crafting intricate nets for vines to climb on, I was back to square one—all of my cucumbers had died. Having grown up amidst the green oasis of my family’s backyard garden, I was no stranger to the toil and reward of nurturing life from soil. Countless hours were spent digging holes, planting seeds, and harvesting tomatoes, green beans, and bitter melons. But hydroponics—growing plants in nutrient-rich water without soil—introduced me to a new kind of complexity. Suddenly, gardening wasn’t just an intuitive or generational skill. It became a science of measurement, control, and precision. I started a hydroponics club in high school to explore these systems with friends, beginning with simple crops like bok choy and lettuce. But as we took on more demanding plants like cucumbers, the systems we built grew more complicated—and fragile. The cucumbers failed because I had miscalculated nutrient concentrations and underestimated how variables like pH and water flow changed over time. To correct my mistakes, I turned to chemistry at first, learning how nitrates, phosphates, and salts interact in solution. But the deeper I went, the more I realized chemistry wasn’t enough. I needed to understand how one change affected everything else in a growing system—how altering nutrient inflow would affect not just concentration, but flow rates, osmotic pressure, and root development over time. I was trying to manage a dynamic system, and for that, I needed a different tool: calculus. Through this project, I developed a new appreciation for the idea of rates of change. I began to seek out related rates problems, curious about how quantities depended on one another. The very concept of a derivative—an instantaneous rate of change—felt incredibly tangible when watching how quickly water pH could spike after a nutrient dump. Suddenly, ideas like first and second derivatives weren’t abstract—they described how my system responded, how fast things grew, and how much margin of error I had. Calculus made me more than a curious gardener; it gave me a framework for understanding how systems evolve and how small changes have cascading effects. And that, I believe, is its importance in the STEM field. Whether you’re working with chemical reactions, environmental systems, or even financial models, calculus provides the language to describe change—and the tools to predict and control it. This insight led me to pursue mechanical engineering and operations research in college, where calculus is not just a subject, but a foundation. It underpins the simulations I run in my energy systems class and helps me model efficiencies on Columbia’s Formula Racing team as we work on designing a more sustainable vehicle. The way force, heat, and motion all connect through differential equations has deepened my appreciation for how mathematical models describe physical reality. But my roots in hydroponics remain central. As someone interested in sustainable design, I see calculus as the bridge between the environment and engineering—between what we want to build and how we ensure it actually works under real-world conditions. Calculus taught me to think in systems, not silos. It showed me that STEM isn’t just about memorizing facts, but about learning how change behaves—and how we can design around it. It’s a skill I plan to carry with me as I pursue sustainable solutions for communities that need them most.

Not many people actively choose to wear clothes that don’t even fit them. But that was my version of back-to-school shopping: standing in my cousin’s closet while my parents sifted through fraying jeans and oversized sweaters, saying things like, “You’ll grow into it.” At first, I didn’t question it. Hand-me-downs were normal to me—familiar, soft, already broken in. But as I got older, the differences between my classmates’ brand-name wardrobes and my stitched-up sleeves started to feel like they meant something. I felt like I had less. Like I was less. Back then, I thought our resourcefulness came from lack. I saw it as something to outgrow. I didn’t yet understand that my family wasn’t just trying to save money—we were living out a quiet philosophy. We reused everything: yogurt containers became lentil jars, torn pillowcases became rags. Nothing was thrown away until it truly had no use left. My parents, Bangladeshi immigrants who spent their young adulthood packed into tight apartments with too many people and too little space, didn’t call it "sustainability". But looking back, that’s exactly what it was. I spent much of my childhood trying to run from that lifestyle—pretending I didn’t know my mom when she picked up a discarded mahogany chair from the curb, avoiding bringing friends home, hiding the discomfort I felt about not being able to participate in the same kind of consumer culture that others could. I distracted myself with clubs and volunteer roles, anything that kept me away from reminders of what we didn’t have. Then the pandemic hit. Locked indoors, surrounded by the very things I once wanted to escape, I began spending more time watching documentaries, reading about climate change, labor exploitation, and the environmental toll of fast fashion—much of it impacting my own Bengali community overseas. It struck me that the lifestyle I had once been ashamed of was actually one I should have admired. My family’s refusal to waste wasn’t just practical—it was purposeful. That realization changed the way I saw everything. I began looking for ways to bring that mindset into the community. I helped run donation and reuse drives at our public library, collecting and redistributing school supplies and gently used books. I organized projects that upcycled discarded materials, turning old plastic jugs into traps for the invasive spotted lanternfly species in our area. To me, being a purposeful community member means staying grounded in values that benefit others, not just yourself. It means seeing where you can contribute, even in quiet or unconventional ways. Being responsible means refusing to look away when you know you can help. And being productive isn’t about doing the most; it’s about doing what matters, with intention and integrity. Now that I’m in college, I carry these values with me into engineering. On Columbia’s Formula Racing team, I’m working on redesigning vehicle parts for better fuel efficiency and lower emissions—creating solutions with sustainability at their core. I’ve continued to volunteer, helping coordinate science fairs for local students and promoting hands-on learning that doesn’t require expensive equipment. I’m still learning, still growing, and still thinking about how every design, every decision, can ripple outward. I didn’t choose my upbringing, but I choose how I honor it. And I’ve realized that I am worth the dreams I chase, because they’re built from everything my community taught me, everything I’ve repaired, reused, and reimagined. My goal isn’t just to succeed for myself—it’s to make sure I leave behind something others can grow into, too.

Selected Paragraph from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Book I (Translation from University of Georgia in Athens): “My mind tends to speak of forms changed into new bodies; Gods, (for you yourselves changed them) inspire my beginnings and spin a continuous song, from the first source of the world to my times. Before the sea and the lands and the sky, which covers everything, there was one face of nature in the whole world, which they called Chaos; It was a wild and disordered mass, Nothing but a sluggish weight, and it was just heaped together Discordant seeds of poorly joined things. At this time, no Titan was supplying daylight to the world. Neither was the Moon renewing her horns by rising; Nor was the Earth hanging in the surrounding air, balancing on its own weight; nor had the Sea stretched out her arms as an endless border of the lands. And while, in that place, there was land, and sea, and air, at the same time, the earth was unstable, the water was unswimmable, the air was in need of light; no shape remained as its own And each thing was a hindrance to the others, because in one body Cold things fight with hot things, wet things with dry things, soft things with hard things, things having weight with weightless things.” Essay: In the years following decades of civil war, the reign of Augustus brought a deliberate campaign to reshape Roman identity. Through building projects, legislation, and a revival of traditional values, Augustus sought not only to restore peace but to project an image of unshakable order—of a Rome destined for eternal stability. Against this backdrop, Ovid’s Metamorphoses, with its ever-shifting forms and defiance, reads almost like a quiet rebellion. In the very first lines of the poem, Ovid presents not a divine, rational beginning, but one of confusion: a world born of chaos, instability, and contradiction. The opening paragraph, “Before the sea, the land, the sky that covers all…”, invites the reader into a fundamentally unstable universe. But rather than rejecting or condemning that instability, Ovid makes it foundational. Why begin a sweeping epic with a world at war with itself? While the passage may initially seem pessimistic or extremely dismal in its tone, Ovid is not offering despair. Instead, he challenges the Augustan ideal of permanence and coherence by showing that disorder is not only natural: it is essential. By depicting the universe as a volatile blend of warring elements, Ovid proposes that identity, nature, and even truth are never fixed but always evolving. The very structure of the world, he suggests, is built on the possibility of change. The paragraph’s opening phrase, “Before the sea, the land”, immediately signals a world in which none of the familiar structures yet exist. Ovid doesn’t begin with gods or creation in the celebratory tone one might expect from a foundational myth; instead, he strips the world of its defining features. This isn’t simply a blank slate—it’s a denial of orientation. By withholding recognizable reference points, Ovid destabilizes the reader’s understanding of beginnings themselves. And in doing so, he plants the seed of his larger philosophical claim: that the most honest version of origin is not clarity, but contradiction. The “one face of nature,” as he calls it, is not a unified whole but an overwhelming tangle. Where traditional cosmologies often construct order as the highest good, Ovid lingers in the mess, asking readers to consider whether what we call “order” is a product of truth or just the final result of selective framing. The words Ovid uses to describe Chaos are themselves in conflict. “Rude,” “unformed,” “weight,” and “ill-according” suggest not just a lack of shape, but active resistance to shape. The special inclusion of weight in particular implies burden, pressure, perhaps even a kind of gravitational inertia that drags the universe downward. This mass of “ill-according seeds” is not neutral; it’s teeming with tension. And yet, Ovid does not describe it as empty or void. On the contrary, it is dense with substance. The description of Chaos as a “wild and disordered mass” composed of “discordant seeds of poorly joined things” deepens this rejection of neat origins. Ovid doesn’t imagine a blank void, but something more troubling—a substance overflowing with content yet lacking coherence. Key words like “sluggish” and “ill-joined” emphasize tension, not absence. Even the metaphor of “seeds,” which usually connotes growth and harmony, is corrupted here; these seeds cannot produce unity because they are inherently mismatched. Ovid doesn’t allow the reader to rest on the comfort of eventual resolution—he forces us to sit with contradiction as the fundamental state of reality. In this sense, his Chaos is not only a prelude to creation but a challenge to the very notion of foundational order. It’s a critique aimed not just at mythology, but at ideology—at the way power tells stories to legitimize itself. That ideological tension becomes more explicit in Ovid’s inventory of what the universe lacked. He writes that “no Titan was supplying daylight,” the Moon was not “renewing her horns,” and the Earth had no balance. These are not simply missing physical elements—they represent missing systems of regulation. The sun and moon measure time; the Earth’s balance anchors gravity; the Sea defines borders. Their absence implies the absence of structure, law, and boundary. In a world without these forces, everything exists simultaneously but without shape: “the earth was unstable, the water was unswimmable, the air was in need of light.” Even more striking is the phrase “no shape remained as its own.” This erasure of identity challenges the core Roman ideal of each person or thing having a proper form, function, and place. Ovid’s world doesn’t simply lack order—it refuses the idea that anything is inherently one thing. He confronts readers with a question: if nothing holds its shape, what does it mean to be? The final lines of the paragraph drive home the philosophical stakes of Ovid’s Chaos. “Cold things fight with hot things, wet things with dry things… things having weight with weightless things.” The natural elements are locked in conflict, not harmony. But instead of resolving this, Ovid highlights how these tensions coexist within “one body.” It’s not that opposites are kept apart, but that they are bound together, constantly undermining each other. Ovid is describing not only physical nature but human nature. We too are contradictions: simultaneously rational and emotional, instinctive and reflective, fixed and fluid. Rather than moralize this duality, Ovid validates it. His Chaos is not a fallen state but a necessary one. It is the world as it truly is: unsettled, dynamic, alive. What makes this especially radical in Ovid’s time is that he presents transformation as a constant, not a disruption. In Roman political thought, change often signified decay or decline. Augustus’ regime depended on the idea that Rome had returned to its rightful form, purified from corruption. But Ovid’s poem insists that nothing has a final form. The entire Metamorphoses will unfold from this single, chaotic beginning—gods, mortals, landscapes all shifting into something else. This vision defies not just politics but metaphysics. Ovid doesn’t just describe change—he defies it. And in doing so, he suggests that what Augustus fears most—instability, contradiction, and flux—is not Rome’s undoing, but its reality. Ovid’s decision to open his poem with Chaos is therefore deeply intentional. It is not a void to be feared, but a space of possibility. By rejecting the Augustan fantasy of a stable, divinely ordered world, he embraces something more honest: that life, nature, and identity are perpetually in motion. His Chaos is not a rejection of creation, but the raw material from which transformation is born. And centuries later, this opening remains vital not because it tells us where the world began, but because it asks us to reconsider how we understand our own beginnings—messy, contradictory, incomplete. Ovid’s legacy is not a single truth, but a method: to look closely, to question fixed forms, and to find beauty in the constant becoming of things. This passage especially resonated with me since my first semester at Columbia University, just months after graduating from high school. I had arrived at my empty, unfamiliar single, overwhelmed and thinking I needed to have everything figured out—what kind of engineer I’d become, what jobs I might pursue, how to chart a path forward—and stick with it rather than take the time to explore new things I previously didn’t have the opportunity to do. But Ovid’s Chaos gave me something I didn’t know I needed: permission to be unfinished. To not yet make sense. To be, like his universe, a collection of contradictions still waiting to take shape. And that quiet but profound insight has stayed with me. I don’t need to begin with order. I just need to begin.