The following is an essay that I wrote as apart of my University of Virginia Application. The prompt was to describe how a work of art, music, science, mathematics, literature, or other media has surprised, unsettled, or inspired me, and in what way.
I watched an episode of Monsters Inside Me in fourth grade. This documentary-style tv show featured exaggerated tales of deadly viruses and parasites that plague our water and food. One night I stumbled into the kitchen to find my parents watching an episode that featured a teen boy's stomach infested with maggots. Needless to say, I was a little traumatized. That image burned itself into my ten-year-old brain and left a scar, one that invoked fear and anxiety in me for months. Soon enough every little thing sent me into panic just because I feared a parasite that wasn’t even there. In fact, I was so concerned with a disease I had seen on tv that I failed to recognize the one that was really eating me alive: fear. Reflecting on it now, I've begun to notice myself fall into the same cycle over and over again. I hyper-focus on the things that are out of my control and fail to acknowledge what I can control. I can control how I feel and react and how I deal with obstacles that are thrown my way. This realization didn't hit me at the age of ten when my parents explained why I shouldn't be afraid, but now I understand that I can't allow fear to control me and what I do.