Relationships are the key to social change. A community is only as strong as the number of individual associations it fosters. Throughout my life, I’ve tried to strengthen the communities I'm a part of by creating environments for connections to form.  During college, I started an initiative to have Chai with Strangers. I extended invitations to neighbors and even developed a website for strangers to register and join us for chai. Some of my most enjoyable college memories have been from these interactions and I'm still friends with the 'strangers' who first came over for chai.  Vismaya Kalike, my non-profit, focuses on creating collective learning spaces. At our first center, a child recently released from juvenile detention expressed a desire to join. Initially, his motivation revolved around computer games, limiting his engagement to solitary activities. As our relationship grew, I guided him to participate in group activities like Kho-Kho and Kabaddi. He slowly became an active participant and started offering guidance to other children. Empowering him to be a catalyst for change within our community demonstrated possibilities for positive transformation. Just as strong relationships can revolutionize communities, their absence can bring progress to a grinding halt. When we were expanding, I needed to work with a local gang, who exploited children for drug-peddling, to get access to a community center for our second learning space. Initially, the arrangement was successful with noticeable progress among children. However, as the gang perceived a loss of control over the children who were free labor and the youth who were consumers, they disrupted our efforts by vandalizing, stealing and threatening our newly created space. Despite my efforts to mobilize community members and cultivate personal ownership, the fragmented local community couldn’t overcome linguistic and religious differences. The center’s closure became inevitable, succumbing to pressures from the local gang. Though I was disappointed I realized that this failure was an indication of having confronted more challenging problems.  The importance of connections transcends class and cultural boundaries. At my startup, CraterClub, we had 1000+ creators host livestreams, many of whom had built strong communities. When we shut down the platform, most communities slowly faded away. The commonality among the surviving ones that continue to thrive is that connections were made not only between viewer and creator but also between viewer and viewer. I had always prided myself on being a focal point for community creation but central nodes aren't enough for a community to succeed. We need to foster environments where connections can form among all nodes.  Each community I have been a part of and nurtured has been critical to building perspective. I have learnt to think in terms of possibilities not problems, learnt to be unafraid of failure and learnt the importance of federated and decentralized systems. As a scholar, I want to bring a well-rounded approach that goes beyond academics. I aim to stay true to my values of fostering agency, practicing compassion, and using relationship building as a conduit for positive transformation.