Today we’d like to introduce you to Serenity Plasencia.
Serenity, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
My journey as an Art student, Counseling student and mental health advocate started during my first year of college (2015). I started college as a full-time manager at a surf and skate retail shop while being a full-time Graphic Design major at SDSU. I was very close with someone who personally knew a family member of the Vans company and I had a deal to work for Vans doing graphic design. After being in school for a few months, I began to be overwhelmed with work and school and felt like quitting. I fell out of love for graphic design and changed my major to Applied Design with an emphasis on woodworking and metals. Unfortunately, my decision to be an Art major was always questioned.
I decided after my first year I was going to drop out and I quit my job and worked elsewhere for part-time. During that transition, I forced myself to go to a community college and at least take three classes a semester. One year later, I transferred back to SDSU as a declared my major as IS3D. Which is Interdisciplinary Studies in three Departments, and this means you get to pick exactly what classes you want from three majors of choice that caters towards your specific career path. I chose Communication, Counseling and School Psychology and Art.
During my transition back, I lost a very close person in my life and began to suffer from severe mental illness. IN addition to that loss, my family also began to split and I fell into a poor economic situation. Despite these hurdles, I am in my last semester of college and am only a few months away from walking in May.
Since my emphasis is Communication and CSP, I grew heavy interest in understanding communication patterns and how they affect what we believe as simple things like counseling. My understanding of cultural competence grew and I felt it was my new life-long duty to become a more effective communicator while also finding my place in fighting injustice in racism and discrimination. A lot of how we perceive ourselves and actions are based on social experiences and how groups of people interact. Whether that may be on a social, political, ethnic, etc scale.
During my time of research and fine-tuning my counseling skills, my love for Art grew again. After years of having what we may know as “artists block,” I found that finding ways to channel mental health awareness into Art is my passion. Through my IG, you can see only a small snippet of that, but once graduated, I hope to incorporate the power of healing and counseling through various artistic mediums.
My journey is so important to me because if it wasn’t for all of the loss and pain I suffered in college and my young adult life years in general, I would have never discovered my love for healing. It is also important to me as I see young adults so vulnerable to mental health issues because of the social standard put to go to college, work full time, support yourself, etc. My lifelong goal is to also be as transparent with myself as I am with others. Part of changing the stigma on mental health is to allow it to be educated easily but also allow people to feel as if they are not the only one/no one knows what it is like to suffer.
Although I can not speak for people who suffer from chronic mental illness disorders or chronic illnesses, in general, being able to be an advocate for someone and anyone is the least I would like to do. I learned that in college, we as people as always changing our identity through various aspects and experiences in life. Our identity is so complex and can play on various levels of racial, ethnic, cultural, sexual preference, gender preference, ability/disability, and more. Because of Intersectionality, it can be difficult to help heal and understand each other, but that is what I have a lifetime for!
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
Like I mentioned, I went through plenty of challenges in college. The first was my own mind game. I started off in college just barely being able to comprehend concepts and barley passing classes. I felt that in the grand scheme, I did not have the intellectual ability to be an educated person and remember what I am learning to help me in my professional life. I came from a family were receiving a higher education was not held with a high importance, so I often felt alone and troubled. However, demanding myself to keep on moving, learn new study techniques, reach out for help and utilize every given service changed my ability to be a successful student. You go into college being told you’ll create an easy four-year plan to get a degree, but what the education system fails to recognize is the outside factors and struggles people face that can make obtaining an education harder than it already is.
So having to constantly battle my own mental negativities, I suffered a hard blow to my mental health when my parents began to split up during the same time my best friend lost her mother, who was a very influential person in my life now that I have time to reflect. Never in my life did I think I would lose someone so tragically and my entire perception of family changed overnight. I had a hard time dealing with my identity. I also realized how devastating it is to lose someone, for this was a pain I had never experienced. I lost a significant amount of weight and stopped leaving my room and slowly fell into complete isolation. Quitting my job was the hardest for me, I had been working since 16 and had a full-time position offer at 18 with that company so to go from that to nothing was hard. I felt as if I was weak and unsuccessful and as if everything I worked hard for in life was thrown away.
Dealing with loss that was equally personal as it was not put me in a state that made it hard to communicate how I felt. I had to quit my job and try to focus on school. There were many times during class my professor would have me step out or seek counseling for my own well being. After four months of this, I decided that the only way I could become a better communicator and counselor is to apply what I am learning to myself. As much as I wish I could say everything has turned around and life is great, that is not the case. I learned what it means to not only love myself but to love others. I have multiple family members and friends who have also or currently suffer with mental health issues, so being aware of that has been important to my own identity. Throughout my five years of college, I finally feel as if I know what it means to be an adult and understand the false social standards we set for college students.
The biggest challenge for me is understanding that some mental health issues may seem bigger than others, but no one deserves to feel as if theirs does not matter. My counseling classes opened my eyes to understand that everyone is hurting, but if there is anything in common, its the ability to be resilient in hard times. I have learned that social media also creates false perceptions of what it means to be healthy, happy, successful, etc. So being able to be fully honest, open and personal through it is one of the ways I have been able to connect with so many people who would never expect I was hurting and vise versa.
We’d love to hear more about your work.
Although I am known for being an artist from most of my friends, another identity I hold is being a car-girl. I love cars and for as long as I can remember, I have always been around car shows, my dad working on his projects and friends who have their own too.
During my what I like to call “identity crisis,” I fell out of love for school and art and needed a news outlet. My brother at the time started a fairly successful car team that began to blow up in attendance at the meets. Being able to look forward to those meets allowed me to get myself out and slowly began to want to socialize. I then got my first project car and fell in love.
When you look at my IG, you will see a lot about my car. I have had it for almost two years now. Although I have put my project on pause so I can focus on graduating, I am still just as passionate and excited to get my hands on it! I learned very quickly the position women hold in the car scene… which is none. You are either a car model or a toy for men. I wanted to make sure I was neither, no shade to either car girls tho!
I started working for an automotive parts store and began to quickly meet people with similar interests. Since I was doing more work on the commercial sides, I was also given the ability to network and gain experiences and special offers through other big automotive shops and mechanics. Although I do not know if this will be something I want to pursue as a job or career again, I know that my love and joy for working on my car will never change. Part of being a person who speaks up for others is to also advocate for women in the automotive and blue-collar industry. It’s already hard as fuck for women to be successful in the position of power but it can be even harder in industries that are dominated in men!
I am most proud of myself for being able to hold so many identities and be apart of so many different groups. Sometimes I spend most of my time holding my identity as a counseling communication student. Other days I am a screaming art student or a car girl. Being able to find so many outlets that in a way, all connect to each other is what I am proud of.
What is “success” or “successful” for you?
Success is not always tangible. We might not be able to have a physical degree, money, awards, etc. to show for our achievements. Success to me is sometimes more the achievements we make behind close doors that can not be seen. Being able to get yourself up everyday and work towards a positive and healthy life is success. Success holds different degrees but nothing is too little to be proud of.
I find that sometimes people are afraid to celebrate what would appear as small accomplishments but who are we to judge and assume what success is for that person. I try to understand and realize that was all have hurdles and obstacles to face in life so success is more than what society labels it as.
For me, I celebrate success in being able to improve my mental health, being able to provide for myself, being able to continue my schooling, being able to get up and work towards a goal. I also find success in not killing all of my plants in my room!
Success is not final. Failure is not terminal. Being able to keep to continue is success.
Contact Info:
- Phone: 619-228-5194
- Email: serenity.plasencia@icloud.com
- Instagram: @s_vdpty
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