My Community Has Helped Me Fall Back in Love with My Life 🫶✨

my thoughts on solidarity, hope, & support - welcome back to the Slush Pile!

As we reach the midway point of May and Issue 46 of the Slush Pile, I can definitely say that it’s been an interesting month. Work has been full of ups and downs, trials and errors. I haven’t been enjoying the books I’ve been reading this month as much as I thought I would. I attended my graduation commencement in New York last weekend but *surprise* still have a few more weeks of school left and thus some leftover assignments that I need to turn in, forcing my generative writing to take a bit of a back seat this month. My dog Buttons also turns 2 next week and of course, that’s been making me think and mourn more deeply about the inevitable passage of time.

But through it all, I’ve realized one thing: my community—my friends, family, colleagues, peers—are one of the things keeping me afloat right now. People make me happy. Socialization, banter, conversation, is fueling my energy. Everyone I currently hold space with, in-person and virtually, has made me fall back in love with my life again. Let me explain.

As some of you may know, I was diagnosed with an adjustment disorder by my therapist last year, which completely rocked my foundation, my view of myself, and everything I’ve ever thought I knew about my experiences in the world up to this point. I have a really hard time adjusting to change and when I’m overwhelmed or overstimulated, I tend to shut down, self-isolate, brood, fester with anger and resentment, and in general, have overt physical reactions to major stimuli. I can even find it physically difficult to talk, unable to put into words what I’m feeling.

Thankfully, with treatment, I’ve been doing a lot better over the past few months. I have calming tools and strategies to help me manage my anxiety and day-to-day reactions and emotional expressions. I have a therapist who sees me and listens to me, providing insight, rationale, and advice.

However, it’s only been within the past few weeks that I’ve realized the importance and role of community in my management plan. Like I said, I tend to shut down when I’m angry, upset, or overstimulated. But it’s when I open up, making myself vulnerable, allowing myself to vent, that I can begin to heal and speed up the process of recovery and stabilization. And if you know me, you know how much of a miracle that is considering how naturally introverted I’ve always been and continue to be. For so long, my safe place has been me and my dog hanging out in my room together (which still holds up tbh).

But at this point, I’m at my happiest when I’m talking to my loved ones on the phone, sharing a meal together, going out somewhere. I feel most creatively motivated and alive when swapping dreams, ambitions, and progress updates with my writing peers and friends. I don’t want to pursue projects alone anymore; instead, I search for opportunities for collaboration, partnership, and crossover, ways that I can avoid walking the long road of writing and publishing alone. And I get excited just thinking about the possibilities, as opposed to how I was before, dreading being told no and deciding to avoid the whole fiasco by not asking at all, and only ever hurting myself. Even at work, I recover faster from unpleasant or confusing interactions when I talk about them with co-workers, and have much more perfect days when we’re all laughing and bantering together. It’s funny in some ways, how much the trajectory of my day hinges on whether or not I made someone laugh.

All that to say, my life is busy and overwhelming and difficult but it’s making friends and connections that have been my saving grace. This is why community isn’t just a buzzword for me that I include in my PR materials, social media captions, or artist statements. It’s the way I stay alive. It’s my guiding light, my fuel, my foundation. And maybe this isn’t a radical thought to anyone but me, or maybe y’all have already realized this long before I have. But it’s true: life is worth living when it’s lived with the people you love. And I’m looking forward to meeting all of the people I will love someday.

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notes from the writer’s desk ✍️

• my favorite recently pub’d pieces:

  • boyhood, The Garlic Press

  • my therapist is breaking up with me, FLARE Magazine

  • Yael Valencia Aldana’s Debut Poetry Collection Explores Mixed Heritage & the Complexity of Identity, HipLatina

  • “Bilingual Bitch” and Proud: Angelica Julia Dávila Reclaims Language Through Poetry, HipLatina

  • 15 Latinx-Owned Bookstores in the U.S. You Need to Check Out, HipLatina

  • 13 Nonfiction Books by Latinx Authors Published in 2025, HipLatina

• updates:

  • ⭐️OPEN FOR SUBMISSIONS!⭐️ If you haven’t heard it through the grapevine already, my collaborative partner Celeste Alyssa Gomez and I are putting together a zine! CHISMOSA is dedicated to reclaiming a word that the power to hurt and tease, inspire and uplift. In the spirit of celebration and reclamation, tell us your secrets, stories, and gossip. Write down what you observe in your home or neighborhood, what is whispered at the table amongst family, friends, and community. Dig into the vast beauty of your experiences and escapades. Let us look around, let us in. Submit from now until the deadline on May 31st through this Google Form! We can’t wait to see your submission! Submit here!

  • ⭐️AVAILABLE TO ORDER!⭐️ amor. is my third poetry chapbook and it’s out NOW and available to purchase from Bottlecap Press! This project was born out of a need to document the origins of my relationship with my partner and subsequent life together. It’s about love, honesty, respect, healing, and longing, and I hope you enjoy it whether you’re in love yourself or just love reading works about love. Purchase your copy here!

  • ⭐️AVAILABLE TO ORDER!⭐️ LOS ANGELES, the zine anthology I co-edited with my friend and poet Paula Macena is officially out! Please place your orders here! All proceeds from the zine go towards the Anti-Recidivism Coalition, which supports incarcerated fire crews through scholarships, training, certification, and job acquisition upon release, with the ultimate goal of ending mass incarceration across California. Order today!

  • ⭐️AVAILABLE FOR PREORDER!⭐️ I’m so excited to announce that my debut children’s book, Queer Latine Heroes, is now available for preorder!! The book spotlights past and present queer heroes from Latin America and the U.S. and is forthcoming from Jessica Kingsley Publishers on September 18, 2025. Find all the options to preorder here!

  • ⭐️WATCH MY TEDXTALK!⭐️ I’m thrilled to share that my TEDx talk, “The Power of Stories in Representing Our World” is now LIVE on YouTube! It would mean the world to me if you could watch, like, comment, and share with your classrooms, group chats, and everyone you know. Thank you for your support! Watch the talk here!

• resources:

  • Looking for book recommendations? Check out my Bookstagram and TikTok to keep up with what I’m reading and loving right now! On TikTok, you’ll also get more snippets of my everyday writing life and lifestyle/fashion content. See you there!

other stories i’m loving 📖

• currently reading:

  • The Buddha in the Attic by Julie Otsuka

• currently watching:

  • Severance S1

• currently listening to:

  • “I Do Better Than That” by Anna Kendrick

all my love,

sofía xx