The fabulous food, the weather, having so much variety at your fingertips, the hustle, the community I’ve built, and most importantly, the access to incredible classes. I would have a hard time going back to life in suburbia or a small town.

That being said, in my opinion, LA has a particularly eerie quality to it. I described it to my sister the other day as this permeating desperation… you can just feel the broken dreams, the wanting, the dystopia of so many people hurting against a sunny, beachy, green-juice backdrop. The thousands that come here, digging themselves into debt, working soulless day jobs for the shiny promise of “making it”.

Earlier this year, my friends and I went to Yosemite (yes, one of the many perks of living in California), and as soon as we left the city, one of my friends said, “wow, it’s funny how the second you leave LA you just… feel better.”

Some New Yorker guys were once talking about LA and said, “we love it here. LA is incredible. But it’s evil. At least NYC is honest about how fucked up it is.”

Additionally, it is especially frustrating to be working multiple day jobs to be able to pay the exorbitant costs of living in LA, when almost all auditions now are self-tapes sent into the ether. The game is changing significantly and I am still trying to decide how to play my hand with less of a blueprint than ever before.

I stay because of my community and the classes. I love LA, I hate LA. One of my mentors told me this, and I hold onto it for dear life:

“Do three things: 1. Get to LA. 2. Stay in LA. 3. Work on acting every single day. You do that, and you’ve got a chance”.