You’re moving your life away from family and friends.
You’re leaving the house you grew up in, the street where the school bus picked you up. Love or hate where you’re from, at the very least, you know it. And by leaving, you sacrifice your knowledge of the terrain, the edge of familiarity – so you better know why you’re doing it.
Don’t underestimate what you’re giving up
You’re leaving your doctors, your dentists, your favorite orthodontist. The relationships with your mailman, the grocer, the barista who knows how you like your coffee. You know where to go for sushi, shrimp scampi, and after 10 p.m. drink specials. You’ll uproot nearly two decades worth of life.
So, why do it?
If you’re still living with your parents, you take many aspects of your life for granted. To think otherwise is naïve or foolish. If you’re paying rent, your parents (hopefully) aren’t gouging you. You don’t pay utilities, electric, cable. Someone buys groceries, someone cooks, even if it’s only on occasion. There are leftovers, and a microwave to heat them up.
Pots and pans are available for your use. A spice cabinet too. You didn’t buy that oil, the salt, pepper, the paprika, the cornstarch, the chicken stock – they were already there. Along with the countless oddly shaped mugs, your favorite Giants glass, the Corelle dishes.
You didn’t buy any of it. But you’ll have to.
I hope you know why.
Think about the question.
Better yet, find and contact people who have done it, and ask them about the transition.
It’s easy to romanticize about your beautifully independent life, or LA dreaming with your car windows rolled down.
Answering the uncomfortable questions, that is hard.
- Why do you want to move to Los Angeles?
- What do you want to do?
- What is success after your first month?
- What is success after your first year?
However, don’t spend much time thinking past year one.
There’s no point. You’re going to find and lose so many interests and meet so many people in your first year, thinking any further is a wasted exercise. Creating a long-term plan (at this stage) will just limit you from seizing the opportunities that come up. You’re better off being flexible, willing to try anything.
Good questions:
- What kind of people do you want to surround yourself with?
- What are you going to use this time in a new location to accomplish?
- What are you not going to do?
- Finally… what is failure?
Quitting is okay. Failure is okay. It’s better to give up something completely so that you can make a full commitment to the next chapter in your life.
What’s truly awful is dragging your feet through an experience, and getting stuck somewhere with only half your heart invested.
Imagining failure is a step most of us glaze over, perhaps because it feels counter-productive or because it’s uncomfortable.
But if you take the time to imagine the worst case scenario, you’ll often realize that:
- It’s not that bad after all and
- It doesn’t take that much work to reverse your fortune, and return you to where you were before.
So take the time to do it. Examine these questions before proceeding with your planning. If they scare you, good.
“If you’re not scared, you’re doing something wrong.”
– David Horvath
What you’ll learn about yourself
If your weakness isn’t exposed, is it still a weakness?
I recently started jiu-jitsu. Until I did, I didn’t realize I had shit for elbows.
After sparring, I complained how sore my elbows were to my professors. They gave me a weird look, like “this guy only comes to class 3x per week why is he bitching about being sore?”
I’ve been icing them every night since, and I still feel a twinge.
Other weaknesses I’ve discovered:
- My cardio sucks. Learned that after gassing 37 seconds into my first roll
- I bruise like a peach
- Smaller, weaker people can sink a rear naked choke on me and force me to submit
Basically, I didn’t realize I was a big pussy until I started Brazilian jiu-jitsu.
Now, if I didn’t start jiu-jitsu, and never realized I had these weaknesses… would they exist?
Of course. I just didn’t know about them.
A good friend entered her first “serious” relationship a few years back. The first time she saw her now-husband talking to another girl, she felt the hot blood rush to her face, and a hand tighten around her throat like a vice. That car ride back to their apartment, she didn’t open her mouth, for fear of bursting into tears.
She never knew she was a jealous person. Until she did.
You don’t realize how unbalanced your strength is until lifting weights for the first time.
Most people discover they’re allergic to peanuts after their first reaction to peanuts.
We don’t realize our weaknesses until they’re exposed.
It’s no secret that moving to Los Angeles and starting a career in entertainment takes resilience, grit, courage. I’ve been saying it for the last 4 years.
You insist you realize it’s a long game. That your career may not gain traction after one month, three months, six… and you’re okay with that. That you’re prepared to cold call and cold email, in the face of deafening silence, until something gives. That you’ll eat ramen and crow in equal parts to make success happen.
I hope you’re right. Because one way or another, your weaknesses will be exposed.
The mission of this blog is to prepare you as much as possible, for:
Like sparring unveiled these uncomfortable truths about me — and forced me to learn how I can grow as a person — you’ll learn a lot about yourself on this move.
Until then, keep working, keep hustling. So when the time comes to face your weaknesses, you’ll be pleasantly surprised at how much room there is for growth.
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Photo Credit: Doran
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