Angelina Anniversary in the City Of Angels

As I sit here on my balcony on a Thursday afternoon, feeling the cooling breeze relieve the heat of this hot Hollywood day, it strikes me that in a few days I will have been living in Los Angeles a year! July 11th is a date I affectionately refer to as my Angelina Anniversary!

This is an strange place this City Of Angels, and as anyone who has come here for more than just a vocation will tell you...if you need to learn what you're made of, Los Angeles is the place to do it.

I have found that in all the cities I've spend time in all over the world, so far, none have spoken to me as directly and as honestly as LA. I have a question, she gives me an answer- and usually in the strangest ways. She has been the most direct & loving of mothers to me...never telling me what I wanted to hear, but always revealing my truth to me! The truth is not always that easy to hear, as I'm sure anyone reading this can understand.

I got talking with a stranger on the street a few weeks ago. One of those rare people born and bred in LA. When he found out that I was coming up to my first Angelina Anniversary, he nodded his head with a sympathetically and said "Things getting tough now about now right? Just stick it out. It all gets better if you can make it past your first year". Intrigued at this stranger who was offering up so much insight, I let him continue.

"Yep, I've seen them come and I've seen them go. The first 3 months are either awesome or hell, depending on how much money you brought with you and what attitude came with it. If you make it past 3 months, months 4,5 & 6 are always hell because no matter how much money you brought with you, you're living off of credit cards from the 4th month on." Fascinated at his analysis I signalled for him to go on.

"Things calm down a little between months 6-10 but not by much. After that, everything gets really really tough. That's when you get to see what Hollywood is really about. You start missing home, you realise that the people here are mostly fake, and that most people are friends with you for one reason- to find out how being friends with you can help them". By this stage I was wondering who the fuck this guy was and how he knew so much about me. I continued to listen.

"Hollywood is different from the rest of the world. The people who come here and live here are usually stuck in limbo. They're waiting for their lives to start. They've come here to make it big but most of them haven't grown up enough before they get here so they get lost in trying to be a star. When it all goes wrong for them they start smoking too much weed or they just leave and move back in with their parents because they've run out of money." Looking at this hipster, a self confessed stoner who became utterly disappointed at the discovery that I didn't smoke, I was blown away at his insight into so many of the people I had met. I asked him to continue....

"Now, if you came here knowing how hard it's going to be, and you can make it past the 12 months, everything will open up to you at around 1 year and 3 months. It's like you've proved yourself to her [LA] and she starts to help you with whatever it is you need. If you stay for 2 years, you're never leaving."  We chatted for about another half an hour and I went about the rest of my day reflecting the whole time about what he'd said. I'd felt that this amazing woman [LA] had given me a heads up as to what was about to come and she'd used this conversation with the hipster stoner dude to get the message to me.

Things had become tough around that time, but only because I was being shown so much truth not only about myself, but about a lot of the people around me. Accepting that truth and letting go of some reoccurring patterns in my life was making acceptance tough. But she was telling me to stick it out. Armed with the knowledge she'd given me in her strange way, I maintained my focus on what I came here to do...create an album that embodies my exploration of my identity in a life that continues to fascinate and inspire me.

I was so inspired by the whisperings of this city, that I was lead to create this music video documentary for my previously released single 'All This Fear'. It shows the my journey so far in this intense yet blessed life of mine. If you haven't seen it yet please check it out below and share it with your friends. I hope that it inspires you and those you share it with.