10 Ways to Not Lose Your Soul in L.A.

10 ways not to lose your soul when you move to Los Angeles.

Not Available Lead
Complex Original

Image via Complex Original

Not Available Lead

You’ve probably already lost it. When you find yourself reading an article about holding onto it, there’s a serious chance it’s already gone. I’m talking about your authentic, passionate snowflake of a soul.

Because L.A. melts snowflakes. They blow in and drip out by the thousands every year. But you have a choice. You can have your $16 salad and eat it too. Of the 10 million people who live within Los Angeles’s sprawling limits, literally thousands of them still retain vestiges of their humanity. Many of them are even successful in the industries most notorious for soul-snatching (entertainment, fashion, even law!). The following ten tips are for anyone in the nominal City of Angels who wants to keep their superbadness intact on their quest for recognition. And for those of you who have already passed that Faustian fork in the road somewhere off Mulholland, there may even be a chance to get it back. Probably not, though. 

Jed Goldstein is an actor and writer living in Los Angeles. You can follow him on Twitter

RELATED: 10 Reasons Why Los Angeles Is Better Than New York
RELATED: A Guide to Fried Chicken in Los Angeles
RELATED: The 25 Douchiest Bars in Los Angeles

Don’t call it "The Industry."

Not Available Interstitial

Maintain standards.

Not Available Interstitial

Beware the fad.

Not Available Interstitial

Never get comfortable at a rooftop bar.

Not Available Interstitial

Contact the outside.

Not Available Interstitial

Don’t call celebrities by their first names.

Not Available Interstitial

Ride a bus.

Not Available Interstitial

Love first, hate later.

Not Available Interstitial

Be bamboo.

Not Available Interstitial

Don’t move to L.A.

Not Available Interstitial

Latest in Pop Culture