Los Angeles vs Cincinnati = Fame vs Family

Comparing Los Angeles vs Cincinnati

I was just watching Joe Rogan’s interview with Adam Duritz from the counting crows. So if you’re in my age, I’m turning 40 this year and a few months here. But you grew up in the nineties, you knew the cashing crows and Mr. Jones and long December awesome music, but I’d never really seen an interview with him. And I like watching Joe Rogan. I don’t watch all his stuff because three hours, every few days is a lot, especially when you have five kids. But they were having this interview and they were talking about different cities. They’ve lived in specifically LA cause they were both in LA, but Adam was talking about moving from San Francisco to LA and the difference in the artist’s culture there that I found really interesting where when he grew up San Francisco was more of like starving artists and it was uncool if you got too popular, basically. And that’s what happened with his band casting crows. They like blew up from this kind of all indie scene. And then they were like on the radio everywhere and everyone in San Fran kind of got sick of them. But he liked moving to LA at that time because it was a working artist town is what he called it. Like, yes, everyone is seeking fame and that’s kind of all they care about, but everyone at least knows that. It’s not hidden and you can celebrate each other’s successes as you go.

Adam Duritz: “I was born here. I grew up here around all these same people and uh, we’re all gonna do this thing here too. And there’s a certain amount to which LA is about. Like, it’s a bunch of people who all decided they didn’t want to do what everyone else in their high school did, whether it’s to be, you know, a poet or a sculptor or a painter or a, or a musician or an actor or, or a model. But it’s still like, I can’t, I don’t want to stay here and just do this thing. I’m going to go over there and I’m going to go like, like it, and there’s a certain pioneer aesthetic about doing that. The problem is if you get there and then it just becomes about famous and famous and as opposed to I, I dig the part of it.”

“That is like, I got a dream and I’m going to go, I’m willing to go all the way over there to get it and to do it. I love that. I felt like I had that in common with all those people, but then there’s a side of it. You lose what you came there for originally. And it just becomes about chasing fame and success as opposed to doing anything for it. And it got really annoying right after the millennium, when a lot of the reality TV stuff started to become bigger and bigger and suddenly it’s just like fame for fame, same for fame sake is nothing about doing anything. And that was when I started to get, I lost my taste for LA”

It was a really interesting conversation for me. You should check out a blog post where we talked about Cincinnati as a place where your family can grow deep roots. Where you can think multi-generationally about your family. And I was just thinking about Los Angeles vs Cincinnati in that way. Now we live in a really weird world with social media, with that. I don’t think any of us fully understand where we all are basically. We’re all trying to create our own little mini worlds of fame. Right? And I mean, it’s an amazing tool, amazing power.

But I do think one of the things it’s doing to us is making us even more self-absorbed than we already are. And we care about likes and we care about shares and we care about followers. And LA is kind of like the pinnacle of that probably in the states in terms of the personality of a city where it’s about your fame and it’s about your persona and it’s about how big can you get from a follower standpoint, how famous you are. And I was just thinking of comparing Los Angeles vs Cincinnati. And it’s like if you’re moving to Cincinnati, you might be relocating here because of a job you might be moving here because of family, or those are usually the main reasons people were are moving to Cincinnati, but you may actually be trying to find a city in America.

That’s a great place to raise a family, like one of the best cities to raise a family. And a lot of times when people make that search, they start scouring different Midwest cities. And why is that? Well, I mean, there’s a few factors. Cost of living here is really low, but the amenities are still really strong. So you’ve kind of got this big city feel, but you’ve got like a small town feel with big city amenities. And that’s why a lot of people like it here. And I’m not saying that people don’t want to get famous here. They don’t want to get popular, or they don’t want to make a name for themselves, or they don’t want to go to their business or their company or their, you know, their network or anything like that. People still have that in them, those who are ambitious.

But the point on the Joe Rogan episode though, I thought it was really interesting that Adam made from counting crows was that LA is made up of all these people who left their hometown because they looked around in high school and they’re like, I don’t want to be like that. I’m not interested in living that life. I want to go make it big. I want to go make a name for myself. And so you’ve got a whole city of that, which is just really fascinating to me. And some people make it a slim percentage and they were talking about a lot of people, they try really hard and it doesn’t work out for them. And, and eventually, Rogan was saying like, they just say that they never really tried to get famous. You know, they just ended there and they’re kind of lying to themselves because they can’t deal with the failure.

That’s a tough gig. I get why people would want to do that. I guess the point I’m trying to make is when I compare that city in that personality to Cincinnati, and maybe you’re not from LA, you’re probably not, but maybe you’re from another city that’s similar in every city, I think has unique its own personality and its own attributes and its own characteristics. You can’t just put one label on a city, right? It’s multi-faceted and there are multiple characteristics, but there may be larger themes that rise to the top. And one thing I would say about my city here in Cincinnati, and I’m actually in Northern Kentucky right now, which kind of encompasses part of the greater Cincinnati area. That’s where I live in Northern Kentucky. It’s a humble, hardworking town that overall believes in family.

In comparing Los Angeles vs Cincinnati, Cincinnati is a place where your family roots can go deep. A place where you can raise a family and then you can be around your grandkids. And I get that. That’s not a goal for the people moving to LA, the thought of their grandkids has never crossed their minds. Like they’re not thinking about grandkids. They’re thinking about making it big and famous. One thing that happened to me when I was younger, was going through this Bible study of Genesis and a friend of mine who’s a little bit older than me ask this question that changed my life. He said, “have you ever thought of your great, great-grandson? I was like, forget LA just for a minute. We, as a culture in America, have a memory of about 80 years with our generations where we can remember our grandparents probably, but how many of you can name your great grandparents, their names even, which is just nuts.

Choosing Between Fame vs Family

And so the question was, how would you live a life where you are actually thinking about your great, great-grandson and the generations after them? How would you live your life differently? How would you build your family? What would you be going after? What would be the goals that you’re trying to achieve as a husband and a father? And that’s been a question that I’ve been pursuing for the last 10, 12 years now. It changed my life the way I’m living my life and the goals that I’m going after. but these are some of the questions that I definitely think about. I think Cincinnati is a unique place where if you are thinking about those questions which is not a big part of the population, I get that.

But if you’re like “Man, I want to build something with my family” and the phrase we use. I borrowed this from a friend of mine, Jeremy Pryor, you guys can check out his stuff at familyteams.com. He says that “multi-generational family team on a mission.” And there’s a lot in that statement. Multi-generational meaning, I’m thinking beyond just my kids. I’m thinking about my grandkids, maybe even my great-grandkids and beyond. And multi-generational family team where it’s all about the family. It’s less about the individual and more about the family, team, our mission. Which is you’ve got a job to do and you can do it better if you’re working together as opposed to a narrative where a family is all about individuals and maybe the best-case scenario is the parents give their kids a great upbringing and that launched them out of the nest and they springboard out to go make it on your own and you leave the family, goodbye, you never come back and you go make a name for yourself. It’s a very, very different narrative.

But it’s one that exists and I’m not trying to say –you’re following that narrative. Don’t try to follow that narrative. What I am trying to say is in comparing Los Angeles vs Cincinnati – in Cincinnati, Northern Kentucky is a place that if you’re seeking another kind of narrative or you’re thinking about a multi-generational family team, it’s a place where you can get it done.

Team Sztanyo Helping Families Find Their Way Home!

I hope you guys have a great day. if you are trying to find a city where you can build a strong family and you need to buy a house because those things come with it. If you like to discuss more about Los Angeles vs Cincinnati? Give us a call at team Sztanyo. You know I can talk to you about that and finding you the right neighborhood, finding you the right home that you have a vision for not only your kids but your grandkids and beyond. Let’s talk, love to chat about that with you. We’ll talk to you later.