Alexa Marmion: Don’t Forget to Have Fun

Courtesy of Alexa Marmion

Alexa Marmion graduated from Lee University in Cleveland, Tennessee early during the COVID-19 pandemic and has since been living in North Hollywood, California. 

Marmion, who loves rock climbing and other group-oriented activities, finally feels like she can start living her life again as COVID-19 becomes less of an issue in some areas. 

“It feels like life is getting back to some ways that it used to be and I feel like I can finally start living again, pursuing things that I want to be doing and opportunities are becoming more and more available to do that,” she said. “So it is exciting, and I definitely have a lot of hope

for the future, more so than I have in the last three years.”

Marmion currently works as a barista as her “day job.” 

“It's like the fun way to say that I don't want to do this forever,” Marmion said. “So everyone that lives in LA says that their job is their day job because, typically, people are pursuing other things aside from what pays the bills until the thing that they're passionate about pays the bills.”

While at Lee Marmion studied digital media, but her love for media began long before she was at Lee. 

“Growing up my parents were involved in ministry, and then they kind of dropped off of that and started doing their own little passion projects, if you will,” she explained. “My mom became a fitness instructor because she's really passionate about health and wellness and just the holistic self. Then my dad is passionate about photography, so when they left the ministry work that they were doing they started doing those things.”

Marmion took interest in her dad’s photography from a young age. 

“I was always just really interested in what my dad was doing. He always had a camera. He was always testing lighting. He was always grabbing random things and testing reflections and pulling focus and going out into the middle of the woods and finding some random obscure thing to photograph and just always messing around. To me at the time, it just seemed like he was just playing like a kid,” she said. 

“I was like, ‘yeah, I want in on that’ because I was a kid and I wanted to play and it just seemed like fun. So I took interest in that very young.” 

Marmion’s parents quickly noticed her interest in her dad’s work. 

“As good parents do, they noticed that I was interested in that and they got me a silly little, you know, digital camera,” she said. “I loved that thing, like, the self timer was my favorite thing in the world. I would take 10 million selfies on it.”

As she progressed through her childhood, her photography and videography skills grew with her. 

“I actually was really into Legos as a kid as well, so I would make stop motion videos,” she said. “I would make little stop motion videos with my Legos, and my parents were, like, what the heck, that's actually so cool.”

She learned how to create stop motion by watching YouTube videos. 

“That's when I just started discovering YouTube and teaching myself how to do stuff,” she said. Then my parents got me a GoPro and I was unstoppable with that thing.” 

“We went on a ski trip and I made ski vlogs and we went on a cruise and I made a cruise vlog and did all kinds of silly videos and, I don't know, I was just always up to something. So I spent a lot of time doing that just because I thought it was fun,” she said. 

Marmion always knew content creation was her “vibe.” 

“In addition to that being my interest. I was also just really terrible at science, really terrible at math, really terrible at English and grammar, a really slow reader. Every academic path that you could imagine, was just incredibly below average,” she said. “So I was like, ‘well, if I suck at that stuff, I'll at least be good at this stuff.’”

“There's nothing for me in the academic world and not to say that I'm like dumb, it's just that stuff doesn't come to me naturally like it does for other people, and digital media stuff does come to me naturally,” she said. “So that's why I wanted to take that path because I was passionate about it, I thought it was fun, I did it in my own free time, and I didn't really see a lot of other things that I was interested in. So I was like, why not this?”

During her sophomore year at Lee, Marmion had the realization she wanted to move to LA, so when she graduated she headed straight to the City of Angels. 

When she arrived in LA, she didn’t know a single person. 

“I honestly wouldn't recommend moving anywhere without knowing anyone because it's very difficult and hard, but I persevered and met people, made friends, connected, and overcame that challenge,” she said. “It's definitely doable, but it is hard. You have to be very strong and resilient, and be okay with being alone, which I wasn't and then I learned how to be.”

Moving to LA during the height of COVID-19 presented its own unique challenges. 

Courtesy of Alexa Marmion

“My entire first year here was very much affected by COVID,” she said. “I had to get COVID tested all the time for work, and it's very exhausting. It's mentally exhausting, physically exhausting, and time consuming. A lot of the avenues that I wanted to go when I first got here were kind of not really an option because of COVID.” 

In LA, everyone creates some sort of content and aspires for a creative career. 

“In addition to that, the job market is really difficult here because there's such a dense amount of people here with the same if not better skill set than I which is difficult,” she said. 

Unlike in other parts of the U.S., there’s no shortage of people with film skills. 

“Whereas in LA it's like, you have these skills related to the film industry, and so do hundreds of 1000s of other people so it is hard to stand out,” she said. 

Marmion’s number one piece of advice for anyone considering moving out to LA for a creative career is to not forget to have fun. 

“LA is super fun. There's a lot of stuff to do, and while you're having fun, you will meet people that are like minded,” she said. “When you meet people trying to do the same things as you it just makes it so much easier.”

Courtesy of Alexa Marmion

“Have fun because if you're just out here chasing your dream, I think you're going to get jaded and drained and tired really fast,” she said. 

She also warns people to be prepared to face rejection. 

“Be prepared for a lot of rejection because, like I said, there's more than likely hundreds of 1000s of people trying to do the same exact thing as you unless you have some crazy, unique never seen before thing,” she said. “If you're trying to move out to LA to be an actor, you just have to face the reality that there are millions of people out here trying to be actors. So you need to work hard. You need to be humble, and just be ready for rejection.”

Finally, she encourages people to build a life they are proud of. 

Marmion has some, self-admittedly, ambiguous goals for her life and career in LA. 

“I definitely want to do something that gives me purpose every day. I want to do something that feels important to me, and I want to do something that I'm proud of,” she said. “I tell my parents all the time that I don't want to move away from LA until I've fulfilled my LA dreams, but I'm still kind of trying to figure out what my LA dreams are.”

To follow along with Marmion’s journey, click here.

Courtesy of Alexa Marmion