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VAMPIRE DIARIES Actor Calls Farm Life ‘More Gratifying’ Than Acting Career

VAMPIRE DIARIES Actor Calls Farm Life ‘More Gratifying’ Than Acting Career

By Movieguide® Contributor

VAMPIRE DIARIES star Ian Somerhalder says his life as a farmer is “far more gratifying” than his former Hollywood career. 

“It’s just very cool,” Somerhalder said of his and wife Nikki Reed’s life in rural California. “It feels far, and I’m not trying to sound like sort of incendiary or anything, but to me, it’s far more gratifying and feels way more elevated than being all fancy, which is fun too, but at the end of the day, this is where the rubber meets the road and it’s connective.”

The actor did admit that farming comes with a certain amount of failures. 

“You learn some of the things that you try and plant may not work, but other ones do,” he explained. “And then you get into this system of when the kids are involved and you and then your community’s involved, and then you find yourself living this really cool sharing, bartering system with your neighbors.”

Somerhalder also emphasized the importance of including his children in the farming process, as well as respecting nature. 

“That’s what we teach our kids and our friends teach their kids, is to be respectful of the balance and really appreciate that balance and live that balance,” he said. “And with that balance comes boundless harmony and boundless food and energy and fun and all those things that we want, but you can’t just take and take and take. It doesn’t work.”

Somerhalder has previously spoken about his decision to quit acting and focus on his new rural lifestyle, as well as spending time with his family. 

“I love what I did for a really long time. I love making films, I just did it for so long. We had an amazing run,” Somerhalder told E! News. “But this is our 2.0 version — about to be 3.0 version.”

Reed has also talked about the couple’s decision to retreat from Hollywood, telling Santa Barbara Magazine, “To be fully transparent about it, I really did not want to be in the public eye anymore.”

She explained that the couple’s dream is to live sustainably — “to achieve total food autonomy, to have zero connection to a supermarket, to city water, to anything like that — to be able to live without relying on any system.”

“So, you know, we’re not too far off from that,” Reed laughed. 

Movieguide® previously reported on Somerhalder and Reed’s life on the farm:

VAMPIRE DIARIES actor Ian Somerhalder doesn’t regret his decision to leave Hollywood for farm life.

“I love what I did for a really long time,” he said of his acting career. “I love making films, I just did it for so long. We had an amazing run. But this is our 2.0 version, about to be 3.0 version.”

Somerhalder previously told PEOPLE of farm life, “[It’s been] magic. It’s really the way it’s always supposed to have been. I think now you’re seeing a lot of people who were working in corporate offices, and you can see it now from a societal standpoint. People are having a really hard time getting back to work.”

His wife, Nikki Reed, added, “When you see the way that nature operates, you find compassion. It’s a beautiful thing to see what’s happening with children, to watch them participate in the growing of their food and the understanding of what food is and where it comes from.”

“I started connecting the dots between what you do for the planet and what you do for yourself,” she continued. “It’s an evolution and a lifelong pursuit. It’s become a way of living so much simpler.”


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