Hello, Hi, Hey
So a few days ago My Daughter turned 21 and I absolutely cannot believe it. We have had so much fun over the years, but the part that I have loved the most is our growth. Having a daughter has been one of the most rewarding and fulfilling journeys ever & continues to be💕There is nothing I love more than guide & direct her through any and everything daily👩👧💛✨🌟
We have learned so much along this journey and we still are!
If I could give Hannah, ALL the things, it would be the confidence to always know her self worth
✨The strength to chase her dreams!
✨ To know her mind, heart & hands are powerful and she alone can move her own mountains
🏔That she is capable of all things great
✨To realize that she is meant to dream & to dream big, never give up on the things that spark her soul & the things that stir her excitement where she can’t fall asleep💤😴
✨The discipline to hold herself accountable for her life
✨The wisdom to know when to speak her mind & when to hold steady in silence.
✨The ability to know how truly, deeply loved she is”💋🥳❤️😍
With that said, my next guest has a similar journey as mine and her daughter will be turning 21 yrs old in Sept🎂🎈❤️ This gorgeous gal lives with intention and is on a mission to heal the world one word at a time!
I love how I meet individuals along my journey that truly align with my personal growth and energetic frequency.
So let’s meet Elizabeth Blake-Thomas Author, Butterfly Doula + founder of Medicine with Words, “a practice that guides people to live with intention”
A little about Elizabeth:
Elizabeth Blake-Thomas, mind coach of “Medicine with Words”.
– Hitting 40, She felt lost.
– Being a single mum, She kept questioning her parenting.
– Plateauing in her career, She felt endlessly stuck.
Through research and her own self-reflection, She realized she had to turn inward to rewire her mental state in order to rediscover herself and her true purpose. Out of that personal growth, friends, family and strangers alike noticed her positive change and asked how she did it.
And from that, Medicine with Words was born to create the mind coach she wished she had and to share her newfound tools with others.
“She has published 2 books, travelled the world, been a professor at Pepperdine University, created a podcast, and directed and produced 24 films. She has been a theater director for 20 years, a film director for 6 years, a homeschooling teacher for 11 years, and a mother for 20 years (and counting).”
“When she’s running Medicine with Words, She is not a writer, a director, a traveler, or a professor. All of these experiences feed into her practice, think of her as a personal trainer for your mind.”
WOW, Love that!
Thank you so much Elizabeth for sharing with my community, blog and various platforms.
Please help me welcome Elizabeth🧘🏻♀️✍🏽🦋🤍 🧿
Elizabeth Blake-Thomas
Author + Butterfly Doula + founder of Medicine with Words, “a practice that guides people to live with intention”
Featured Entrepreneur: Elizabeth Blake-Thomas Author + Butterfly Doula + founder of Medicine with Words, a practice that guides people to live with intention.
Interviewed by: Anna Svetlík De La Rosa
Episode: #113
Date: 08/11/2023
MY INTERVIEW WITH ELIZABETH BLAKE-THOMAS
Q1. What did you want to be growing up?
I first remember wanting to be a vet. But my father put me off by asking me if I would like my hand up a cows bottom.
Then I believed I would be an actress and was again told by a couple of people that I wasn’t very good. Of course we tend to listen and believe the people that point out our own fear.
I realized what I enjoyed doing was being in the theater world. I was approached as a teenager and asked to run some theatre classes for young children at a local art center. It turned out I was a natural and really good at it. I set up my own theater company aged 14. I had children from all the local villages attend and then at the end of every semester we put on a performance! It was a huge hit and I ran this for over 6 years. I became a theatre director.
Q2. When you did you start Medicine with Words?
Medicine with Words has always existed, I just didn’t know it. I wrote a children’s book called “More Than a Book” aged 19. Along with my drama and theater skills, I had created one of the first mindful books for children. The trouble was it was too early for the world to fully integrate mindfulness, especially with children, so I kept it in my back pocket. I used the mindfulness I taught in my book to raise my daughter, it’s how I began guiding and teaching other people in my world. I never stopped coming up with mindful stories and taking notes.
Years later, arriving in LA from the UK I saw that LA seemed to be a place where this type of thinking fitted. I began writing, reading and learning more about all religions and spiritual beliefs based around mindfulness. This empowered me to keep going with my knowledge and I spoke at Pepperdine University where they asked me to become a professor running “Storytelling and The Power of Our Words” on their business MA program. Following this, it all just continued to flow and a very good friend who runs start ups suggested the name. So it came to life in 2019.
Q3. Do you have a motto you live by?
Living with intention. One of the techniques I use to ensure I continue to live in this way is to consider the following question:
”I only have_____ left!”
The blank space is meant to be filled in with a number and a situation. For example “ I only have 30 Christmases left. It might sound morbid but it’s practical and ensures intentional living.
None of us truly know how long we’ve got on this planet but when we actually decide to live with intention we can make clearer decisions on how we want to spend our life.
For example: I have 18 summers with my daughter before she leaves for college, I have 30 Christmases left with a parent, I have 4 halloweens left with my child before they think I’m not cool enough to hang out with them. Of course, it’s impossible to know for sure, but if we have the belief system of making each moment count, we can live with intention and purpose. It means we won’t waste a single moment!
Q4. You have an amazing podcast with your daughter, Filmmaking without Fear, tell us a bit about it?
I was a theater director as I previously mentioned, and my daughter was and still is a TV and film actress. On set I would support her, and one day someone said I should be a director! I was there to support Isabella but I knew that one day, (living intentionally, I only had 6 years left of legally needing to be on set with her) I could set myself up as a film director. So I did! I wanted to create something that could be beneficial for Isabella once she became an adult. So I created Mother Daughter Entertainment. A production company where we could write, produce, I could direct, and we could create movies together. My first year as a director, I directed 4 movies in 12 months. This start to my journey is what set the podcast, and my book of the same name, off on its own journey. Everyone wanted to know how I had done it. The podcast seemed to be the perfect way to share everything I had learned along the way.
Q5. In the past how many feature films and narrative shorts, have you directed over your career?
I believe it’s over 20 over a 6 year period. It’s been intense and fabulous. I still have a few wonderful inspirational stories to tell and I’m honored I’ve been given the rights to those true stories. However, currently I now only choose films or stories that are totally aligned with Medicine with Words’ philosophies. By being aligned I consider what I want to put into the world and leave as a legacy. I also ensure this mindful practice is utilized on my sets. Having experienced a few incredibly toxic sets where I was bullied and witnessed some of the crew bullied, I realized this was not how I would want to work ever again. I wanted to ensure my daughter didn’t experience this toxicity as well.
Q6. What does success mean to you as a powerful / determined woman?
It’s a great question because my idea of success has changed as I’ve gotten older, from a practical sense, but my core beliefs haven’t changed. I believed success amounted to tangible items, you could show your success by the car you drove, the type of house you lived in, or the holidays you went on.
As a minimalist, who has just sold everything and moved in with my daughter in her apartment, I realized I didn’t need what I had, it was actually preventing me from living the life I wanted, the life that I knew would make me successful. I lived on a boat and had a cool VW 1969 bus, but both of these vehicles needed love and attention. I wanted to put my love and attention into my passions.
My dog, my daughter, and my writing, alongside running Medicine with Words. I wanted to be of service to the world. So I had to make big decision in order to change my life. In order to be successful/powerful/determined I have to give myself free mental space.
I have the privilege of having that each day. I wake up and hug my daughter and dog every morning. I get to work with and talk to my daughter everyday. I see the ocean most days and get to create. Draw, write my things and guide people on their journeys. I can’t believe I get to do this every single day. I get to transform lives, including my own. Without the burdens of life I can give so much back and I feel so successful because of this. I’m determined because I know the benefits of what I provide as I’ve seen first hand how it’s changed people lives so I will never stop, and powerful because I don’t have the power, it’s in others, I just help them recognize it.
Q7. How do you process work load stress or personal stress or just to much coming at you all at one time? Ex: Exercise, Meditation, Journal, Creating or all the above.
I have built a concept called a “Pyramid of Purpose”. This allows me to live with intention and make very clear decisions on what I need to do resulting in me being able to say yes and no to the right things. It’s literally a pyramid with cloud words around the outside and then four layers in the pyramid.
Once I’ve filled the pyramid out I answer a simple question “does…..get me closer to……” basically I prioritize what the most important thing to me to work on or achieve or get to, is.
Then I ask myself if for example going to that event I’ve been invited me to, gets me closer to my goal. If it does I say yes if not I say no! The cloud words are also useful because I have to tick at least 3 of those in order to make the right decision about whether I say yes or no to something.
I also take a lot of time for self care which I call “Brain Breathing.” This is where I sit and stare at the ocean or the sky and clear my mind.
I also make sure I have plenty of time to create. Coming from London I was used to having a meeting every hour and being here in LA, I realized that wasn’t even possible. But more than just doing less, I understood my life had to be totally different. So instead of trying to fit so much into my life, I have paired it right down. I have J.O.M.O, joy of missing out. I decide who I want to spend my time with, how, and where. I spend a lot of time with myself.
The ten main tools I created for my book, “Living with Intention” are how I live my life. Each day ensuring I spend time on those tools.
I also share with people when I can, and that is the best feeling in the world. I try to remove stress completely from my life. I recognize when I feel “stressed”. My body reacts and I listen to it. I sit in the sun and let it warm me through to my bones, and remove myself from the outside world.
I have just completed my butterfly doula training, this was a two week, self retreat, at a wildlife habitat, and nature taught me everything I need to know in life. To disconnect and be on nature’s time zone really brings us back to our core and grounds us with Mother Nature. It’s possible to do this any time during the day, by actually removing your shoes and standing on the Earth, relaxing your mouth and eyes, breathing and being aware of your breathing and just stopping for a few minutes. It works wonders.
Q8. If you could speak to one woman from history, who would it be?
I would have to say Maya Angelou. I am a huge fan of not only her writing, but also her work as a civil rights activist. Angelou was such a powerful woman, her words brought to life on the page. Her journey from dealing with trauma from her childhood through writing was so inspiring to me that I fell in love with her work. To think that she was still around up until 2014 is mind boggling to me. This woman who had endured so much and uplifted so many, was around in a world where so much and yet so little progress had happened.
Q9. Favorite quote?
“If you don’t say anything you can’t be quoted!”
This is actually something I say all the time and have always told my daughter. On a simple level. it’s about being kind and thinking before you speak. On a deeper level it’s actually about us saying less in general. We all talk too much. and if we listened more and then really heard what was around us and what was being said, it can be quite transformational. Our ego backs down and we realize we don’t need to give opinions or be right.
One of my others is:
“Peace, love and understanding.”
If we all took this on board each day, the world would be a much calmer happier simpler place!
Q10. Where can we find you?
Website: HERE
Instagram: @Elizabeth_b_t
Facebook: HERE
Twitter (X): HERE
LinkedIn: HERE
Medium: HERE
Tiktok: HERE
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