Elizabeth Blake-Thomas - Unlock the Secret to Living a Truly Fulfilling Life

What would you be willing to do to live your dream life? Leave family and friends? Move halfway around the world to a place where you know nobody else? Dive into your passion, a career where failure is the norm? Being willing to make mistakes and learn as you go? 

     Well, that’s what my guest in this episode, Film Director Elizabeth Blake-Thomas did. She left her home in England to seek success in Hollywood and her inspiring story can help you, too, take that dive into what you really want out of life. Elizabeth shares the keys to what she did, including:

·      Why dreams matter

·      How to keep a positive mindset, no matter what

·      How changing your narrative can help you overcome fear

·      Why slowing down can be good for you

·      The importance of mentors

     Whether you’re seeking fame and fortune or just the courage to follow your dreams, you’ll enjoy Elizabeth’s insights on this inspirational episode of Dream Power Radio.

     Elizabeth Blake-Thomas is a British award-winning director and philanthropist based in Los Angeles. Her romcom Just Swipe, starring Full House/Fuller House star Jodie Sweetin, was purchased by Viacom, available now on various streaming platforms. She recently wrapped up directing action thriller Hunt Club starring American Beauty's Mena Suvari and Mickey Rourke. Elizabeth’s previous feature Caralique is a family drama starring Disney+ star Isabella Blake-Thomas and Chocolat’s Helene Cardona. She also exec produced thriller Et Tu starring Lou Diamond Phillips and Malcolm McDowell, co-produced Sony AFFIRM's Moonrise, and 1st Assistant Directed on action-thriller Murder at Hollow Creek starring Jason Patric, Penelope Ann Miller, and Mickey Rourke. 

     Elizabeth is the co-founder and resident director of entertainment company Mother & Daughter Entertainment. Her latest directing projects include wrapping up a TV episode of Sony AFFIRM's upcoming show Shadrach, as well as YA supernatural thriller Karma's A Bitch, starring a stellar ensemble cast including Once Upon a Time's Isabella Blake-Thomas, Candyman's Tony Todd, and Disney Z-O-M-B-I-E-S 3's Terry Hu and Pearce Joza. 

     Elizabeth is also the founder of mind coaching practice Medicine with Words. Through workshops and sessions, Elizabeth shares mindful tools to help others navigate life and live intentionally. Elizabeth is the author of Filmmaking Without Fear, a multi-medium resource curated for indie filmmakers. Her FWF podcast is available on all streaming platforms, and the book of the same name is available on Amazon and Walmart.com. Her next book, Living with Intention, is soon to be published as an interactive guidebook for her Medicine with Words practice.     

     Elizabeth frequently speaks on panels and at events, both as a creative and as a Medicine with Words coach, sharing her passion for storytelling and healing with others.

Website: https://www.medicinewithwords.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.

Chapters

• 1:33 Elizabeth's Dreams
• 3:16 The Journey To Hollywood
• 6:51 Dealing with Fear
• 11:07 The Importance of Saying Yes
• 12:11 Handling Rejection
• 19:33 Slowing Down and Simplifying
• 22:54 Manifesting and Setting Goals
• 24:42 Finding and Learning From Mentors

Transcript

Announcer (00:00:04) - This is Dream Power Radio, the place where your dreams turn into reality. Here is your host, Debbie Spector Weisman.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:00:13) - Hello. Hello. Hello and welcome to Dream Power Radio. I'm your host, certified Dream Life Coach, Debbie Spector Weisman This is a place where we talk about dreams, both daytime and nighttime dreams and how you can use them to make the internal shift to a life you love and rediscover the truth of who you really are. Some of you may know that before I rediscovered my dreams and before I created this podcast, I was involved in the entertainment business. My husband is a writer and director, and together we have a company that's involved in many aspects of feature film production and post-production. It's a crazy business, to be sure. It takes a special kind of person to succeed in it. In my opinion, probably the greatest quality you need to have is passion, as you will encounter person after person whose sole mission in life seems to be to discourage you, cut you down, or in many other ways, make you feel like you have no business being there.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:01:14) - Well, one such person who has that passion and so much more is my guest today. Elizabeth Blake-Thomas is an award-winning director who has spearheaded a number of projects and has created a production company with her daughter called, appropriately enough, Mother and Daughter Productions. Elizabeth is also the author of the book Filmmaking Without Fear and is going to talk to us about what it takes to be a success in all areas of your life. Welcome to Dream Power Radio.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:01:44) - Elizabeth Oh, thank you for having me. I love that introduction. I was really listening thinking, yes, I have crazy dreams at night, and I Google them every morning and then obviously I have totally dreams in the day. So it's fabulous that you explore all of that.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:01:59) - Oh, absolutely. And I should ask you about your dreams. I mean, did you have a dream when you were living in England that said, oh, I have to go to Hollywood now?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:02:09) - I didn't actually I didn't think of it as something that was even possible.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:02:16) - That's the thing about a dream. I often feel like dreams is something that you think you can have, like a dream to be this. I dream to be that LA was this place that was 6000 miles away. Not even possible. It's where famous people lived. And so that dream didn't exist like that. A dream of being successful in my industry was there, but never the 6000-mile crossing. And somewhere like Hawaii was on another planet, you know.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:02:43) - Very much so. Well, Elizabeth, I brought you on here today not so much talk about the movie business, but to get behind the mindset that you needed to develop, to bring you to where you are today, you're very much an example of someone who followed her dream and is living the life she loves, which is what I believe we should all live our lives. So tell me a bit about the journey that brought you from England and how you summoned the courage to leave to go out to Hollywood to face what really was at the time an unknown future.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:03:16) - You're right. It was very unknown. And I will say that that journey is still continuing constantly. Even this morning, I often wake up and have my epiphanies and I'll say, I understand this now, or I get why this feels like this. You know, this this mental journey as well as a physical journey has taken me all of this time and will continue as I go because I'm constantly learning new things as well. So the journey of 6000 miles was a very simple journey of packing six suitcases. You know, the practical side of things was very much, okay, what do I need to do to get from A to B and how am I going to do it? And there are things like your visas and things you have to put in place to do that. But the mental preparation for it, I almost feel like I'm glad I didn't know because if I had known what that would be, I might not have gone for it. I always use this analogy of having a baby. If someone tells you how painful it is, you might not do it again and again.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:04:16) - So this whole world's I'm very much for gung ho. Go for it. Let's see what happens. And just hoping and praying because you put all of this passion into it that it will work out for the right reason. So that's how I kind of tackled everything I was coming into.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:04:38) - I also want to just reiterate something you said about it being a journey, and you're still on the journey because so many people think, oh, well, I'm here and I'm going to do something to transform myself and that transformation is going to happen, and then then you're done. But it's like, no, you may have a new way of thinking or a new mindset, but you have to continually feed and continually go on that journey and that's going to lead you. To more places that maybe you think you were never going to go.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:05:06) - They absolutely. And that's actually the exciting part of it because it was the disillusion that I did have, which was when you get to Hollywood, the concept of you've made it is that you win an Academy Award.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:05:19) - And I did think, Oh, well, that's the top of the ladder. Well, I've realized this ladder never stops because once you've done that, you'll want to do something else anyway. So these rungs exist so that you can just continually climb, and you'll learn as you climb. And what you learn is what is exciting.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:05:37) - Absolutely. And you're speaking about the Academy Award. Hollywood is littered with people who won Academy Awards and then you never heard of them again. So even like you get an Academy Award and then you're golden for the rest of your life, you know, that doesn't exactly work that way.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:05:52) - That's the beginning. That actually becomes the first rung of the ladder. And again, that's what I realized. I thought I'd climbed all these rungs and was nearly there and then thought, oh, no, what I've done is actually build a solid foundation. I've actually just been on the solid foundation now almost. Your Academy Award is the starting point and then the rest of it follows. But you learn that as you're doing it.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:06:14) - And that's what that's what life's about. It's about the journey.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:06:18) - It is. And another part of life that I think everybody faces, especially when they're looking at themselves and saying, What I'm doing isn't working and I need to change. I need to do something else. They're faced with that horrible four-letter word fear. How did you deal with fear? You must have had fear when you landed in Hollywood. Not having a job, not really having a place to go and just there to with the passion that you had and the mindset that you're going to succeed. But how did you deal with the fear?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:06:51) - Well, it is funny because I think one of the things people would say to me is I don't have any. Maybe that was a short fuse. I never got wired in my brain because I kind of don't have fear. And the way I've been able to convince myself that there is no fear now, I don't mean a fear of heights or a fear of spiders. You know, sometimes there are things I don't like that.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:07:13) - But this actual fear of what it is in life and going for it is because I have this innate belief that it's going to work out the way it's supposed to work out. So the expectations are removed. And I think fear comes from expectations. For example, if someone had said to me, okay, you've been there now 11 years and you were supposed to or you should have, you know, all those diseases that we have won an Academy Award, then okay, does that mean I am now failing? So therefore I should have had fear in that because that was my expectation. No, my I didn't have any. Anything that happened was a bonus to me. Anything. Because I've come from somewhere with nothing to come here. Everything is a bonus. And if you shift that mindset and it's all about changing the narrative for that, you can then put yourself in a place of, well, it doesn't matter because it's only going to be a lesson. I'm only going to learn from this. So removing expectations, understanding that everything is a lesson, then you don't need to have fear.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:08:16) - I've got a fabulous book I'm looking at actually, that you are standing on called Fear is Not an Option. How ironic. That's one of my books.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:08:24) - Oh, that is wonderful. And so important. Then you have everybody else in the world who is facing a change and they have doubts. And especially if they're trying to get something and let's say they're trying to get a job and they don't get it and they start to feel, okay, well, is it me or is it what? How do you shift to have that mindset so that you have that feeling of no expectations? Life is a wonderful journey. Everything's going to work out. How do you make that shift?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:09:02) - Well, I often use the phrase, what's the worst that can happen? Okay. That to me sums up everything I do. Okay. So if I'm going for this, but what's the worst that can happen? And generally there isn't anything horrendous. Now, I'm not talking about a life death situation and I'm not talking about if I don't get this job, my family are going to lose their home, then that's a practical thing.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:09:25) - We need to look at that as practical and say, okay, what do you need to earn then go and get a job here or do that. And you might have to put your passion aside for getting that going to the what's the worst that can happen emotionally? Okay. You don't get that job. Well, you try again. Every no is closer to the next. Yes. And these are phrases that people throw out, but they're really true. So let's say somebody doesn't want to make my movie. Okay, well, I'll go somewhere else. Or maybe I need to make it. There are other ways of doing things. And I think if you've got an understanding of if you truly believe in it and you have that passion, then you can make it happen. It just might not be exactly how you thought. And again, is that your expectation or is that other people's expectations on you? You know, my mum said to me, oh, you're going to be a director. Oh, gosh, is that okay? You know, I don't know.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:10:17) - Can you earn any money from that? And I said, well, I think Steven Spielberg's doing okay. But again, the expectation of what that is from her perspective the other day sold everything I owned. I live on a boat; I had a VW bus. Everybody else's expectation is, oh, are you going to be all right? Is that going to be okay? And I knew I needed to do that in order to go up to my next level of where I am on my journey. So it's a mixture of things that I use.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:10:42) - Yeah. And think also at least what I've been able to learn about you is I think a lot of your success comes from saying yes when other people say no. So would you agree to that?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:10:55) - Oh, definitely, because my first movie was a quarter of a million budget. And then my next movie, my mentor said to me, you’ve got to make your next one. I was like, I'm sorry, I've got to do this all again.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:11:07) - What? This isn't just it. And I made one for 26,000, you know, there was no, and I just did it. And then I went up and that led me to the next person who invested. That led me to the next person. So if I hadn't said yes to taking it back, to even coming to LA, I wouldn't be doing what I'm doing now. And I love working backwards and thinking, oh, how did I get there? And I'm in a place at the moment where again, my life is. Totally shifted and I am practicing what I preach in a very different way and supporting others in that and guiding them to live with intention, because I feel that is the most important aspect of how we can achieve what we want to achieve.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:11:49) - So true. What about rejection? Because Hollywood is just filled with rejection. The many other fields where it's the same mean I came from, from book publishing and where, you know, I can't tell you how many rejections you have to deal with before you find somebody who takes it on.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:12:07) - So how do you handle rejection?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:12:11) - Yes, it's a very interesting one. How do I handle it? Because I don't think I even acknowledge it's rejection. If I'm honest, I don't believe I use that term. If I'm talking to somebody, I think it's because you have to you have to have a thick skin, but you also have to acknowledge that it's not right for that person. So don't feel I've been rejected from me. I feel like it's rejected because that person wasn't right for it. So therefore it's just getting me closer to the person that is. It was just that. Yeah, that just didn't work out for that person. Would you like to invest in this movie? No. Oh, okay. It's because it's not right for you. So when I find the person that's right, then that will work out. And I also believe in my projects. I'm also very I'm rational about things. I don't sit here like a lot of people and say, you know what, I've got the next thing I've got the next big thing.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:13:09) - Actually, I think I've got something that's good, but no one really knows. So again, an expectation on myself, Do I like it? Am I passionate about it? Do I love it? Do I believe there's the right person for it? Yes. So therefore, you just keep on going until you put all those pieces together.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:13:27) - You know, as you're saying it, it brings to mind the whole idea of self languaging is that, yes, you don't say, I've been rejected. You say you say, oh, this just wasn't right for this person because that does give you saying it. Rephrasing it that way gives you the impetus to say, okay. I just need to find somebody else, or I'll go to the next person instead of if you if you dwell on the rejection part, then you're, you're, you're internalizing it. And this incentivizes you to go to that next person to try to seek out the next person.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:14:03) - Yes, I changed the narrative all the time on the way I'm thinking.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:14:07) - I also find the right words for everything, something I've just done recently, which is going on my own healing journey and working out my triggers, my traumas, understanding them, put piecing them together. And it's just so incredible when you work out what that one thing is, because then when you look back over it, you realize every decision you make or every reaction you make is based on that. And I've realized mine is safety. Do I feel safe? If I don't feel safe, then I react in some way. I worked out this morning that somebody else that was in their behavior, I thought it was their values were different to mine. And I realized that they don't have empathy. So when you find that correct word or when you find the correct way of looking at things and changing those words to fit your narrative that changes your heart, your soul, and you don't have fear. In fact, my book, Filmmaking Without Fear, I was going to have my next book as Living Without Fear, and I changed it to living with intention.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:15:13) - Just that shift. So it's I can have a huge impact.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:15:17) - Oh, I certainly see that. And speaking of impact, we have to take a short break here, where you're speaking all about mindset and success with director Elizabeth Blake Thomas. And we'll be right back. If you're not pleased with the trajectory of your life, the time to begin your own personal transformation is now in your dreams can help pave the way. How? By tapping into your unvoiced confidence. What is unvoiced confidence? You say it's acceptance of your abilities and qualities. It's a state of mind coming from liking and even loving yourself and feeling free to say or do anything you want without concern for the judgment of others. You were born confident that may have had a chipped away, little by little by the negative self-beliefs you've picked up over the years. If you're looking for the heightened energy, clarity of thought and the feeling of being more alive, that comes from self-confidence, you can rediscover it by paying attention to your dreams.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:16:20) - Need some help doing this? Go to my website The Dream Coach Net and sign up for my complimentary dream Discovery session. I can help show you how your dreams can help you return to the confident person you were always meant to be. Again, go to the dream coach Net the dream Coach dot net.

Announcer (00:16:40) - Welcome back to Dream Power Radio with your host, Debbie Specter.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:16:45) - Weisman Yes, Welcome back to Dream Power Radio. I'm your host, Debbie Specter. Weisman And we're talking about mindset and success and all that good stuff with Elizabeth Blake. Thomas Well, Elizabeth, you also founded a company called Medicine with Words that speaks about developing mindful tools so that people can live a life with intention. What do you say would be the most important thing a person needs to do to create an effective mindset?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:17:16) - Well, it's a very interesting question because everybody is so different and everybody's at such a different place in their life. But I think there are some practical things we can do as well as those mental things each day.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:17:29) - For example, when I wake up in the morning, I try not to and by the way, try not to is very important because if we put expectations on ourselves to be perfect, we're never going to be successful. So I try not to immediately turn to technology. I try to go and get a healthy glass of water with a slice of lemon in it. I try to wake up with that positive mindset of, okay, how do I want my day to go? How do I want to feel at the end of my day? And just those four things can actually shift you into a positive mindset for your day. That one question How do you want to feel at the end of your day can then help you work out and plan how your day is going to be. So I have these little practical tools like that as well as this living with intention. I've created things that help me decide how I want to live my life. And I think we all have different tools that we utilize, but it's finding that tool and that modality that works for you.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:18:35) - Because if you have this life of just kind of like, oh, I don't know what I'm doing or where I'm going, or let's see how the day takes me again, that's fine if you're choosing that. It's all about the intention.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:18:49) - Very important. The other thing is that we live in a fast paced, go world rush, rush to go everything. But you say there's a benefit in slowing down. Why?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:19:01) - I love it so much. I love it so much so. And I was in London, you know, everything is so close to each other. So you can literally put in a meeting every half an hour if you want to. You get on the tube and you're dashing around. And it's a fast-paced life in the city. And I came to LA thinking I could do exactly that. But I very quickly realized the 4 or 5 does not allow you to do that. And so bit by bit, I was forced into a slower existence. But what I add to the word slowing down is actually the word simplicity.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:19:33) - I try to be as minimalist as I can, but simplicity to me is a better concept. If you afford yourself time, which is one of the most precious gifts we have Time to sit and breathe, time to think, time to deliberate, time to dream. All of that is put into this one word of time by slowing down actually gives us more time. And I didn't realize that. I felt like I needed to fill my day because, oh my gosh, I'm running out of time. I'm halfway through my midlife transformation. This is it. I need to fill the days more and actually slowing down and simplifying what you own, what you have, what you decide to do in your day. Gives you a much healthier mindset and a much healthier heart.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:20:25) - You just said something interesting because you did say it's simplifying in terms of what you own. And so many people believe that the way to success is to acquire. You know, how many things do I have, how many cars do I have? How many? Whatever I have? Then you're saying that that's not really beneficial to our health?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:20:46) - No, it's not.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:20:47) - I've just sold everything, and I've literally got rid of everything that I own. In fact, we laugh because I've moved back into my daughter's house, and I live in a cupboard. That's where my stuff is. And I personally have never felt happier and healthier because for me, I believe we all have these filing cabinets in our brain and filled with all the things that we need to do. I have now got less filing cabinets, which means I can put more effort into the things that matter now. I loved living on a boat and when the time was right for that, that was my simple life. That was incredibly simple. But then things needed to be looked after and done on it and things changed. So in order for me to put my time and energy into my books or my daughter, I needed to sell it. My VW bus. I loved having a VW bus. It was my transport. But it's vintage. It needs love and care and attention, as everything should. And the time in that meant that I didn't have that time to put into other things.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:21:49) - So now I've been able to reduce what I put my time into, and I am much healthier and happier for it.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:21:56) - I know it seems such a counterintuitive idea. Slowing down equals more time.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:22:03) - Yes. Yes, it does. It does. And it's a hard one to get into. I say I'm very I'm a professional now at when I say doing nothing, I don't mean that because I'm constantly creating and writing. But for other people, they might think I'm doing nothing. Remember, I was lying there one day. I'm actually on the back of my boat and the boat neighbor came up and always wanted to talk to me. He was very sweet, and I looked like I was doing nothing, but my brain was creating and working and coming up with ideas. But yes, I look like I'm doing nothing, and we need to give ourselves the time to do that.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:22:39) - Yes, it's so true. And on a metaphysical level, we're actually raising our frequency, our energy level. And when we do that, we do feel lighter.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:22:49) - And we also do open up our brain for that creative space.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:22:54) - Yes. I'll show you a prime example. I bought my little book here to show you for six hours. I sat there by the beach, and I literally created page after page after page. And it just kept on coming to me because I was giving myself six hours to think and follow through and draw and write. It was the most incredible six hours I've had the other day. That's a luxury to me. I feel very privileged that I have that luxury. So I was really manifesting and putting it out there.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:23:28) - And it said most people probably would say six hours. I don't have that, but you don't need to do it in six hours. You know, you can start off, I like to say when you're doing things, trying to make changes in your life, you could do it in baby steps. You know, start.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:23:44) - Absolutely start.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:23:45) - Out. If you only have five minutes, use those five minutes. Well, and it.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:23:49) - Is changing the way you live. It's changing your mindset of that and having that practical concept of oh, hold on a minute. Instead of doing this, I could do this. Instead, instead of turning on Netflix, maybe I could do this, but you have to want to do it. That's the thing. I've realized that this isn't about like any habit. You can't stop someone smoking if they really don't want to stop. It's the same if you don't if you're not there in your journey yet and you're not at the right place, then I'm not going to force you. But it is about taking that understanding and seeing, and you can show and teach by just being the person that turns up with a glow and they go, how did you do that? You know, that's happened to me quite a lot. So I try to guide in that way.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:24:35) - Yeah, when people see that, they always say they want to know, how did you do it?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:24:39) - Exactly. Exactly.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:24:40) - Yes.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:24:42) - Getting back to something a little bit more practical that doesn't involve creating a mindset is the idea of mentorship, because that was very important for you when you got to Hollywood and trying to start that. Talk to me about what someone should look for if they want to seek out a mentor.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:24:59) - You're right. In fact, it is continuing with what we're saying because it's leading by example. You know, anybody that leads by example, you want to be around. And so luckily, my daughter was actually in the industry. So I was on set and experiencing that, but not yet understanding that my shift was going to be on set as well because I'd been a. Theater director. So my head was just supporting her and my mentor. I have 2 or 3. One of them came to me because I was at a film festival, and I became very good friends with him, and he was the one that initially said You should be a director. And I said, how do I do that? And he said, you just say you're a director again.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:25:39) - It goes back to that language that we use. I am a I am an author, I am a butterfly doula, I am a director. I am whatever it is, you say it and you are it. And so that mentor came to me by me being in the right place. I was at a festival for films and that was the industry I was going to be in. Obviously, if I was looking for a mentor to help me learn how to build a house, that wouldn't have been the right place. You have to put yourself in the right place to find that mentor. Again, with the fear of rejection, there is no fear. Just ask if there is somebody that you think you like the way they live, the way they work. You want to emulate them, seek them out and contact them. I have another mentor who is a manager and again, he is the one that has helped me then turn my concept of how I film into something that could earn money or something that is leveling up.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:26:37) - So again, different mentors for different things. I don't think it's about just one person and it's about the knowledge. It's about going out there and asking as many people as possible. I was thinking of doing this. What are your thoughts? And I mentor quite a few people. I help them understand how to get from A to B, especially crossing the pond.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:26:58) - So you're not only being mentored, but you are mentoring others and giving back. In that sense.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:27:04) - Exactly.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:27:05) - How important was it for you to start a company with your daughter?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:27:09) - Very important. I believe that from my heart that the most incredible thing to do is to be able to work with your children. If you're in the same industry. I think that's just a phenomenal idea and concept. And by the age of 12, we've supposedly spent 75% of our time with our children. Well, I was thinking that is not the case. I have got my whole life with her. This is not going to happen. I can't say I've only got 25% left.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:27:36) - So we were in the industry together. We're naturally working together. We naturally get on and we actually mentor each other. She teaches me an awful lot and I guide and teach her. So it was a natural progression where we'd made these films that said, Let's put them under an umbrella company. Mother daughter entertainment seemed to make sense. And then I knew that when she got to an age that she could take over the company, I could pass that on to her and we'd built it together. It wasn't just, oh, I've built something. And by the way, you're going to be very fortunate. I'm just going to give it to you. We built it together. She has as much passion behind it as I do, and she understands it and sees how hard I've worked. Again, setting an example in that. So now she has taken that over. I just direct things and work with her and that level. But she is in charge. Mean I love. She knows so much more than me.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:28:32) - I listened to her on phone conversations and she blows my mind.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:28:36) - So Elizabeth, what's next for you?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:28:39) - Well, I have got some very exciting things coming by the end of the year. My next book, Living with Intention, will be out. I'm traveling next year to actually do a book tour around the world. I've also started writing my next book called Life Love Loss Lessons from My Dog, and that is a beautiful memoir. I'm also running several workshops and sessions with medicine with words one in Beverly Hills, one in LA, one in Bali. So I'm actually going worldwide with that as well. And then from a film perspective, I've got the most beautiful, inspirational story I've been given and I'm going to be directing that. Hopefully it's being written by an Academy Award winning writer at the moment. So maybe in the next 12 months or so.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:29:26) - Oh, wonderful. Well, Elizabeth, how can people find out more about you and your work?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:29:30) - So I have my Instagrams, TikTok’s, all of that.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:29:34) - Their medicinewithwords @ medicinewithwords or @Elizabeth_ B_ T. We also have our websites medicine with words and motheranddaughterent.com.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:29:46) - Well, Elizabeth, thank you so much for being on Dream Power Radio today.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas (00:29:50) - Thank you and hope everyone's dreams come true.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:29:53) - We've been speaking with filmmaker and author Elizabeth Blake-Thomas. I hope you enjoyed today's program. If so, please hit that subscribe button so you don't miss out on any future episodes. Until next time, this is Debbie Spector Weisman saying sweet dreams, everybody.

Announcer (00:30:09) - You've been listening to Dream Power Radio with your host Debbie Spector Weisman. For more information on Debbie or to sign up for her newsletter, go to Dream Power Radio.com. This has been Dream Power Radio.