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In this episode of The Motion of Gratitude podcast, Shannon sits down with creativity coach, award-winning author, director, and speaker Elizabeth Blake-Thomas, founder of Medicine with Words.

Elizabeth’s life is anything but linear—from moving across the world with two suitcases, to directing films, writing children’s books, and becoming a professor. Through it all, she’s become fiercely devoted to one thing: the power of words to shape our inner world, our sense of safety, and the way we move through life.

Together, Shannon and Elizabeth explore how language can either confine us or set us free, how grief can completely rewire our foundation, and why finding your word (like Elizabeth’s word, “safe”) can become a compass for how you live, love, and create.

This is a heartfelt, thought-provoking conversation about intention, grief, creativity, and giving ourselves permission to live by our own inner algorithm—not the one the world hands us.

In This Episode, We Explore:

• The power of words
  • How the words we were told as children still live in our bodies
  • Why phrases like “be successful” are often empty until we define them
  • The difference between saying words and feeling them
• Finding your “word”
  • How Elizabeth helps people move beyond vague goals into one core word (like freedom or safe)
  • Why her word “safe” guides everything—from where she sits in a restaurant to which work she says yes to
• Gratitude as a felt experience
  • Moving from “I should be grateful” to truly embodying gratitude
  • Simple examples of deep gratitude, like noticing the privilege of opening a fridge full of food
• Creating your own “algorithm” for life
  • How to be intentional about what you consume, who you spend time with, and what you say yes to
  • Elizabeth’s morning ritual and how she “sets her algorithm” for the day so she can end it feeling how she intended
• Grief, love & a reshaped foundation
  • Elizabeth’s experience of losing her beloved dog Chai and how grief has ripped her heart open and expanded her capacity for empathy
  • Why grief isn’t a set of neat stages, but a tunnel that becomes part of who we are
  • How her understanding of feelings and words deepened through this loss
• Autism, identity & a permission slip to be yourself
  • Elizabeth’s recent autism diagnosis and the immense relief and clarity it brought
  • How it reframed the way she sees her sensitivity, her reactions, and the way she processes grief
  • Why naming something can feel like an exhale—and a powerful act of self-acceptance
• Living with intention (and letting purpose evolve)
  • How Elizabeth defines “success” and why she shifted from chasing an Academy Award to recognizing her daughter and her life as her living, breathing “award”
  • Her Pyramid of Purpose and how she uses it to check if her choices are aligned
  • The reminder that our purpose is allowed to change with each season of life

About Elizabeth Blake-Thomas

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas is a creativity coach, award-winning author, director, and speaker whose work lives at the intersection of art, purpose, and transformation. She is the founder of Medicine with Words, a body of work dedicated to helping people use language as a tool for healing, clarity, and intentional livin

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