we don't make an impact in the world because we don't think highly enough of ourselves you know we don't think we're worthy who am i to change the world who am i to create a movement who am i to create an organization or mind valley or you know and i think that that's a terrible obstacle because if not you then who is going to make an impact [Music] hi everyone and welcome to the mindvalley podcast today's guest is elizabeth wrong she's a german american tv and film actress best known for playing assistant district attorney serena sutterlin in the american tv series law and order and detective kate lockley in the tv series angel she's been in over 80 movies from joy to bombshell to american hustle check her out on imdb but elizabeth is multi-talented in 2013 she wrote a book called baby steps having the life i've always wanted just not as expected and you can get that on amazon 2013 baby steps now elizabeth is going through uh so many new evolutions in her career she just finished directing um she recently got into directing and her debut film is called girl in the basement it is a compelling story starring judd nelson she just finished directing her second movie she just got off that job in a secure life with us and she is now also passionate about her newest endeavor called the respect project so i was just chatting with elizabeth on what we're going to cover in this podcast and every time i meet someone who is so incredibly talented as you know recently we had we had an incredible woman like priyanka chopra who was in the time 100 danica patrick the race car driver now elizabeth wrong what i seek to understand is how do they see the world we call these models of reality what are the beliefs in ingrained in someone that allows them to do way beyond what is what what ordinary life expects you to do so that's the first thing we're going to cover and the second thing we're going to talk about is elizabeth's day-to-day methods of living systems of living how does she eat how does she stay fit how does she keep her mind active and so i'd like to welcome elizabeth wrong onto the mindvalley podcast for a really beautiful conversation elizabeth how are you today how are you good to be here with you guys thank you and we're recording this live in front of 200 mind valley members who are equally excited to to to get to know you and learn about how your mind operates i like the question so much that you that you posed you know because i think as human beings were so beautifully flawed that to suppose that there is one way to to thrive or to to um excel in life sort of underestimates our human frailty and actually i think one of the great um ways to succeed is to be gentle with yourself to be forgiving you know to show your self-respect meaning you're allowed to make mistakes and then pick yourself back up in the morning and i i've been having a 13 year old daughter who's been really difficult lately and it's amazing to me how we regenerate you know in the morning you know we love again more deeply and i think that we feel that way hopefully for our children we give ourselves permission every morning to have i guess a rebirth is what i'm saying i sort of like it you know we can put the yesterday in the past and not judge ourselves too harshly but hold ourselves accountable to do better the next day and i think that philosophy really came from my mom who you know was a deep seeker and probably my spiritual teacher and i've taken her as my north star my whole life and and that philosophy has guided me well meaning if i fall i pick myself up without judgment and let let's talk about that right because i as i said earlier we can understand so much about someone when we understand they are models of reality the model of reality is a belief that you hold to be true about the world and these beliefs can be can be bad they can hold you back or these beliefs could uplift you now you went through a really interesting experience as a child part of your personal journey included losing your mother and your aunt to heart disease at a young age i'm curious to know because you now are a mother of a 13 year old how that experience shaped who you are and how you operate as a mother today well i was very lucky to have strong matriarchs my mother was a devotee of maharishi and so i grew up exposed to buddhism and meditation and yoga and eastern philosophy so she was my mom a very deep spiritual teacher of mine and even though she died young and i was left orphaned in a sense i had a two-year-old daughter when she passed away she left such a deep imprint with me that i was dreaming about her two nights ago and this has been a big moment of transition for the world uh you know we're going out now i've gotten my vaccine i you know there's been many shifts i just moved into a new house three days ago and i think in these big moments of transition i i reflect on my mom and how you know she inspired me to to feel a sense of responsibility to the world um that said that's something that i really want to inspire in my daughter and it's funny last night we were talking about it around the dinner table and i said you know i've always had this north star for my mom and it is something like this you know the thought is if not me then who we don't make an impact in the world because we don't think highly enough of ourselves you know we don't think we're worthy who am i to change the world who am i to create a movement who am i to create an organization or mind valley or you know and i think that that's a terrible obstacle because if not you then who is going to make an impact you know and we should be inspired to think we don't have to be rich and we don't have to have a hundred hours of time to make an impact but even if we have one minute or we can have a conversation or if we can pay attention to somebody in a different way and i love this quote maya angelou said she said you won't remember how you met somebody or where you met somebody but you will remember how they made you feel about yourself so that is a gift you can give to somebody just that so those are some principles that i got for my mom that i give to my daughter easton and i try to remind the child inside myself to live by every day so i want to circle back to that right how do you make someone feel and and that's when we want to talk about the respect project but before i get there you spoke about rebirths in the morning i want to find out like what is a day in the life of elizabeth wrong like what do you do when you wake up in the morning how do you start your day um i definitely don't start my day well if i'm rushing that is not a good thing for me i mean i'm traditional in the sense that i like a routine i get up in the morning i make my bed you know i need a couple of hours to be quiet i don't get on the phone i don't engage with people you know what i mean i try to very very much buffer myself maybe because i was raised by a meditator i try to be quiet and get very grounded and i like the thought that um i don't want to take my dirty shoes through people's lives so like you know i guess in the morning i give myself the opportunity to to get rid of my own personal chaos you know i try to get organized i always have a to-do list i'm always checking it off if i oh i have it here it's ridiculous i mean it looks like you know like a 12-year-old's to-do list but i'm very like meticulous and getting you know organized and just having a very quiet self-reflective time in the morning and that way when i engage with people i'm not in a state of fear i'm not you know even if there's difficulties going on in my life i've sort of gotten ahead of them a little bit and that type of organization has helped me um and i think the same thing goes for me at night you know i become a little self-reflective i think in the morning and the night and i tend to try to get quiet so i'm not a chaotic person and i do feel a sense of not only wanting that peace for myself i remember david o russell who directed american hustle and joy said to me one day he goes what do you want to do more than anything in the world and i said he said what do you want more than anything in the world and i said i want peace of mind and he burst out laughing david has a great laugh and he said only you would answer the question like that he said i was asking i meant i was asking you like what role do you want to play like joan of arc or you know but i said i want peace of mind and i think that i lead my morning and end my day with that um as a priority because i know what it's like to not have peace of mind and i've probably not been my best self when i get too chaotic and um you know i don't i don't kind of hone into those quiet moments that's a beautiful practice ensuring that peace of mind is how you start your day and how you go to bed what are you what are the last thoughts in your head before you fall asleep well i tend to actually pray i guess i don't really pray to any religion or any tradition but i sort of connect with my own spirit i guess i meditate in a sense whatever your particular spiritual beliefs are i mean i really lay there quietly until i fall asleep and i you know think of my mom and i think of the the spiritual teachers i've had and i think of you know i kind of try not to go through the day and get caught up with that to-do list that that guides me during the day but i try to empty out and connect more to um an essence i guess and so whether it's breath or it's um the i the thought of my mom or a teacher or a thought you know i try to get into stillness and um and i've always struggled with sleeping so i guess that's probably been a trick that's helped me along the way because as a kid i was a sleepwalker and always very restless at night and a big dreamer which hasn't ended for me either i love that i love that now now i want to get to your project so i'm actually going to share the screen right now and i'm going to bring up the respect project okay so uh so this is a it's a not for profit and the respect project is about online and in personal cultural programming rooted in respect honesty and celebration of diverse opinions and experiences so elizabeth brings together all of these amazing people to have these rich conversations on a variety of topics from the green economy to respect courage stoicism love the future reinvention and you can learn more on therespectproject.org elizabeth for people who are listening on the podcast or watching this interview on youtube if people wanted to to learn about these conversations that you are running how do they how can anyone attend any of these conversations yes well first of all i'll say people can book a respect project talk for you could book a private one for mind valley you know just for your mind valley listeners i could lead it you could put five different people on the panel and i could help moderate and curate a conversation with you based upon whatever topic you were inspired by um that said i create and curate a conversation or two a month that inspire me personally i just did one with tim shriver on his organization unite and i just prior to that did one with the special olympics so that said i do those you can go to elizabethrome at instagram and you can then look and see what the current invitation is but you can always go to the respectproject.org to find the most recent talk and you can rsvp and i'll send you a zoom much like this conversation we're on and people can participate and also in the chat ask questions so we make time for that at the end of the conversation to talk to everybody that's been there amazing that is amazing and look guys one of the things i want to do with my audience is help spread enlightened ideas you know before mindvalley became mindvalley our tagline was helping spread enlightened ideas and respect project is about enlightened ideas being able to to to see diverse viewpoints and be open to diverse ideas is such an important thing in fact one of my favorite quotes from star wars by the way elizabeth are you a star wars fan i'm not but lay it on me okay hey as we are recording this it's may 4th it's may 4th right and may 4th is star wars day because it rhymes with made may the force be with you ah okay okay stupid that geeks think like this and so all around the world today there are people walking around with lightsabers and dressed up as obi-wan um and so today is star wars day so one of the greatest quotes from star wars and i opened one of the chapters in my book with it is only the sith deal in absolutes obi-wan says that he's the he's the wise buddha-like character and what he means is that only evil deals in absolutes everyone else recognizes good recognizes that there are multiple viewpoints you can be a different you don't have to be at the ends of the spectrum which is the absolute you can observe multiple viewpoints and that's what i love about the respect project yes yes it's interesting i just did one um and there was on a panel a woman an african-american woman and she said i don't believe in the melting pot don't ask me to smear myself i'm an individual and i am i am wanting to be i want to be respected for my individuality and so i thought that was a beautiful thought because ultimately we can agree to disagree in tolerance and acceptance we agree that we're different and in the respect talks we agree that each one of our narratives is important but we're not asking the other person to have the same life opinion or life experience that we are so the idea that we can all come together share our own personal experience and we can listen hear learn and act and base our knowledge on each other's differences and be inspired by our differences not afraid of them because it's either we get to choose one road the fear the fear road or the love road and we're not all alike and we shouldn't melt together but to have self-respect is deeply linked with having mutual respect mm-hmm right right and so why i wanna why why i'm excited to to tell my audience about your the respect project website is because it's such a great tool so go to the respectproject.org sign up to get on their mailing list just put in your email and you'll be invited to these live zooms when these beautiful conversations happen we're having one on thursday 2 p.m pacific time in the u.s and it's on the future of the green economy so a few really cool leading people in the environmental business as well as having companies that are committed to environmentalism so uh to talk about it especially through the new administration of the united states and to understand what the future could look like here for businesses that are committed to being environmentally aware i love that i love that now the question i have for you is when do we know so this this is what i struggle with so would you have a conversation with someone who was talking about is the earth round or is the earth flap absolutely and i think one of the things about the respect project is although there are conversations that you know are based in topics that inspire me i want to create a diverse um disruptive in a sense group of people who come from a different point of view different gender different race different economic but even if it was saying was disproved by science what i'm saying is i want to welcome people into a conversation with different points of view and let that be okay because at the end of the day if i have a conversation about gun control and one person's you know family member was murdered and another person doesn't give a you know because they have you know seven guns in the house you know what i mean it's it's i welcome people into a conversation with different points of view but i but i always say this don't come unless you can step into this with respect understood don't bring your dirty your dirty screws into this conversation if you can lean into this conversation with respect and listen and not become volatile and guess what i've invited people into conversations and they've said no respectfully i cannot come into that conversation with respect but i i try to create a very diverse group of people who can have a conversation based in in respect so that we can begin to learn from each other because we're not all alike and all of our points of view have some validity but your point about science yes i understand there is not there is um you know from certain points of view that is not a valid statement and so it that's a little bit trickier yeah so now i was i was i was deliberately just just just to get a perspective i was i was giving a really stock example right um so let's talk about something a little bit more more controversial would you have a conversation with someone who was pro-vaccine and someone because recently what happened is there was a public debate between um joe rogan who said that he recommends that young people don't get vaccinated and then dr anthony fauci from the us government came out and said that joe rogan was essentially wrong and that vaccines we all it's our responsibility to get vaccinated i guess i guess the answer to the question would hold a debate like that right yeah yes absolutely i guess the question is ultimately though i'm not a seeker of controversy i am a seeker of love and unity and respect so that is the basis of which you know i might that's my north star so i'm not i'm not looking to create controversy or sensationalism i would lead a conversation if i invite you in and i say come and tell the truth your truth on behalf of other people if that that resonates with you if that feels true then you belong in a respect project talk you know if you're coming to create conflict that is not that is not the nature of these talks because and i'll just digress for a quick second i'm doing a movie i'm directing and starting a movie um coming up hopefully in the fall based on scarlett lewis's life and scarlett lewis's son was murdered in the sandy hook massacre in the united states and so gun control is a big issue here in the u.s now i am going to lead a conversation on on gun tragedy um and choosing love but i'm not leading a conversation on gun control with people who want to you know punch each other in the face and like brawl over it that's not the intention my intention is to say let's have a deep conversation about uh the crisis and the trauma of gun violence but i'm not you know and so people would come into that conversation with the um with the north star of wanting to lead with love but not controversy elizabeth i just became a massive fan of the respect project because i see i see what you're doing i i see what you're doing i love the fact that you are not chasing controversy because so many people do it right now i mean joe rogan does it fox news does it um there are left-leaning websites that do it as well it's an easy way to get click bait it's an easy way to spread misinformation to get viewership but i see what you're doing what you're really doing is you're bringing in what ken wilber the philosopher would call integral thinking and integral thinking means you see the other side with respect you see the lens through which they come on you you the the lens through which they come from you practice empathy and that is a massively powerful spiritual skill but isn't that what a great marriage would be like or a great friendship you know i respectfully agree to disagree i respectfully agree to live in this union and not be like you i don't need everything you need i don't eat everything you eat i do things differently i move through the world differently but i love you and i want intimacy with you i mean isn't that this is the only exactly exactly exactly but it's a that it's that it's it's easy to say it's harder to practice oh absolutely but that's why i was inspired by okay if i'm talking to one of my best friends i can talk like this it's really deep it's really personal there's nothing you can't ask me or i'm unwilling to share with you because i love you and i want healing and i want connection so that's how the basis of an intimate relate intimate conversation is um why couldn't we have intimate conversations as a public forum and that was my thought so why couldn't i invite people into a conversation and say can we talk as honestly and deeply as as we might if we were husband and wife or we were best friends or you know can we can we speak from that point of view and so if i invite somebody into a respect talk they're willing to go that deep with me mike much like being here at mine valley i'm here to participate i i want it to be a mind-bending experience i don't i'm not here to self-promote right so it's like that's what the respect project is also about and people who come into those conversations are coming in to have deep conversation and ironically we're doing it on behalf of each other but the panelists are always the ones who call me and say oh my god like i had so many epiphanies talking to you it's crazy and then they all want to know each other so they because they're interested in each other right you put five six people together who don't know each other and you ask them to be intimate with each other and somehow they're deeply impacted and what have we learned we've learned to listen we've learned to act based on what we're listening to and yet we're respectfully agreeing to disagree because we're not all the same and we don't want to melt into each other we want to be uniquely distinctly beautifully different right and i love that i love that it reminds me of have you ever heard of the philosopher tim urban no you're gonna have to email me all these great ideas so so so tim urban he writes an incredible blog called wait but why okay wait but why and um he's he's a he's he's really young i've met him i think he's like in his mid 30s but the guy is freaking genius and he's the man that elon musk calls up and elon musk asks asis tim urban to explain concepts that elon has in his head to the entire world so when elon created muraling the brain ai uh integration device tim urban was the one who explained it to the world now tim urban has an interesting model on dealing with conflict and he says that when two sides come together you can choose to to to to look at your beliefs through four different perspectives you can operate as scientists which means that i i believe this but if you present me with data i will change my mind that's the scientist the scientist isn't locked into any one opinion yes in the in the presence of data the scientists will change their mind now there's one level below that and that's the level that a lot of us even people here on mind valley people who are who consider themselves conscious will still gravitate to and that level is spot stance so sports fan so i went to michigan right so whenever i attended a football game between michigan and ohio state i would always cheer for michigan because that was the t-shirt i wore but if ohio state won i'd be happy for them i'd applause i wouldn't be as happy if my team won but i'd be you know i wouldn't i would enjoy and tell them you suck if the opposing team won so sports fans have a respectful attitude towards each other but they cheer for a certain side so that's that's that's one level below then there's a there's the next level which gets a little bit more animosity and that is lawyers or attorneys so lawyers lawyers will pick a side and they will choose to destroy any evidence to the contrary so if you decide that vaccines are unsafe your mind if you're at the lawyer level which is not an ideal level will choose to ignore any evidence that says that it is safe and likewise if you believe vaccines are safe and the anti-vaccine movements are a bunch of idiots you will choose to disregard any evidence from their side you've picked your side and then the lowest level the worst level to be on is fundamentalists fundamentalists will want to destroy you will want to destroy you if you disagree so to a fundamentalist if you disagree with them it's like you just stabbed them you just wounded them and they will want to fight you right so so at the lowest level you have fundamentalists one level of book you have attorneys that's where a little bit the fighting happens then you have spot stance and you have scientists and what i love that i believe you're doing from a philosophical point of view is you are training people to operate as sports fans and scientists with mutual respect yeah i mean i think that's a really great way of saying it because ultimately i am inviting people into a conversation with the understanding that we are 100 we are absolutely different and i'm not inviting you into to sort of be be alike but what i then do is i base the conversation whether it's a topic on science or the environment or i base it on our basic human needs which is to deeply communicate i i love to hear this i love to talk and have someone listen you know what i mean i i need to be heard i need to be seen i i actually bet every single person here is like i love when someone listens to me and i can tell a yarn about my life you know so if we could all sit there and and actually be able to talk about our lives and have other people listen and respond um that in itself begins to unite us so you know i mean i've led conversations with people who all work at the same company and they all think they like each other so much but the truth is what they would admit privately to me is that none of them really know each other that well so the idea that they could come with a moderator and have a safety net which is me to pre you know sort of protect and guide it then they suddenly are like oh my god i'm getting to know these people i work with for the last 20 years who know nothing about me they don't know what i go home to what my house looks like what i eat anything who i sleep with that all of that and so i guess there is this deep human need there are deep human needs that unify us regardless of our differences and although the topics can have um fragmentation in them and we are all looking for solutions and we may have to agree to disagree um there are some basic emotional spiritual needs that we all need and i try to lead all topics from that that that foundation i love that so what would be your your advice to everyone listening today on how they can embody this level of respect when faced with an opinion that challenges their own i think it's really hard to do it you know and that's the reason why i needed it myself i created something i needed i created something i i'm thirsty for i was you know we all get sort of emotionally and spiritually dehydrated in this world and you know um i guess i created something that i felt that i could benefit from um but i guess you know it's sort of i love this um this thought you know even if um something is difficult you know that we should do it anyway you know that we should we should be the person that helps ourselves recalibrate you know and and so ultimately we have to work on ourselves you know what i mean i see a lot of people here talking about empathy and love but how about empathy towards self how about nurturing towards self how about love of self you know and i i think unless we all start taking some responsibility for keeping i always say this i if if my side of the street isn't clean i know it and i if and five coming in participating as an you know i know it so you know my my thought is is you know please take care of yourselves life is hard being a human being is hard life is mysterious to your point vision you know um from science all topics are mercurial they're constantly changing and the deeper and more intelligent you are you're going to be aware of the fact that life is a moving target you can feel wobbly very quickly so you have to you have to be really in touch with your own self so that you can navigate this life with as little destruction as possible my mom used to always say this to me don't let people be reckless with you liz but don't be reckless with us our words are very powerful choose your words wisely you know why because i'm never going to forget anything you've said to me today it is going to stay with me so choose your words wisely how we communicate with each other and i guess at the end of the day i just feel the way we talk to each other no matter what we believe should be chosen very carefully because it becomes our psyche our mental health and then our mental health is what we take out into the world and we drag through everybody else's life so work on your mental health we all need it i love that i i gosh i wish i wish you had your own netflix show where you brought these conversations together maybe you should be my producer no but but but i i love what you're doing so much it so reflects my values like one of my highest values is unity and respect i employ people for example from 60 different countries and that's my choice i want to have that that huge mass of diversity in the office together because that's a great way to to practice the muscle of respect which is why mindvalley as a company is so diverse but uh yeah i want to draw attention to the respect project i want to make sure that people who are listening to this podcast are not just gonna stop here but go deeper in your work by signing up to your list because i think the service that you provide is so needed in today's world thank you and and the irony is is you know no matter what the topic is even if it seems interesting or not interesting to you just know that i don't ever lead the conversation based fully on the topic my intention isn't to have a conversation about just the environment or gun control or this or that it's really to get you know get into our hearts and just choose you know choose love with each other and to be um as self-revealing as possible on behalf of each other i've learned throughout my life where where we have dark shadows you know that is where we bring negativity and pain into the world you know and i think that we when we become self-reflective and we we bring things out into the light they don't have as much power or control over us so we we do less destruction and we do less harm to each other so the more we talk and communicate whether it's with a partner or a therapist or even in a community like mind valley or the respect project you realize like you're not out of control and you don't have secrets that become destructive to others and i guess my point is is when we say things out loud we gain control and we recognize that things inside of us don't have as much power our secrets don't have as much power as we thought amazing thank you so much so now what i want to do is i want to take some questions from the audience and again for those of you who are listening on the podcast this is where you can learn more about the respect project go to the respectproject.org and then you can see a list of all talks and you can sign up to be notified when there's a new talk therespecproject.org so there's been a bunch of questions that just came in and um and i'm just going to go through the questions right now elizabeth do you see the questions oh yeah yeah for sure let you choose i'm going to let you choose a question that you would like to answer this is from our live audience let's see let's see um well a lot of the things you guys are saying are just very affirming so what is your source what if your source is from someone who is given a spiritual gift to understand all disease and has healed thousands of people from that understanding okay hansen maybe you have to explain that to me a teeny bit more um let's go up a little bit or or while you're doing that while you're looking at the questions let me bring up the guy who has the most votes jd villages make jd a panelist and i'm going to let jd ask you his question great you are now a panelist welcome jd hi how are you good how are you good such an honor to us thank you so much i'm you're kind of going a little bit in and out can you hear me well yeah i can hear you oh perfect okay jd do you want to go ahead and ask your question yeah of course so um the question that got the most both was um how did you throughout your throughout your journey throughout your growth journey how did you manage to uh really deal with your limiting beliefs and which were those so that was it i like that i mean you know i'm not a very judgmental person in general but i think i can certainly be extremely hard on myself and i guess you know um learning to be more gentle and self have more self respect because i guess what i'm trying to say ultimately is that like if we're the source you know if we're the creative source like tyler the creator says i'm the creator i am the creator so i'm the creator of my life i'm the creator of the energy i'm gonna put in the world that means that i have to start to heal my own self my own pain and take some deep responsibility in that so i just have a deep belief that we either lead with fear or love and it's very hard to love people if you're operating from a place of pain and hurt so i guess i started to really work on you know myself in in a more deep way even though i think i've always been philosophic and you know sort of seeking i had to accept that i had a lot of broken pieces and that i had to take care of those and heal those so that i could bring less um less negativity less judgment into the world because ultimately we all we all can operate from ego you know and what was that limiting belief one that you had to transcend um i think the limiting belief was that operating from fear was uh acceptable you know it's like there's something about operating from love that's like incredibly terrifying right you free fall your body free falls into the life experience but when we operate from fear we can grasp and we can hold on to something in other words i let go of needing to be in control and i started to trust the universe and myself and my guiding principles so that i could freefall with more grace and so that means like choosing to live from love versus from fear vulnerability somebody said exactly love it thank you thank you nice to meet you thank you jd and as usual nice hat every time you come on you have like this really cool sexy hat i like to wear hats too awesome yeah send me your address i'll send you one okay cool go to my instagram elizabeth rome we can dm each other that's good lady thank you i'm going to make you an attendee and we're going to bring up our next um our next guest interviewer okay so samaya samaya i hope you had two questions that got really good votes i'm going to make you a panelist samaya get ready to take over the interview samaya you ready sometimes zoom has a little bit of a lag yeah where is samaya how do you see actually how many votes they get um oh maybe do you not see that maybe only the admin can see it yeah i think only you can see it because i just see the comments did sumiya just leave because she was too shy to come on live what happened there yeah she literally just disappeared or maybe she was trying to adjust something and she lost a connection okay i'm going to bring in i'm going to bring in the uh the next person oh there's sumaya sumaya you're here awesome turn on your camera sumaya hi samaya um sorry can you hear me yes hi my laptop picked the perfect time to be a little um yeah so i have two questions um my first question is i think a little more to do with your career uh so my first question is how was the transition from being an actor to a director and did being on camera help you with making making that transition did it make it any easier or was it more challenging and sorry go ahead no go ask the second one we'll do both so my second question is on a different spectrum it you mentioned about i'm not letting our external judgment in so how do you change your mental model on not letting external judgment in but at the same time how do you balance it so that you can let in constructive feedback you know so that you don't end up being obnoxious or like and so but just define balance between um keeping that sense of security but at the same time letting enough feedback so that you can improve yeah that's really a tough one that's really a good question um well let me do the acting and the directing one that's a little bit easier i'm having acted for 25 years in a business where um a lot of times i didn't feel respected i didn't feel protected um it's a mainly no offense to the wonderful men i have in my life who are feminists but there were i never saw me as a director you know director reflected back to me um so i think i really approached uh directing from the point of view of the actor really holding the space for the actor yes i have a strong vision for how i wanted to look and the cinematography and the storytelling and the narrative but i also really specifically approach it from without the actor there is no movie right without you know you guys that you know who love movies and i me also you know i i identify not just with the cinematography the poetry of how it looks but really the actors heart and soul so i think my way into telling stories is through having been an actor and protecting the actor and sort of holding that flame and so it just you know took 25 years for me to have the confidence to say that i had the if not me then who you know would be the storyteller and and protect others and hold that flame for for those actors because up until that time it had been me only that um would put myself into those vulnerable places so that feels like a privilege and an honor to protect actors emotional hearts the other thing is is how do you let people um not take drag their dirty shoes through your your heart and soul but be open to listening um i think it's really important to always communicate about your needs uh quickly um so that people can hurt you less right so i just moved in with my significant other and i moved into his house and instead of having conflict between us about you know um the fear of you know kind of living in a new environment i said this is what i'm gonna need when i move in so we don't we can avoid conflict you know what i mean it doesn't mean that that's what he needed it just was that i needed i guess we have to set each other up for success right you can hear con you can hear criticism it's just that maybe you're holding inside of yourself your own needs because you don't want to be judged or you don't want you know them to you know think one way or another about you so i think i think my mom used to always say this tell the truth fast and communicate very well about your needs so that people can hurt you less you know what i'm saying yeah amazing thank you so much sumaya i'm gonna i'm gonna send you back to the attendee group thank you samaya nice to meet you so maya seems to be okay here we go so elizabeth as we come to the tail end of this interview i want to ask you about two other topics that that were on my mind one is is suffering you said yo you believe it's important to lean in and experience the pain suffering shouldn't be avoided let's talk about that yeah i do i do feel that way i think that the cracks are where the light comes in i mean if it took me 48 years to learn that that is what i would impart on anybody if i was to leave this planet in this body is to say don't avoid the pain you know dance with it um be excited when things are difficult because you know as well as i do that is when you're gonna grow the most when everything is going wonderfully and everything is perfect it's really hard to stay out of your ego right because you're like i did that look at me i'm i'm thriving i've got all this money or i've got this success or i've got this great boyfriend or i've got this you know it's i i i right we're we're humbled we're brought to our knees when we're going through pain and we've lost somebody or we're having a difficult time in our lives um right now it's been very challenging with my daughter and i and and i've said to myself do not forget your guiding principles your principles being this is an opportunity this is an opportunity for growth she may be a child and you're an adult but you this is your spirits moving through this life experience together don't don't don't avoid this discomfort right as artists we're comfortable with discomfort we're constantly unemployed we don't know when we're getting our next job usually um and our our feelings our pain our hurt they it's our that's that's what we dip into in order to play characters and tell stories uh based in our human experience so we're probably better at that than some people but i would say that that's a life struggle um to dance with fear to dance with pain to embrace it and to not avoid it because um it's like a viewed this beautiful quote um the barn has burned down now i can see the moon you know we should be attached to nothing right we can't take it with us we didn't come into this life with it and if we believe in anything somewhat spiritual we know that we're going to meet again so we're spirits moving through this life so what does it matter anyway we shouldn't you know and why do we consider something painful painful and then something abundant better i mean it seems really i don't know it seems like a mind game we're playing with ourselves that's unnecessary and it's based upon suffering beautiful what what you speak about reminds me of michael beckwit's philosophy of kensho versus satori satori through a eureka moment can show is growth through pain but both ultimately help you grow and become the best person you can be and this brings me to one of our final questions today and that is i want you to talk about that remarkable bit of advice that your mother gave you including don't lie to yourself and tell the truth quickly well she would say to me don't lie to other people but for god's sakes don't lie to yourself so you had asked me what i do in the morning and what i do at night and i guess that there's some sort of kernel in that which is i really quietly sort of comb through like my behavior and and and other people's behavior and you know and and try to become objective and get perspective i guess the respect project at the end of the day is about not just agreeing to disagree but getting perspective on each other's differences and getting that aerial view as opposed to that you know deeply personal view um because it's not often that we actually are forced to listen to each other's different life experiences where are you from how do you navigate life how do you wake up in the morning how do you go to sleep you know how what is your intimate personal life experience and how can we get you know um some some distance in buddhism they say you know to be in the world but not of it to not be attached it's really really hard to not be attached and we have to pay our electric bill and or we're thirsty or you know we're going through things but it is true my ultimate goal in life much like my mom said you know to tell the truth quick or to not lie to yourself my ultimate goal is to be in the world but not of it and to move through it um you know with that sort of perspective thank you i love that so i i um as we come to the tail end of this i just want to remind people to check out elizabeth's incredible project the respectproject.org and go ahead and sign up and elizabeth i want to get uh a quick um virtual selfie of us so i can post about you and the respect project on my instagram would you smile for the camera i guess hold on let me fix my yes go ahead okay we'll just take one more for safety okay and also because i wanna it's it's um as i said it's it's made of bought at star wars day and my team was telling me i gotta post something on star wars so now i'm gonna post that that quote only the sith believe in absolutes and link it to the respect project double win i love it thank you okay that is awesome love that i got a great shot of you too um everyone thank you so much for joining us today elizabeth thank you so much however i can help you with your project thank you i feel the same way and if ever i can lead a respect talk for you guys or any organization you're passionate about let me know i would be happy to moderate that yeah or ever if you're producing or directing new movies and you need and there's a there's a character even a background character who happens to be indian i'm all in i i just want to be okay i i love it don't even threaten me with a good time i love it thank you elizabeth take care all right you guys be well thank you support bye you