Planning Movie Inspired Trips with Jessica Grace Coleman

Show Notes: Planning Movie Inspired Trips

Movie Inspired Trips · Set Jetting & Movie Tourism · Cinematic Travel Experiences

From set-jetting to magical movie moments, travelers are discovering how films and TV shows can enhance their journeys. In this episode I sit down with Jessica Grace Coleman — author, filmmaker, podcaster, and founder of Movify Your Life — to explore how movie-inspired travel can transform not just your trips, but your  life. Jessica shares how she turned her adventures into a “moviementry”  and practical tips for bringing cinematic magic into everyday travel.

Episode Highlights

• What movie-inspired travel really means — from visiting film locations to designing a cinematic journey of your own
• Practical tips for set-jetting and creating itineraries based on your favorite films and TV shows
• Jessica’s story of finding confidence and transformation through solo travel
• How to use an alter ego to step outside your comfort zone while traveling
• The story behind Movify Your Life project and “moviementry” film

Next Step

Grab a piece of paper and write down your favorite travel or life memories. Look for recurring themes — people, places, or details that always light you up.  When planning your next trip, intentionally weave more of those elements into your itinerary and your life.

Reflection 

Jessica shared a powerful line from Donald Miller’s A Million Miles in a Thousand Years:

And once you live a good story, you get a taste for a kind of meaning in life, and you can’t go back to being normal. You can’t go back to meaningless scenes stitched together by the forgettable thread of wasted time.

Connect with Jessica 

• Movify Your Life website
• Movimentary
• Podcast: Movify Your Life Show
• Free guide: Movie Star Alter Ego Starter Kit 
• Instagram

Links & Resources

• The Alter Ego Effect by Todd Herman
• A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Donald Miller
• The Art of Making Memories by Meik Wiking
• The Top Five Regrets of the Dying by Bronnie Ware
• Are You Dave Gorman 
• Films & Shows on Trip Scholars Related to Travel Destinations

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Transcript: Planning Movie Inspired Trips

Welcome To Conversations for Curious Travelers

[00:00:00] Erica: Welcome to Conversations for Curious Travelers, a Trip Scholars podcast. I’m your host, Erica Forrest. In each episode, we explore how travel helps us learn more about the world and ourselves. If you travel, not just to escape, but to grow, connect and understand you are in the right place.

[00:00:23] Erica | Trip Scholars: Today I am very happy to welcome Jessica Grace Coleman to the show. Jessica is an author, a podcaster, a filmmaker, a course creator, and the founder of Movify Your Life by combining personal development techniques, mindset tools, and the transformative power of travel. Jessica empowers people to boldly pursue their biggest goals.

Create incredible lifelong memories and live an epic life. They’ll be proud of when the credits roll. Jessica, welcome to the show.

[00:00:56] Jessica Grace Coleman: Hello. Thank you for having me on. I’ve been really looking forward to this. I really enjoyed having you on my podcast, so I think we’re going to have a good chat today.

[00:01:04] Erica | Trip Scholars: I think so too. I loved being on the Travel Transformation Podcast, your earlier show, I find your story about how travel changed your life. Very inspirational, and it’s been exciting to watch how.

Your work has been evolving over the last few years. Could you share your story of how you got started traveling, and then how that’s led into the empowering work that you’re doing now?

Jessica’s Travel Transformation Story

[00:01:30] Jessica Grace Coleman: Yeah, sure. I’ve always been into travel. My parents were into travel as well, so I was very lucky to be able to go on family holidays when I was little. We would go to Cornwall and south of England in a caravan holiday, or we’d hop across on the ferry or the tunnel to France and Spain and, trundle around for a week or so, really into road trips and that kind of stuff. but it wasn’t until I was 10 when we went on a road trip to the states that I got the travel bug we went to Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, Utah. We went to the Four Corners. I just loved it. It felt like such an adventure. So different to, anything I’m used to in England, like all the big vast spaces and all the different kinds of. Places you can go in America. I was just like, this is amazing. And that sowed the seed. I really wanted to go back. to university. I applied for a four year course where the third year was a year abroad in the States. And it was American studies. So I did American history, American culture, American literature. And I did that joint studies with film which has come in handy recently. I had a year abroad in Colorado, CU Boulder Go Buffs, and that was like the best year of my life. I had such a great time. And that gave me the confidence, I think, because I went over there essentially on my own, not knowing anyone. And that gave me the

go on and do all the solo travel adventures. I’ve become self-employed in 2014. I still run my own editing and ghost writing and proofreading business, which I can do from anywhere in the world. And since 2014, I kept telling myself, can be a digital nomad now.

I can work from anywhere. I’m going to do it. I didn’t do it. Then the pandemic rolled around. Being stuck. I’m sure a lot of people can relate with this being stuck in one place, not being able to go anywhere. That’s when the travel bug really, I was just like, I really have to, as soon as I can, I’m going to go traveling. I’m going to do the thing, ditch my rental property, put all my stuff in storage, like properly

[00:03:19] Erica | Trip Scholars: Hmm.

[00:03:20] Jessica Grace Coleman: 2021, I went to Spain. I spent a month in a co-living house in the bass country, and then a few weeks in another co-living house, which is the same company in southern Spain. And I just had the most transformative, amazing month. I sort of gave myself a challenge to put myself out there as much as possible. I’m naturally very shy and quiet and an introvert, so this was tough. And I also had a massive fear of public speaking and I made myself. And this is like a house full of digital nomads from all over the world, and they did workshops and things like that so you could put yourself forward to do a presentation. So I did, even though I was terrified And once I did that, I found I could do anything. I kept, you know, like just talking to people instead of sitting in the corner and listening, which is what I usually did. Made so many great friends. We went on so many adventures and I just had the best time. And that turned into my travel transformation era

Where I wrote a book called Intentional Travel Transformation. I had my podcast, the Travel Transformation Podcast, which you were a guest on, and I was doing everything around travel. And then that has now morphed into what I’m doing now it’s called Movify Your Life, as you mentioned. And it’s still very travel focused. But it’s more sort of themed around movies and TV shows I just love going to the cinema. It’s one of my favorite things to go to the cinema with my friends, watch a happy, uplifting film, and you just, you know, your state changes instantly and you come out and you’re just like, yes. I just really love movies and I wanted that into all the personal development mindset and travel stuff I was doing. So that’s it in a nutshell, I guess.

[00:04:54] Erica | Trip Scholars: That is a full nutshell. And I can’t wait to dive into what you are doing now with Movify your life. I know sometimes you call the. Very exciting and transformative experiences that we have. Magical movie moments. You were doing that with the work that you were doing earlier, so it was fun to see that transform into what you’re doing now.

Could you tell us a little bit more about what you mean by magical movie moments?

[00:05:22] Jessica Grace Coleman: Yeah, so I found when traveling I have these a lot more I’m sure you can relate. So whenever you, you know, you’re in a new place, maybe you’re with new people, you’re doing new things, you are outta your mundane, maybe routine.

And sometimes you just have these moments when you feel like you’re in a scene, in a movie, like you can imagine there’s a soundtrack playing.

Or just as such a moment that you feel content or you feel in the moment or you feel. inspired or you know, something and you just, you can imagine it being like a scene in a movie. And I’ve had so many of those traveling and I mean, I could give you so many examples, but one of them that comes to mind, because I’ve been writing about it recently, is the Bilbao bridge party. I went back to the co-living house where I first went to have my transformative month. I went back there had another month there loads more people. And it’s in the Basque country. And then at the end. Most of us went to Bilbao for a weekend before we all left. So there was about eight or nine of us, I think. All women plus Stan, bless him. He was like the only guy left at the end. And then we all went out for the evening in Bilbao and it was about midnight and we were walking past the Guggenheim Museum, which is like this amazing museum.

If you’ve never been. And they have like this, the Guggenheim puppy outside, like huge puppy made of flowers and the Guggenheim spider, which is like this really cool sculpture and it’s right next to the river. And all the lights were on, all the river was sparkling. It was all lovely. And my friend Isabella from Brazil, she’s just so into music.

She had this little portable speaker and we were like listening to music as we were walking, sort of dancing and walking and singing. And then we came across this bridge. It was all lit up. And it looked like something from you know, a backdrop of a nineties boy band music video. And we were like, yes.

And we didn’t even discuss it. We just all went onto the bridge, our stuff down. We got the speaker and we were just dancing. It was like midnight. 

 And we were dancing to the Spice Girls, Miley Cyrus flowers, all that kind of vibe. And it was midnight, so lots of people sort of going out to pubs, leaving pubs. And this bridge was a major thoroughfare.

And so people were walking past us and some of them would give us weird looks, then some people started joining in so they would sing

[00:07:29] Erica | Trip Scholars: Hmm.

[00:07:30] Jessica Grace Coleman: as they walked past us, and we’d dance with them. Or they’d like join us for a verse and then like high five us and then leave. one woman joined us for an entire song,

That was just so lovely. Like I didn’t expect this at all and went on. did this for about an hour and then the bridge started swaying in the wind a little bit and we were like, oh, better get off. It’s a bit dodgy. But it was just such a amazing spontaneous thing. Like we hadn’t discussed it.

It just happened and the fact that all these strangers were passing by and they joined in and they seemed to. Just like they were looking a bit tired or bored or whatever, and then they saw us and their faces lit up and we just had the best time. And then they went on their way laughing and looking back at us and clapping.

And it was just so amazing. And I was like, this is like a scene from a movie. Like, I want more

[00:08:11] Erica | Trip Scholars: It is.

[00:08:12] Jessica Grace Coleman: Yeah. And these were people I’d only really just met for the past couple of weeks or whatever, and it was

[00:08:17] Erica | Trip Scholars: Hmm.

[00:08:17] Jessica Grace Coleman: bonding moment. And now we still talk about it like hashtag bridge party and it’s like this amazing moment that never forget.

Turning Travel Into Movie Inspired Trips

[00:08:23] Erica | Trip Scholars: I can picture it as the end scene in an epic film where everybody’s dancing in the city and feeling very alive and you guys boldly made that happen and stepped right into it. I love that. And then you were able to kind of think about a lot of those moments and turn it into what you’re doing now with the Movification

Whole thing that you have been building. So you have a film, you have a podcast, you’re writing a book, and you also are working on a course about it so that you can support other people in bringing this into their lives more. You walk us through a little bit about what Movification is and what you’re doing with it?

[00:09:07] Jessica Grace Coleman: It kind of started accidentally, which I think a lot of these things tend to do, don’t they? Like, you’re

[00:09:11] Erica | Trip Scholars: Mm-hmm.

[00:09:12] Jessica Grace Coleman: where the idea comes from, but it was the end of 2023 and I’d read a book in preparation for the new year and one was called The Year of Yes, by Shonda Rhimes. She is like the Shondaland lady. She’s. Amazing. Like a powerhouse of a woman makes all these amazing shows. I don’t know how she has time to do it all. But her book was basically the recording of her year of yes, which is when she started saying yes to things instead of saying no to things. ‘

[00:09:33] Erica | Trip Scholars: Ah.

[00:09:34] Jessica Grace Coleman: you know, she’d rather be at home rather than going out to these events and, you know, all that kind of stuff. And it just changed her life basically. And I love stuff like that. I love someone giving themselves a challenge or a quest seeing what happens. And I loved the idea of doing it over a year.

So I thought. I would do the same. my original thought was that I would just write a book about it. because I’d just read her book but it’s all about making your life feel like an epic movie. So it makes no sense whatsoever just to do a book.

I was like, I’m going to have to film this, aren’t I? So I upgraded my phone so I could use my phone camera. because I thought if I use a big bulky camera, I’m never going, actually get it out all the time.I bought a couple of lapel mics a tripod that was it. Basically I decided Year’s Eve 2023 is when I recorded my first sort of talking head about my quest. And then the idea was to record. Another one, new Year’s Eve, 2024, a year later to see what I’d done. And the idea was basically just to do a straightforward documentary following me as I try and Movify my life my life.

I didn’t even really know what that meant at that time, honestly. I just had the idea of these magical movie moments in my head and the idea that maybe if we could sort of bottle that feeling we get. When we go to an amazing movie and it makes us feel something. You’ve watched it, you know, it very quickly descended into absolute madness and chaos 

[00:10:49] Erica | Trip Scholars: It was very fun and playful and real and honest. You have all kinds of things interwoven into it, but yeah. When you first started it did feel like a documentary and then it felt like there was a bit of philomena kunk in there where it starts to become more playful 

[00:11:04] Jessica Grace Coleman: Yeah. She’s amazing. So I call it a moviementry because it is sort of half documentary, my real life quest of the year and half of it is like my homage to all my favorite films and TV shows growing up. All the classics, you know, I try to get loads of quotes in there and references. I actually made a bingo card that I send to people to see if they get all the references. 

that was the idea to move for, find my life and I knew travel would be a huge part of that. So I included another huge. US trip, which was like my dream trip that I’d been wanting to do for years. And that involved going to Tennessee because I really wanted to go to Nashville and Dollywood and then go back to New England. because I did that a few years ago with my friends. We did like a Halloween, autumn road trip and we did all the leaf peeping or the foliage stuff, all the harvest festivals, and I loved it so much. I knew I had to go back there, so yeah. a big part of it is travel especially solo travel. I did a lot of it solo. Stepping outside your

[00:11:59] Erica | Trip Scholars: Mm-hmm.

[00:12:00] Jessica Grace Coleman: in that way is so powerful. it is what helped me become way more confident when I was solo traveling to start with.

And especially if you go to countries where you don’t speak the language, you don’t know anyone, you’re forced to, step outside your comfort zone, ask for help, make friends, all the stuff that you wouldn’t maybe normally do if you were with someone else. So um, I knew I wanted that to be a huge part of it.

And um, yeah, I had the best time in America. It was great.

Joy, Playfulness, and Cinematic Travel

[00:12:24] Erica | Trip Scholars: I love it. you also have a lot of great advice in there for people about how they can try to implement and bring some of this into their own lives and their own travels.

one of the things you focus on a lot is joy and playfulness and how important that is. Even right now when the world. Feels very heavy many times. Can you share with us some of the ideas that you encourage people to step into to bring that joy and playfulness into their travels?

[00:12:51] Jessica Grace Coleman: Yeah. I mean, you said there like, you know, with the world the way it is, that’s exactly when we need all this joy and playfulness. things are so. Serious. There’s a lot going on, a lot of terrible things happening in the world. That’s when we need to lift ourselves up, lift others up,

[00:13:06] Erica | Trip Scholars: Mm-hmm.

[00:13:07] Jessica Grace Coleman: even if that means being really silly. I, there’s one part of the, the moviementry where I, I went to the Cotswolds and I was doing like a Wes Anderson sort of spoof, like a little mini movie in the Wes Anderson style. because I love his style. And I was dressed this

[00:13:21] Erica | Trip Scholars: Like a red berry and red hot sunglasses. And I should mention that two of my sidekicks in the film are a disco strawberry with googly eyes and a mustache and a tiny cardboard cut out of Pedro Pascal. You need to watch it to understand why, but even then, it’s very random, it was like the hottest day of the year. There were tourists everywhere. Even the local school kids were having their lessons outside. So everyone was there and I was walking around like this. And this one woman looked at me, pointed at me, laughed, looked at a friend, laughed, and just looked like she was having the best time.

[00:13:52] Jessica Grace Coleman: I did feel very self-conscious to start with, but your dignity soon flies out the window. You don’t care. You just get on with it and you just have fun. So I highly recommend doing stupid things on camera.

It will boost your confidence. No end, during my year I thought, this is just really random. I need something, I need a structure to explain what I’m doing and why I am doing it, and maybe other people can follow it too. So I came up with my Movification framework and this is a lot of the playful stuff you’re talking about.

It’s about, well I started by choosing my favorite genre. film, like my favorite uplifting genre of film. because like, you know, I like horrors and thrillers, but I don’t really want my life or my trip to be a horror film. So the idea is to pick, your favorite, feel good genre, like something you watch and you just love it, like it’s so cozy or it feels like home you want to step into that world, you want to live there.

I chose Gilmore Girls because I’m a big Autumn girl. My birthday’s in Autumn, it’s my favorite season. And Gilmore Girls is like autumn personified and also Fallmark movies like Hallmark, autumn movies, like super cheesy ones, but you know, there’s like maple leaves everywhere, pumpkin, everything.

I just love it. So I chose those as my, inspiration and I’d been to New England, so I knew that was just like. All the small towns there, you could be in Stars Hollow, in Gilmore Girls. So the idea was to pick a genre scout your location and then set a quest that you go on, on your trip, and it doesn’t have to be far away.

I went to America because I was making a film and I thought it would be pretty rubbish if I just didn’t go anywhere or do anything. So I knew that, it was really beautiful over there. I wanted to get that on camera. 

Building Confidence on Movie Inspired Trips with Alter Egos

[00:15:22] Erica | Trip Scholars: There’s a lot of things I’d love to dive into there. One of them is this idea of an alter ego. Like many gifted performers who have contributed so much to society, talk about adopting another character when they step on stage. A lot of them say that they’re somewhat introverted, like.

David Bowie is a famous example, with Ziggy Stardust and some of the other alter egos that he created, and then he was able to experiment and perform and really be outside of his comfort zone in a way that without doing that we might not feel so brave. 

at Trip Scholars, we talk a lot about traveling authentically, and I think in some ways people might think about, you know, encompassing alter ego as. N as not being that, and yet you’re able to take it and use it kind of as this extra push to move into who we really want to be. Almost like a mentor or a cheerleader encouraging us to step outside of our comfort zone.

[00:16:26] Jessica Grace Coleman: the way I talk about it, there’s like loads of ways you can look at an alter ego, but call it a movie star alter ego, because. I find being an introvert, I find the idea of taking, the energy and the confidence of a movie star on the red carpet and trying to channel that can really help with doing the hard stuff. But also if you’ve chosen a fictional character you love and you’re trying to be more like them. I think because you love them so much, there’s a reason you love them, it’s because you see something in

[00:16:54] Erica | Trip Scholars: Yeah.

[00:16:54] Jessica Grace Coleman: Or you know, you can be like that person if you, really tried, like I chose Laura, I Gilmore because I want you to do the whole Gilmore Girls thing anyway, but she’s, very independent. She’s very witty, she’s very funny. She’s very fun. She’s also very stylish. I want all her autumn wardrobe please. But she’s very fast talking and, very smart she runs

[00:17:17] Erica | Trip Scholars: Mm-hmm.

[00:17:35] Jessica Grace Coleman: think the more you do it. The more you actually become that version of yourself, it’s not a different person. It’s you just amplified and all the qualities you want to have, you can bring to the surface.

If you know what you are aiming for, like, if you don’t know what you’re aiming for, you might not get there, if I’ve got Laura, like Gilmore in my head when I was traveling and thinking like, would she be really boring and stay in and not go out because she was a little scared because she was going to be on her own?

No, she wouldn’t even think twice. She’d just go, she’d have fun, she’d laugh, she’d make friends with anyone. She’d talk to anyone. And I think that just channeling the energy of someone like that can really help you. And yeah, I do like the question about authenticity. I think it’s a really great question and. I don’t know if you ever got this in the us did, we had a show over here called Faking It in the nineties.

I loved it so much and I really resonated with it. And I didn’t really know why until recently when I re-watched them all and I was like, oh my God, this is just like everything I’ve been talking about. Basically they get a person with a certain job and they. have a quest for a month to fake it as a completely different job, But the idea is to fake it, obviously. But so many of the people, it boosted their confidence. A lot of them actually ended up doing the same profession that they were faking it as, or at least incorporating it into their life.

There was this proper posh cellist in Cambridge, and then at night she would turn into this DJ and go and DJ at all these clubs she would never have been open to that before.

She wouldn’t have even been exposed to it. But I really like the idea that they weren’t faking it by the end, And I just love the whole notion that you can change your life in a month for one thing, but that it’s all about stepping into the best version of you.

And this is just a really fun way to bring it out. 

[00:19:09] Erica | Trip Scholars: That’s so, so well said. And I agree with you I’ve lived in a number of different places, which is kind of like traveling long term. When you are. Traveling or you move somewhere new, you get to decide what aspects of yourself that might be dormant or might be smaller.

You want to amplify Often you’re around people who don’t know you and so, you know, a lot of people might feel nervous about dancing on a bridge or dancing at a concert or singing out loud or those things that bring us this deep intrinsic joy.

But we might feel a little. Uncomfortable about people seeing us in that vulnerable state. And when we’re traveling or moving somewhere new, we do get to have that freedom to explore I think when you were also talking about, choosing what the genre is that makes you feel good or choosing the characters from a film or for some people, maybe it’s a book or something that. That they want to emulate, then you have goals and intentions and something that you are moving forward to with clarity.

So that’s awesome. Thank you.

[00:20:18] Jessica Grace Coleman: Yeah, I’m glad.

Grief and Challenges 

[00:20:19] Erica | Trip Scholars: I also know that while you were creating Movify your life, you lost some people who were closest to you and very dear to you, and you were experiencing a lot of deep grief You have shared how much that, perspective helped you focus on how brief and precious life is.

Would you be up for talking a little bit about how those losses influenced your commitment to living fully and helping other people do the same?

[00:20:49] Jessica Grace Coleman: Yeah, so just before I started this quest my nan passed away and she was 98. So, you know, it was a good run. And she was amazing. She was very independent. She still lived on her own had been living on her own for several years and she was always the one who used to tell me like, travel, while you can like, see the world while you’re still like physically able.

because she was, you know, she was 98, she wasn’t physically able enough to, you know, go very far in the last few years. So she was like. Enjoy life while you are young. Like she would just say that over and over again. So I always had that in my head. And um, actually when I went to Nashville, I did this Airbnb experience thing that I found on Airbnb with this songwriter.

And you could go to her house and co-write a song with her. So I did that with my nan in mind with all these advice she used to give me about travel and all that kind of stuff. So that was really great. I started filming the moviementary and had my NAN’S funeral.

And I sort of reflected on that a little bit

[00:21:38] Erica | Trip Scholars: Hmm.

[00:21:39] Jessica Grace Coleman: you know, life is short, which we all know, but it’s only when things like this happen that it really hammers at home. And then 11 months to the day after my nan passed away, my mom passed away. And so that was my Nan’s daughter. And she was only 75.

So this was after a horrific battle with cancer, her second time having cancer

[00:21:58] Erica | Trip Scholars: Am sorry.

[00:21:59] Jessica Grace Coleman: Thank you. It was, it was a week after I got back from the States, actually. So the whole time I was in the States, I was worried that, you know, I’d get the call or I’d have to go back and I, I, I am annoyed about going on this trip for ages and just like my nan, my mom was like, no, you have to go.

What are you crazy? Like,

[00:22:13] Erica | Trip Scholars: Go live. Yeah.

[00:22:15] Jessica Grace Coleman: your life. 

[00:22:15] Erica | Trip Scholars: Hmm.

[00:22:16] Jessica Grace Coleman: my mom was like the most positive, most smiley, She lived life to the fullest. She was in lots of bands, actually several bands in her mid seventies. She played the guitar and the bass guitar. She sang, 

And then they played in like pubs, folk clubs. And they did a lot of stuff in hospitals and care homes as well. Like just spreading the joy, really, like singing all these old songs like

fifties and sixties that all these older people loved. And she was just like the epitome really of like Movifying your life, like living life to the fullest. And when it happened, I was still filming, it was in November of 2024. And, you know, for a while I just stopped filming.

I didn’t do anything. I was like, I can’t do anything. And I still had all the editing to do which takes a lot of time and a lot of energy. I thought about just ditching the whole thing or putting it on the back burner, but I knew if I did that I wouldn’t have the momentum.

I’d never pick it up again. So I was like, no, this. She would

[00:23:07] Erica | Trip Scholars: Yeah.

[00:23:08] Jessica Grace Coleman: do it like this was the whole ethos behind it was exactly what my mom would always say. Like live life to the full. She was always smiling, always happy. She never let things get her down.

She was grateful for everything. And I was like,

the kind of stuff I’m talking about. And I think when someone passes away. especially when it’s before their time, like she still had so many things she wanted to do and the idea that you are still here and you get to do whatever you want to do, basically, within reason is something to really think about. I think about people in the past, especially women. So like, not just my family or my ancestors, but like all women in the past save people from like hundreds of years ago if they could see me now or see us now. And you know, we have all this technology, we have all these opportunities as women, we have more opportunities than we’ve ever had before. if they could see us now we can go traveling, we go solo traveling as women, And I just think

[00:23:58] Erica | Trip Scholars: Yeah.

[00:23:59] Jessica Grace Coleman: and I’m like, it feels like a responsibility to go out and have the most amazing, adventurous, epic, exciting life

[00:24:05] Erica | Trip Scholars: Mm-hmm.

[00:24:05] Jessica Grace Coleman: who can’t do it anymore. Like what would they not give for like another year on this planet to go and do all these amazing things? And we are still here right now and we can go and do it. And that sort of lit a fire under me And I was like, no, I’ve gotta finish this film. I’ve gotta put it out there.

And even though it’s really scary and like putting, all my weird personality out on the internet for everyone to see which is a very scary thing to do I’ve got to do it. Like I can’t not do it when there’s so many people who would, kill to be able to do stuff like this 

So that’s what I think about when I stopping doing something. I’m like, no, gotta keep going.

[00:24:39] Erica | Trip Scholars: That’s very inspirational and so beautifully shared. Thank you. I can see a lot of them in you and they would be so proud of what you were able to do. 

[00:24:49] Jessica Grace Coleman: Thank you. Appreciate that.

[00:24:52] Erica | Trip Scholars: Yeah. In the first two years of starting Trip Scholars, I also lost both of my parents and I can so resonate with what you are talking about Losing the people that are closest to us reminds us how precious it is, and also how we want to bring their voice and their story back out into the world.

Like it sounds like both your mom and your nan. Really lived life fully and we’re brave and doing all of these amazing things, and that now you are doing those things and carrying that story forward. So thank you for sharing all that.

[00:25:31] Jessica Grace Coleman: Oh,

[00:25:31] Erica | Trip Scholars: Really beautiful.

[00:25:33] Jessica Grace Coleman: yeah, it’s about carrying on the story of those who can’t do it anymore, so, yeah.

[00:25:38] Erica | Trip Scholars: Yeah. And I am so sorry you had to go through all of that in such a short amount of time. I’ve been thinking of you and your family.

[00:25:45] Jessica Grace Coleman: Oh, thank you.

[00:25:45] Erica | Trip Scholars: Yeah,

[00:25:46] Jessica Grace Coleman: you.

Set Jetting and Movie Tourism

[00:25:47] Erica | Trip Scholars: On a very different note with everything that you have thought about both travel and films so many of our listeners do plan. There are trips or parts of their trips around films or around movies.

You have shown us a lot of ideas about how you can bring that to life. could you kind of talk us through how do you practically go about creating an itinerary based on a film or a movie?

[00:26:18] Jessica Grace Coleman: Yeah, so I think there’s two ways to do it, and one of them is like a lot easier and still really, really fun. It’s basically visiting the filming locations of your favorite films, TV shows. It’s called. Set jetting. So instead of jet setting set jetting it’s becoming this huge thing.

I’ve started following all these people online who like their whole thing is set jetting, and I’m like, oh, I love this. I did this in my film as well. One of my favorite TV shows is Ted Lasso and it’s filmed in

London. Yeah, I love it so much. And I went there for a weekend. And it was just so great.

Like you can go on a Ted lasso tour. There’s the pub that is in the show and they have like this TED table, which I managed to get. And all the shops sell like Ted merchandise. There was a Ted lasso store that had just opened up and, it was a beautiful day, and it’s like a really beautiful, affluent area.

Loads of celebrities live there. It’s a really, really beautiful place. walk around these places and I feel like I’m in the tv. Like, I feel like it’s just so surreal. I just love it. So that’s one way to do it is, if you have a favorite TV show or film and it was, set somewhere that’s real or filmed somewhere that was real or both look those up. because they’re probably like a lot of tourism around it. There’s probably tours around it. There’s probably shops and things like that you can visit. I know Americans come over to Richmond as well.

They do like a pilgrimage to

[00:27:32] Erica | Trip Scholars: Mm-hmm.

[00:27:33] Jessica Grace Coleman: Like it’s, it’s a huge thing. Probably makes up a big part of the tourism industry now. Just Ted lasso alone. But no, so that’s one way to do it. And then the other way is to do what I did is to like, go through the framework, really sit down what, like think of what your favorite film or TV show is, like your favorite, uplifting one.

Figure out why, like, because I think that’s a big thing. Like, I want my life to be like, Gilmore Girls. I want to live in Stars Harlow. Well, why? But like, I like the community feeling. I like the feeling of belonging. I like the small town vibes. The fact that everyone likes each, like knows each other and likes each other, and you know, really drill down on why you like it.

And then ask yourself, would I like. my trip to be like this or my life to be like this. Like, you know, expand it to your whole life. And I’m like, yes. I want it to be a perpetual autumn. And then you can go like location scouting, which I think is the really fun part.

So some places might be really obvious, like Richmond was really obvious because it is filmed there. Something with Gilmore Girls, it’s set in Connecticut, but it was filmed in LA so you’d have to go to LA to visit the actual. which you can do now. But that doesn’t really fit with my whole autumn, new England vibes.

 I recommend coming up with like your dream location, your like luxury, good location, and then like a sort of budget one, a more realistic one. So my second one, if I hadn’t gone to New England was the Cowa, which I did end up going to for my west or something anyway, but because it has the same vibes, it’s like small, cute, really cozy community vibes. Lovely fall foliage and stuff like that. Like I could have pretended that was New England somewhere maybe with a little bit of movie magic. And then yeah, like I did, I recommend doing, coming up with some kind of challenge to make it really fun and sort of gameify the whole experience.

And if you can film it and create a little video from it, then even better. I highly recommend that. I really love the idea of set jetting and, going on walking tours and learning all about your favorite film and how they made it. it is just really fun.

Books and Resources for Cinematic Travel

[00:29:21] Erica | Trip Scholars: Thank you. Those are fabulous tips, And do you have any resources for people who are interested in Movifying their life in any of the ways that you’ve talked about? Any, like books or films or any resources?

[00:29:36] Jessica Grace Coleman: Yeah. So the first is my film and my book.

[00:29:40] Erica | Trip Scholars: Yeah, 

[00:29:41] Jessica Grace Coleman: Thank you. But yeah, I do have a few books I want to recommend that aren’t mine. So there’s the Alter Ego Effect by Todd Herman. If you like this whole idea of alter egos and you want to dive deeper into this, he’s the big authority on this subject.

 I think over 20 years he’s helped performers, singers, business executives, athletes, all get to the top of their game by having an alter ego. So that’s really fascinating. One of my favorite

[00:30:03] Erica | Trip Scholars: Ah.

[00:30:04] Jessica Grace Coleman: ever is A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Donald Miller. He does lots of business stuff now, but he started out as a memoirist and it’s all about approaching life.

Like you are writing a screenplay and you are creating your own inciting incidents as a catalyst for like your next storyline without just, you know, waiting around for something to happen to you. And that’s been a huge influence on me and I’ll Movify your life. There’s a lot of similar. Things that we go into. But his came around because he was actually writing a screenplay of his life and the people who were helping him writing it,

[00:30:34] Erica | Trip Scholars: Huh.

[00:30:34] Jessica Grace Coleman: Basically told him, your life’s too boring. You need to like judge it up a bit. And then that got him thinking. It’s like, God, my life is boring.

I need to create some insighting incidents. And then it all went on from there. It is really, really good. It’s beautiful, beautifully written. Another favorite book is The Art of Making Memories by Meik Wiking. It’s really this really cute book. He wrote a lot of books on Hygge as well. And it’s all

[00:30:56] Erica | Trip Scholars: Hmm.

[00:30:56] Jessica Grace Coleman: to make memorable moments, which is a big part of Movify Your Life as well. And then the last book is the Top Five Regrets of the Dying by Brony Ware, which is a

[00:31:04] Erica | Trip Scholars: Yeah.

[00:31:05] Jessica Grace Coleman: But I think it’s a must for absolutely everyone because a lot of my stuff as well is about getting to the end of your life and not feeling regret for the dreams you were too scared to go after.

And it’s basically she, looked after these dying people and talked to them about their regrets and it’s sort of like a roadmap of what not to do, like what to avoid, and what to make sure you do in life. And I think everyone should read it. and one last thing. If you love crazy quests and wacky adventures pretty much any book, TV show. film they’ve done as well by Dave Gorman and Danny Wallace. I don’t know if they’re huge in America or not. But they were huge influences on me. They do these ridiculous adventures and quests and record them. Dave Gorman actually went to my high school He was a bit older than me, so I wasn’t there with him, but I was just like, yes, representing Walton High School.

they’re just really, really funny. goes on a quest to see how many other Dave Gormans, he can meet, and he flies all around the country in the world meeting them. And it’s just ridiculous, but it just really makes you want to go and do something really silly and fun because life is short and it should be fun and silly.

So those are my recommendations.

[00:32:11] Erica | Trip Scholars: those are so fabulous. Thank you. That was really generous of you to share all of those. We will link those below in the show notes

[00:32:18] Jessica Grace Coleman: Great.

[00:32:19] Erica | Trip Scholars: And if listeners are looking for more advice like that, I highly encourage you to follow Jessica and check out all the work that she’s doing with Movify your life.

[00:32:29] Jessica Grace Coleman: Thank

One Small Step for Better Travel

[00:32:29] Erica | Trip Scholars: Do you have one small tip for our listeners that they could move forward with this week so that they could start moving in this direction for themselves?

[00:32:38] Jessica Grace Coleman: Yeah, so it’s actually something I did in my film. And it’s a really fun exercise. I got like a piece of paper and I got loads of different colored pens and I wrote down all my favorite memories I could ever remember. And you can do this, like a lot of mine were travel related, just because they happen to be.

But you can do this with just like your favorite trips ever. If you want to focus on travel. I wrote everything down and then I looked at all the patterns and all the things and like sharing food and drink with people. 

[00:33:06] Erica | Trip Scholars: Hmm.

[00:33:06] Jessica Grace Coleman: Hot tubs were a big focus. I love hot tubs, so when every time if I’m traveling and there’s a hot tub, I’m happy. I just looked for like all the patterns. And then once you, start recognizing all the things that have made your favorite memories or your favorite trips, then. You can start thinking, how can I incorporate this into my next trip?

Or how can I incorporate more of these

[00:33:24] Erica | Trip Scholars: Hmm.

[00:33:24] Jessica Grace Coleman: my life because I know they made me happy. So this is like a blueprint for what I need to do going forward if I want to keep making all these amazing memories. you can spend as much time as you want, like thinking about this and it could be really fun exercise anyway you like reminiscing if you do it with someone else, like your partner reminiscing about all the great times and looking at patterns that show up and like, oh, how can I get more hot tubs in my life?

You know, that kind of, that kind of thing.

[00:33:44] Erica | Trip Scholars: I love it. It was one of the parts of the film I really appreciated and wondered, were you putting that onto a canvas that you could hang on your wall? It looked like it might even be

[00:33:55] Jessica Grace Coleman: in a

[00:33:55] Erica | Trip Scholars: a canvas.

[00:33:56] Jessica Grace Coleman: that. That’s a really good idea. And then you can just look at

[00:33:59] Erica | Trip Scholars: yeah.

[00:34:00] Jessica Grace Coleman: and be like, oh, what should I incorporate in my life today? Yeah, that would be a really good, really good idea.

[00:34:04] Erica | Trip Scholars: You know, I loved that you had it so visual with all the different colors and everything and then your idea about pulling together themes that we can intentionally move towards in our life. Thank you. That’s a great tip. We like to leave our listeners with a reflection on travel to carry with them into the week. I was wondering if you have a quote or a question you could share with us.

Reflection for Travelers Crafting Movie Inspired Trips

[00:34:27] Jessica Grace Coleman: Yep. So I have a quote, and it isn’t directly related to travel, but when I read it, I was in my, solo travel era, like doing all the new scary things and I equated it to travel. So it’s actually from a million miles in a thousand years by Donald Miller, which is one of the books I

[00:34:41] Erica | Trip Scholars: Yeah.

[00:34:42] Jessica Grace Coleman: And the quote is. “And once you live a good story, you get a taste for a kind of meaning in life, and you can’t go back to being normal. You can’t go back to meaningless scenes stitched together by the forgettable thread of wasted time.” And I love it so much. I think it’s so beautifully written and it really resonates with me, especially the forgettable thread of wasted time.

I read that during the pandemic when everyone was locked down and I was like, oh my God. All our days these days are like just forgettable threads wasted. Time seeming Like scenes stitched together, meaningless scenes through no fault of our own, like it was the pandemic, but it really made me just want to get out there when I could and go after something that wasn’t normal.

I didn’t want to live a normal story anymore. I wanted an incredible, adventurous, meaningful story that I’ll be proud of to look back on when I get to the end of my life. 

Where to Follow Jessica Grace Coleman and Learn More About Movification

[00:35:27] Erica | Trip Scholars: Thank you for sharing that. you have brought so much richness to this conversation. I’m really grateful. Thank you. Can you let us know where people can find all the work that you’re doing and follow you and what you’ve got coming up next?

[00:35:43] Jessica Grace Coleman: Yeah, so you can go to my website, everything’s on there. It’s mofi your life.com. So that’s M-O-V-I-F-Y, your life. So two Y’s in the middle there. And you can find me on Instagram at Mofi Your Life. And you can also check out my newly rebranded podcast, the Mofi Your Life Show. So it carries on from my other podcast. A lot of similar themes, but everything is move aside now.

[00:36:05] Erica | Trip Scholars: I have, a free guide, a PDF called the movie star, alter alter Ego starter kit. And it just takes you through the seven basic steps you need to create your alter, alter ego.

[00:36:15] Jessica Grace Coleman: And it’s all really fun stuff like naming them, coming up with their personality coming up with your transformational item like your trigger. your signature scent if you want one. Um, how to create your own theme song to go with it. 

there’s also a real world. challenge in there to take your alter ego for a test drive, which is what I did in my film. 

 And there’s a bit about the psychology behind alter egos in there too, in, in case you’re interested in that. And you can get it from my website. So you can go to Movify your life.com. Uh, there’s a big button you can click 

or you can just go to move via your life.com/free and you’ll get sent straight to the form and you can get it there. 

[00:36:47] Erica | Trip Scholars: And we will link to all of that below in the show notes because it’s a great resource. Thank you so much, Jessica, for sharing your experiences and your insights. I got so much out of today’s conversation. I know our listeners did too.

[00:37:01] Jessica Grace Coleman: Thank you for having me. I had a really fun time. 

[00:37:03] Erica | Trip Scholars: Thanks so much for joining me. I know your time is valuable and I’m truly grateful that you spent some of it here together. Please come visit [email protected] for free travel resources, workshops and travel coaching. And if you enjoyed today’s show, please follow, review or share. It really helps other curious travelers find us.

[00:37:24] Speaker: Until next time, curious Travelers.