Meet Nathalie Plamondon-thomas

 

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Nathalie Plamondon-thomas. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with NATHALIE below.

NATHALIE, so many exciting things to discuss, we can’t wait. Thanks for joining us and we appreciate you sharing your wisdom with our readers. So, maybe we can start by discussing optimism and where your optimism comes from?

Everything starts with the story you tell yourself in your head. Let’s go back to the days when I was just starting out teaching fitness, at a gym in Toronto. I was not super confident; I’m sure you’ve been there before, maybe not in a gym but in some other setting where you were brand new and a little out of your element. You’re not sure what you’re doing, you’re not popular, you don’t know anybody, or you’re new in the area and haven’t really found your feet yet. So what happened between me begging my boss not to remove my class from the schedule because of the low numbers, and being awarded fitness instructor of the year for the whole country, less than a year later?

The gym was introducing a new dance program. We put together a group to demonstrate it at the next instructor’s meeting of the Greater Toronto Area. So picture this: You are on stage in front of 100+ fitness pro, all much better than you, you are really intimidated but you are “giving your all”. You are starting to feel pretty good and you can just feel all the eyes in the crowd turning towards you. You know you are drawing attention and everyone has this shocked look on their faces! You are thinking “Oh my gosh, they’re so impressed with my dance skills! They had no idea I was this good at dancing!” You’re having the best time on stage and can really feel all the energy coming from the audience.

I don’t know what this would do for you, but for me, it made a huge impact on my life. It was a real turning point. We finished the number, and I was amped. My confidence was through the roof! That performance totally changed me. I started strutting around in the gym and putting my hand up to become team leader, I was so confident that my teaching style exploded, and my classes started to get packed. Everybody was so impressed with how I well I was doing.

Much later, I was chatting with one of my colleagues in the locker room, and she said to me: “I’m so impressed with you, Nathalie. Even after what happened to you that day, you’re still so confident, and you’ve been acting like you own the place instead of being embarrassed. Everybody really respects you because you didn’t let it bother you at all.”

Um, record scratch! Excuse me?! What was she talking about? Well, it turned out that, unbeknownst to me, I’d had a wardrobe malfunction that day, and my breast was sticking out during the whole performance. That’s why people were looking at me with shocked looks on their faces. But for a very different reason than I thought!

But I had no idea, and for weeks afterward, I was this super confident person. Once I heard about this, of course, I kind of wanted to disappear, but only for a few minutes; by then, it was too late, I was already the queen of the gym, boob malfunction or not. Because, honestly? I still felt absolutely amazing. Although the story I’d had in my head was not the right one, it completely changed my mindset, and it just hadn’t mattered. One of the most embarrassing moments of my life had a much different impact for me than it might have, because of that story of success I had in my head. What mattered most was my mindset around it.

So I spent the next decades studying the brain and neurosciences and I created a system to transform the story in our head and a process to apply it to your daily life. That is the system I shared in my 12 International #1 bestsellers, the system I work with my one-on-one coaching clients, the system at the base of my 20+ online courses and the system I share on stages around the world.

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?

There has never been a time where things were happening faster than they are today. Most directors, VPs, managers and team members have to juggle with many challenges all at once in their personal or professional lives. The decisions they make are sometimes worth tens of thousands of dollars, and they have to decide quickly, so it’s important that they have the tools to be at their best so they can respond with their expertise and their knowledge and not be tainted by accumulated stress or by their own internal negative self-talk. “You’re not good enough!” 70% of our thoughts are negative. Statistics show that 85% of people suffer from a lack of self-confidence which causes imposter syndrome, resistance to change, low performance and ultimately not working – or living – at full potential.
The THINK Yourself® ACADEMY, offers keynotes and trainings, leading-edge online courses, laser-focus business strategy and one-on-one transformation coaching.
We help people turn off the panic button, manage stress, increase confidence, perform through change, and unlock their full potential.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

It is not enough to simply entertain the audience for an hour get them all pumped up, all motivated. They want to change the world, they take tons of notes then they go back to work, put their notes on the self and it becomes shelf-help. Now yes, of course I can be entertaining, of course we’ll have a good time, but being entertaining is not enough. You need your speaker to do more than that, they need to have a transformational impact with simple and concrete tools for the audience to implement the knowledge into their lives.

When I talk to organizations, the one most common challenge is not that they can’t find eloquent speakers with a high level of expertise.

We are all experts. It is the fact that a month later, when you ask the audience members what they remember from the keynote speaker, they have already forgotten. Not only do I bring relevant content so that a transformation can happen at a deeper neurological level, I also have a unique multi-touch points follow-up approach that will ensure a longer-term impact. When that happens, then YOU succeed and my job is to make YOU unlock your full potential!

So the skills that are impactful are the ability I have to use stories, metaphors, analogies to make the audience understand the concepts easily. Secondly, the customization of actionable content for a long term impact and return on investment is what sets me apart from other speakers. And I have often been told my high-energy, laughter and fun dynamic style will make them FEEL great.

What was the most impactful thing your parents did for you?

My parents are highly positive people. We had signs in the house with motivational quotes reminding us that WE CAN DO THIS…. When we were kids, every Sunday morning, my brother and I had to sit in the living room and listen to motivational tapes of motivational speakers, Zig Ziglar, Og Mandino, Jean-Marc Chaput were my bedtime story authors. Even today, my parents are still my biggest cheerleaders and I am truly blessed to have them with me.

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Dawn Bowman

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