Meet Nichole Parmley

Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Nichole Parmley. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Nichole, so great to have you with us and we want to jump right into a really important question. In recent years, it’s become so clear that we’re living through a time where so many folks are lacking self-confidence and self-esteem. So, we’d love to hear about your journey and how you developed your self-confidence and self-esteem.

Developing confidence and self-esteem is a lifetime journey, especially if you’re a woman. Over the past two years I’ve done a lot of very intentional work to develop those qualities and I still have a long way to go. Without a doubt, the most important thing I’ve done to develop self-esteem is join The School of New Feminist Thought created and led by Kara Loewentheil. She also has an amazing podcast called Unf*ck Your Brain and I cannot recommend it enough.

What makes this work so effective is that, through a series of thoughtwork tools, it teaches us how to discern which thoughts are causing our emotions and how to discard thoughts that don’t serve us and how to create and choose thoughts that do. It’s also really helpful for uncovering a lot of beliefs that we’ve been socialized into that are holding us back: things like scarcity mindset, imposter syndrome, and a plethora of beliefs about what a woman is supposed to be, how she’s supposed to act, what makes her attractive, what makes her valuable, and what her “worth” is based on. Uncovering those thoughts and then learning how to overcome them is a game changer.

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

I am a personal trainer and coach. I use both terms because I train the body and coach the mind. Through several poignant experiences, it came to my attention that many women were beginning personal training programs in an effort to people please. Society and sadly, people in their lives, were usually making comments about the size of their body or their habits and so in an effort to quell the shame they felt, they would seek out a trainer’s services hoping I could “fix” their body. What none of them realized is that it wasn’t the size of their body that was the problem, it was the shame they were socialized to feel about their body. And so I decided to change how I do what I do.

While I do still take a few in-person clients, I have changed my focus to an online program that helps women figure out if fitness is really what THEY want, create a sustainable fitness program that is tailored to what they LIKE, and help them gently and gradually transition from working out at home to working out in a gym. I do this through daily thought work activities, a curated fitness program they help me write, check-ins, and monitoring biometric data like resting heart rate, daily strain, and heart rate variability.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

The three most important things that have helped me on my journey are tenacity, curiosity, perception.

Tenacity is something I was born with. My parents called it stubbornness. I’m probably not the best person for explaining how to develop it but I’ll try. If something lights your heart on fire, let it. Don’t write it off. Don’t let other people calling your crazy steer you off course. Go after it. If it keeps you up at night, let it. If it drives you to work all the time, let it. The season will come when you want a break and when that happens, take one. But don’t be shamed out of your dream. It’s ok to look a little crazy. Also, just don’t give up until you’ve achieved your goal. When are you done? When you’ve accomplished what you set out to do. Will you fail? Probably a lot. So figure out what happened, make a change, try again. You don’t stop until you’ve got what you came for.

Curiosity is something I’ve had to develop. This is what picks me up out of the lows. Why did something go wrong? Why aren’t people responding? Why do I feel this way? Are these thoughts serving me? Where are these thoughts coming from? What emotion am I feeling right now? Can I choose a different thought? Does it make me feel better. That’s what useful curiosity sounds like and it will change your life. It takes the judgement out of failure and turns it into learning.

Perception: What do people need? This comes, I think, with practice. For me, coaching really developed it. My whole business is watching people, evaluating people, listening to people. When you spend time being curious about other people, when you take the time to really talk to them, when you ask them to explain what they mean when they say something is “hard”, you begin to see patterns of behavior and it helps you figure them out even when they might not know what’s wrong. Perception, I think, is often called intuition.

How can folks who want to work with you connect?

I am 100% open to collaboration. I’d love to work with companies that are body positive and female owned. Whether you are a clothing manufacturer, a women’s health provider, a life coach, etc. The most important thing to me is that we can truly improve the lives of women who are struggling to find peace, to find acceptance, and to love themselves. If you want that too, we have grounds for a conversation. The best way to reach me is via e-mail.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://hygeiafitness.net
• Instagram: hygeiafitness
• Other: thehygeiaprojectinfo@gmail.com

Image Credits

Silk and Salt Photography (black and white photo only)