High Performance Mindset | Learn from World-Class Leaders, Consultants, Athletes & Coaches about Mindset - 85: Think Like the World's Best with JF Menard, Kambio Performance

Episode Date: January 19, 2017

JF Menard, a performance psychology specialist, joined the internationally acclaimed entertainment company Cirque Du Soleil at the age of 25, fresh out of graduate school. “They didn’t hire me for my experience. They hired me for my passion.” In this interview, he talks about how being around the best athletes in the world helped him elevate his game. He provides several lessons learned (one from a clown) and how his work at Cirque lead him to start Kambio Performance in 2013. Over the years, he is helped athletes win gold medals in the 3 biggest major sporting events:  Commonwealth, PanAms and Olympic Games. He discusses how he helps his athletes handle pressure, perform their best at the Games, and how he prepared himself as a sport psychologist to go to the Games in Rio. He also shares what he sees as the mental attributes of the World’s best one of those attributes being that  “World champions are not fearless – they just fear less.”  You can reach JF Menard at kambioperformance.com as well as on Twitter @JFMenardKambiop and on Facebook. 

Welcome to High Performance Mindset with Dr. Sindra Kampoff. Do you want to reach your full potential, live a life of passion, go after your dreams? Each week we bring you strategies and interviews to help you ignite your mindset. Let's bring on Sindra. This is your host, Sindra Kampoff, and I'm grateful that you're here, ready to listen to an interview with J.F. Menard. J.F. Menard is a performance psychology specialist out of Montreal, Canada, and he joined the internationally acclaimed entertainment company Cirque du Soleil at the age of 25, fresh out of graduate school. And he said, you know, they didn't hire me for my experience, but rather for my passion.

In his interview, he talks about how being around the best athletes in the world helped him elevate his game. He provides several lessons that he learned, one from a clown, I think you'll enjoy the story, and how his work at Cirque led him to start his own company, Cambio Performance, in 2013. So over the years, he's helped athletes win gold medals in three major championships, the Commonwealth Games, Pan American Games, and the Olympic Games. And he says what makes an Olympic champion is the mental side.

It's the mental side that leads to success. So specifically in this interview, he talks about how he helps his athletes that he works with handle pressure, how he helps them perform their best at the games, and how he mentally prepared himself and physically prepared himself as a sports psychologist to go to the games this year in Rio. So he shares many of the mental attributes of the world's best, including my favorite quote of this interview, that world champions are not fearless. They just fear less. So I think you're going to really enjoy this interview with JF.

To reach out to us, we'd love to hear what you thought about the interview. What stood out to you? What's a quote that you really enjoy that you can use in your work? You can head over to Twitter. My Twitter handle is at mentally underscore strong. And JF says JF Menard Cambio P. And we'd encourage you just to share with us what's it out to you and start a discussion over there on Twitter. All of the show notes are also available on my website. That's cindracampoff.com. Or an easy way to get them is just go to Dr. Cindra, C-I-N-D-R-A.

And you can search for JF Menard. It's also on my homepage right there. Well, I hope you enjoyed this interview with JF. Also, one other thing that would be really helpful for us, if you could head over to iTunes and leave a review for us. If you like this interview, if you like other parts of this podcast, other episodes, we'd love to hear from you. That just helps us reach more and more people each week. Without further ado, let's bring on JF. JF, I'm so excited to welcome you to the High Performance Mindset. I just want to thank you

so much for being here to share all of your knowledge and wisdom with the listeners. Thank you, Sandra. It's a pleasure to be here. I'm just looking forward to diving into your work and just learning a little bit more about what you do. I know we know each other, but I think this is an opportunity for us to just get to know a little bit more about your work more deeply. So to start us off, JF, tell us about your passion and what you do right now. So I'm based in Montreal, Canada. And as we speak, I have my private business called Cambio Performance. So I work with different types of clients, from athletes to entrepreneurs to musicians to surgeons, and basically two different types of services. So the consulting one-on-one type of stuff, and I also do a lot of public speaking engagements as well. So the reason I do this is it's always been my dream

to help people achieve their dreams. And I think a lot of people say this, but I actually remind myself every morning. It's a little mantra that I have that I tell myself that today I have an opportunity to help people achieve their dreams and you know sometimes like everyone else I wake up in the morning I'm a little bit a little bit tired and maybe I don't feel extra motivated for my day but I don't remember one moment where this little mantra did not help me.

And it just allows me to be a little bit more connected with the real purpose of what I do. Is there a specific time in the morning you remind yourself of that or just, you know, sometime in the morning? I actually associate it with breakfast because I find that if you don't associate it with something, you forget to do it. So, and I have breakfast every morning. I usually do want to have breakfast. So JF, just tell us a little bit about your background and how you got to where you are now. Yeah, sure. So I always wanted to become a gym teacher, actually. So I did my undergrad in kinesiology. And I had a two week practicum during my last week, or my last semester, sorry, of my, of my undergrad degree, and the practicum was awful

i hated my experience the kids were so hard to handle and it actually became one of the best moments of my life because it's at that moment i started reflecting about what else i could do and so i studied at university of ottawa and at the time they had probably the best arguably one of the best sports psychology programs in the world With the carry or like that most people know that was teaching there and penny work there and other great people as well so I decided to do my master's program in sports psychology and And then I had started my PhD program. I had done a bit about a year and a half and Then Cirque du Soleil offered me a job.

So I worked for Cirque du Soleil for five years from 2008 until the end of 2012. And I will get more into details about my work at Cirque. Early 2013, I decided to start my own business. So I've had this business now for almost four years. Excellent. Excellent. I love how you're describing like your internship wasn't that great. It just reminds me of like how difficulties happen for you.

You know, there's a reason that it didn't go so great. So you'd find Terry Orlik and sports ecology. So, OK, let's just dive into your experience at Cirque. We were just talking before we started recording the call about just a diverse amount of clients you had working for Cirque du Soleil. So just tell us about maybe just to start, like what actually you did and how did it start? Well, it's a great question.

And before we get into that, I'd like to just share how I got that opportunity working at Cirque du Soleil because I think a lot of people that are listening to us today are maybe searching for answers or just feedback on how to start a career in sports psych. So when I was doing my PhD, I was participating at a lot of different conferences presenting the research that I was doing. And I put a lot of value in making connections. And again, I think a lot of people talk about this

and they say it's important, but like really go out there and meet a lot of people because you never know what that can bring in the future. So I had met this one guy. I'll make a really long story short. Met one guy at one conference. I met this guy again at a second conference. They were really connected. And it just happened that his best friend was a vice president at Cirque du Soleil.

Talking with his best friend, just introduced myself. And then at some point, there's an opportunity that opened at Cirque. And because I really inquired about meeting his best friend and got connected with him, which it was a long process, but I made it happen, he decided to accept my CV, my application. And at that time, the applications were only internal. So because I was such a hard-nosed kind of guy really you know persevering and I wanted to make sure that he knew who I was he decided to take my application and I was only 25 at the time I still you know very green just I was still in school I didn't

have much experience like I had this started consulting a little bit after my master's degree on the job application they were looking for someone who had at least 10 years at the national level. I had two weeks. I worked for the Women's National Baseball Program because one of my friends was a coach. They were looking for someone who had five years of experience in the artistic field. Well, Sandra, let me tell you. I mean, artistically, the only thing I know about artistics is that whenever I have a few drinks, I'll start, I'll start dancing. I'll sing once in a while in the shower. But other than that, I had no experience in the artistic world.

But I do remember one thing I was really good at is at the bottom of the job application, they were asking for someone who had a good knowledge of Microsoft Word and Excel and PowerPoint. And I was really good at that. At least I had that. That's awesome. Yeah, so I went through a series of interviews. And I guess the message I want to get across is that they didn't hire me for my experience because I didn't have any. They didn't hire me because of my expertise because, I mean, I didn't have much expertise back then.

But I found out afterwards that they hired me because of my expertise because I mean I didn't have much expertise back then but I found out afterwards that they hired me because of my passion uh and because I was very much open to connecting with their world and really you know learn about what strip to slay is make sure that um you know I remember this one thing I told them in my last interview they asked me if I had anything else to say. And I said, actually, I do. I said, I'm going to face a lot of moments. If I do get this job, I'm going to face a lot of moments where I'm not going to have the answer, but I'll be the first one to work extremely hard to find it. And I remember when I said that, both people that were interviewing me,

they looked at me with a big smile on their face. I don't know. It was just kind of this pure moment where I'm sure it had an impact. And I found out later on that the other person that was considered as well, because at the end, we were two people. I think there was 25 people that applied or were considered for the job. And the other guy was someone that had like 20 years of experience and someone that I knew. So yeah, so it really opened my eyes because it really showed me that you know experience can take you so far but your personality and your willingness to learn is huge so I got I got the

job this is in 2008 in a nutshell I had three big responsibilities so the first one was to teach them teach mental skills uh to the to the acrobats and all the artists within the shows. The second one was to teach them recovery techniques. So breathing techniques, a lot of stuff around relaxation, visualization. We got them to do some yoga classes and catchy stuff and different types of massage techniques as well. And the third thing was to teach them what we call professional skills and making sure they knew how to work within a company

because a lot of them came directly from sport and it was their first job. You know, when you're 18, 19, 20 years old, you've never worked your life, during your entire life and you've only been an athlete, being an employee for a huge company like that is not easy so you know the importance of respecting your your colleagues your work colleagues what it meant to work with people that spoke different languages that came from other places in the world what it meant to be on time as well and make sure you're punctual because you know the North Americans know very well what that means

but when you're working with Brazilians or a lot of different Latino types of cultures which I absolutely love by the way they're fantastic people but they are known to be people that can be late and that's normal so uh yeah so those are those are my three main responsibilities. So we can go maybe a little bit more into details in the next few minutes. But in a nutshell, that was my role. you know, say like, I don't have it all, I'll find it out, right? And I'll look for the answer and how your personality and your passion made all the difference. So when you think about, let's just dive into the Cirque du Soleil, the atmosphere a little bit more. And in terms of what you saw the athletes and the performers struggle with. So just tell us who did you actually work with there in terms of the types of clients you had? And then what did you see in terms of the people that really thrived?

What did you see were their mental attributes? What did they do well? That's a great question, Sandra. So I'll start with the type of artists that I worked with. And we're talking about the elite. I mean, these are some of the best in the world. I mean, most of the gymnasts were on their national team. So some are Olympic medalists.

Some are world champions. Some of these jugglers, this one juggler that I worked with who is really interesting, he holds 16 world Guinness Book records to himself. Wow. So just being around these people was inspiring. I mean, I think I was able to bring a lot of great stuff with them in terms of performance psychology content and strategies, but they brought so much to me as well.

And I would tell them this, like, just being around these people, they just have an aura that, I mean, when you're around the best in the world on a daily basis, and by the way, not only the acrobats or the artists, but also I got to work with some of the best in the world on a daily basis and by the way not only the the acrobats or the artists but also i got to work with some of the best acrobatic coaches the best artistic choreographers in the world to come back to your question about what they do that's different that makes them so good i think that there's a lot of answers to that but i would argue the one thing that really jumped to me is these are all people that at some point in their

lives they dreamed of working for Cirque du Soleil so you know I when I would meet every artist individually I would one of the first questions I would ask them is tell me about your past and tell me about your journey and how you got to Cirque du Soleil. Sandra, we could have a conversation for 12 hours about these stories that are just, they just blow your mind. Like, and most of them, well, mostly, yeah, most of them, I would say about 90% of them would tell me, well, when I was five or seven or 10 years old, I saw Cirque du Soleil show at some point, and I told myself, I want to work for that company. So these people that I was working with, they were living a dream.

So when you talk about passion and you talk about, you know, being engaged and being perseverant and, you know, just making sure they not only reach their dream, but they thrive in the setting of their dream, it was very, very inspiring. One thing to come back to your question about what they struggled with, I would say the one big thing that a lot of gymnasts and acrobat struggled with is that they are all perfectionists to them are and most of them came from a world where they would perform 10 12 times a year and train about 300 days a year

well at Cirque du Soleil it's completely opposite. So they would do up to 400 shows a year and train only a few times a week. When you're an acrobat or a gymnast you can have a goal of trying to be perfect at every competition because you have about a month to prepare for the event. Whereas when you're performing 10 times a week, you can't expect to be perfect every show. Because if you do, by the end of the week, you're not going to have any juice left in the tank.

Like you're going to be burnt out. So I created this concept that ended up being very, very practical for many of them, which I call giving your 85% every show. First, the reason it was really important is because, you know, can they make themselves believe that they can give 80% every show? The answer is yes. Can they make themselves believe that they want to give, that they can give 100% every show?

The answer is no. I mean, you can give 100% the first few shows. By the time you get to your 10th show later in the week, you're going to get 40%. That's just the way it works. 85% on every show, that was possible to give. But the kicker to that concept is that I would tell them, make sure to give 100% of your 85. So in other words, make sure you give your best version of that 85 every night. And if everybody does that in the show, it's going to be a wicked show. Because in the end, the person who pays $150 to go see the show, they don't even know what the difference is between 100% and 85% anyways.

So, yeah. So it ended up being something that was very practical. Yeah, you know, I'm just thinking about, JF, some of the shows that I've been to, and I'm thinking about how it's pretty impossible to be perfect. And for all of us, it's just impossible to be perfect. What do you do in terms of what they do in terms of performance is, like I've seen it, it could be life and death, right? In terms of they make a mistake, you know, they fall, you know, and that could mean injury. So how do you work with that in terms of, you know, they might say back to you, well, you know, I need to be perfect. So then this and this and this doesn't happen. What are your thoughts on that? Right, great question. So first of all, as much as a normal, like if a normal person sees a surgical salation, they might think it's really high risk, it's very dangerous, but in the end, it isn't that high risk it's very dangerous but in the end it isn't that high risk um they've done some studies

with the amount of injuries that uh service lay artists go through in a year and they actually like per performance they actually have a lot less than like american football or professional hockey um so it's not that bad but you're right i mean there are certain things that they do that they're high in the air and it is risky in a sense. But, you know, if you think about it, they do this 350, 400 times a year. So for them, it's something that they're comfortable in doing. And, you know, just a little side note about this, a lot of the injuries that came out of our shows were injuries that were done

on what we called simple acrobatic tricks. And this idea that, and actually I work a lot with, from what I learned from Cirque into sport now, where most mistakes that are done in sport are not on difficult tasks. They're often on these simple stuff that we just take for granted. And when we categorize something as being easy to do, well, our focus is not as sharp. Whereas when we're doing something that's a little bit more risky or a little bit more difficult, well, all of a sudden, your focus is sharp. So the way I explain this is our brains are made in a way to be very good at anticipating what's coming up in terms of the

task at hand and i tell my clients you have three boxes in your mind you have one box that is called easy second box is moderate and the third box is difficult and when you have something that's coming up in your training or in your competition like for example a judo athlete that's preparing for an easy an easy fight, well, I just make sure that he understands that you've got to be careful with this because if you consider this as being easy and it falls into your easy box, well, your focus is going to be probably a little bit altered and it's not going to be as sharp as you want it.

So we make sure that we take an easy task and make it a little bit more complex so their focus about it is a little bit different to make sure that we take an easy task and make it a little bit more complex so their focus about is a little bit different to make sure that they're a little bit more challenged and in the end it works very very well so yeah so in terms of coming back to your original question about this high risk stuff or there's stuff that they do that's dangerous um we just make sure that they're able to be they have their little routines where they prep very well and that's one great thing about performing so many times in a year is these prep routines become so handy and they just fall into their into

their warm-ups and it's just it's something that you'd be just know very very well and from a psychological perspective it allows them to really zone in so yeah so in the end it's, it's not as risky as we think. And they are able to really focus quite well on when they do those stuff. You know, JF, you mentioned how being around these world class athletes impacted you. Tell us how it impacted you. And what do you take from your work at Cirque now? And even, you know, I know you work with a lot of Olympic athletes. Tell us about that. I was able to pick out a lot of little nuggets from a lot of different performers at Cirque du Soleil. I mean, there's a lot I could share, but it's one thing

I think that for the listeners, it would be good to hear. There's this one clown that, you know, clowns are some of the most interesting people I have ever met in my life. If you think about it, they earn a living entertaining people. So to be able to entertain people on a daily basis, you really have to have an agile mind. You've got to be flexible to what's going on. You've got to pick out information in your entourage

to make sure you react well to what's going on. And so they're extremely clever. And this one clown told me once that his philosophy of preparing for a show is called 50-50. So 50% is allocated to, you know, his choreography in the show and the act he needs to do. And it's a lot about, you know, the content of what he's supposed to do on stage. And the other 50% is what he calls just being creative, adapt yourself to the crowd. It's basically improvising.

And so I would ask him to tell me a little bit more what that means because, you know, it kind of makes sense. But, you know, in reality, what does that mean? And he said, well, if I prepare 100% for my act that's coming up in the show, I do the act for me. I don't do the act for them. It's all about like, well, I'm going to do this this way because it's going to make me uncomfortable.

Or I'm going to do this this way because it worked in the show before. So there's people that are spending a lot of money to watch me. I'm not i'm not doing my job because my job is to entertain them not entertain me so that really flipped my mind about how i consult and and when i do public speaking as well um because when you consult with someone and you know i remember in my early, when I didn't have much experience, I would prepare my sessions so much, like it would take sometimes up to an hour to prepare for a one hour session that was coming up and take some notes and making sure everything was

organized, I had a set plan. And in the end, I realized that I wasn't really listening to understand my client, I was listening just to respond. And when you're listening to respond, you know, as they're speaking, you're thinking about, okay, well, this is what I'm going to say. So really you're not listening. And listening to understand is really taking in what's going on, and then, you know, automatically your brain is going to come up with something if you just trust it.

So I got this from this client. He really had an impact on my life. automatically your brain is going to come up with something if you just trust it. So I got this from this clown. He really had an impact on my life about how to be able to really connect with what's going on. He would call it pay attention. And as simple as it sounds, we use the words like concentration and focus, but he would say pay attention. And when he would be be because he was also a master prof so he would teach other clowns as well and when the clowns when he was teaching a class and the clowns were not listening he would tell him like you're not paying attention and then he would get into what that means

about like connecting with the people in front so uh yeah so the 50 50 rule has been something that's been really practical for me because I give a lot of workshops at different universities across North America. And when I work with people who want to be better consultants, there's a big part of my workshop that's based on that and how to do that. So that's one thing that I learned that's been very practical. I like it. I like it just in terms of like what I really heard was trust it, trust that you have it and not overthink it or, or over try. I think another way to say that. How do you apply that concept of 50-50% to those athletes that you work with who are attending the games, you know, the Olympic games? I know you just had a few that have just recently

went to Rio. So tell us how you might apply that to a sport athlete. Well, I think it all depends about what kind of sport we're talking about, because if we're talking about a sprinter who needs to run a hundred meters, there's not much to adapt to in his environment. Yes, there is stuff he needs to be flexible to like how, you know, how intense the crowd's going to be or like you know managing maybe his opponents around him and etc but like if we take a combat sport athlete like a like a wrestler or judo athlete um you know they they're fighting

against an opponent so what's going to determine if they win or not is how well they master their opponent right absolutely if they're only stuck on their plan their internal plan about how they think they're going to win well we got to remember that the opponent also prepared for the athlete that i'm working with so you know you might think that your plan is going to be great but in the end your plan you might have to throw out the window at some point just try something else and you're not able to really try something else and be good at it if you're not really paying attention to what your opponent is giving you yeah i think it really depends on the sport but in the end you know

it's the clown that taught me this concept but it can be applied in so many things really i even take like an entrepreneur who like a corporate leader who is leading a meeting. Like that is so typical. I do a lot of work in the corporate field now and they go into their meeting, it's like, it's almost like it's their meeting, you know? Like they have these five or six things they want to go through and they don't really pay attention

to what their employees are telling them in terms of body language or in terms of like feedback on what's going on. So JF, tell us what you see your elite-level clients, what separates them mentally from others? What do you see them do that's maybe different from those that haven't succeeded at that highest level? The answer I'm going to give is not only about athletes.

I would argue it's about anyone that excels in their domain. It's this curiosity in what they can do to get better on a daily basis. I have a client of mine who's a mogul skier and he's arguably the best ever in the sport.

And he's been dominating the sport for the last few years. And at some point I asked him, I said, what makes you so great at your sport? And he's a very humble guy.

He's awesome. And he looked at me and he said, well, he said, I find a way to go to bed at night better than I was when I woke up this morning. And then I said, okay, well, what does that mean? He says, well, he says, sometimes it's one conversation I had with you, Jeff. Like you taught me something that I didn't know when I woke up this morning. Or it might be like a workout at the gym where I lifted 10 more pounds today that I wasn't able to lift yesterday. Or it might be this little technical thing about, you know, how I position my arms when I'm skiing that I didn't really get last week,

but now I get it today. And as long as I do that on a daily basis, you know, I'm pretty sure I'm going to remain on top of the world. And the way he said it was so clear and so in a humble way, that made so much sense. I said, well, that's a great point. I mean, it really does make sense. So there's an acronym that I use. A lot of people ask me this question, like, what makes it that people are successful? And there's so many books on this and, you know, the seven habits of successful people and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. One thing that's been very clear to me is it's people that just keep educating themselves. And education can be divided in a lot of different topics

or different ways of doing it. But the acronym that I use is key. It's a key for a door. So the key to success is keep educating yourself. And actually, if I can use myself as an example, for the last seven years, I've been reading for at least 20 minutes before I go to bed every single night and I read close to about 50 books a year books related to all kinds of stuff like sports

psychology to leadership stuff to biographies I mean I had a whole library in my house it's huge and you know I'm not in any obligation of doing this you know nobody's holding a gun next my head say Jeff you have to read 20 minutes today but I know it's an investment and the funny thing is and you you might know this yourself if if you read as well like the amount of times I find myself using something in a consultation session that I read last night in my bed it's crazy and then and then my clients ask me like how do you know this stuff like you know how how can you know so many things on different things and you know I'll just tell well actually I read it

last night I read a lot too JF but I've been listening to some books on tape and I love them or you know just on audible as I drive and And I love learning too. And I like, I like that you're saying that that's what the best of the best do. And you know, something I'm going to add to that syndrome is that I have this philosophy for myself and that I try to teach other sports sex and everything in our field. And if you're working with high performers or you wish to work with high performers, you have to be high performers or you wish to work with high performers,

you have to be a high performer yourself. And, you know, if I can share the way I prepare for the Olympic Games. So, you know, as professionals, we put so much energy and thought into how we prepare the athletes to perform on demand at the Olympic Games. And, you know, if you think about it, going to the Olympic Games is not only a dream for athletes. It's a dream for coaches. It's a dream for physiotherapists. It's a dream for sports psychs.

And it's been a dream of mine for a long time to go to the Olympics. And I was very fortunate to do this past summer. So a year before the Olympics, so summer of 2015, I gave myself a one-year plan. I said, okay, you're going to the Olympics to prepare five different athletes that are all mental hopefuls, and we all know that, you know, when you get to the Olympic Games, physically, technically, they're all strong

they're all very good and what really makes an olympic champion is it's on the mental side like what determines if they're going to perform or not is if they choke or not in a sense like these physical capacities are going to be there technically they're going to be strong but it's the mental side that usually makes them succeed or not so say well, well, that's my job. I need to make sure that, yes, for the next year, I prepare them optimally, but I need to make sure that I need to perform on demand as well while I'm there.

I had a very, very busy schedule working with five athletes in four different sports over two and a half weeks. It was crazy. Every day, I was working with every athlete, with every coach, with the IST team like there's a lot going on so there's a few things that I did that I'd like to share today because I think this is good to hear I wasn't sure how much it was going to help me but I now I know how much it

did help me and I'm actually starting this one-year plan again preparation for Korea for the Winter Olympics in 2018 so So I changed, one thing that I did is I changed my diet. I noticed that a year before the Games, like I was someone that had a lot of energy, but I thought to myself, you can be more energized, a little bit healthier. So I started cutting my portions, eating a lot healthier. I did a lot of research on how to do that. I worked with a nutritionist a little bit as well. I lost almost 15 pounds within three months, and I maintained that for the next nine months going into Rio.

All kinds of stuff. I added all kinds of different seeds in my diet, and I started eating a lot more nuts and cut a lot of the sugars. So that's one thing that I did. It wasn't easy because I started eating a lot more nuts and cut along with sugars. So that's one thing that I did. It wasn't easy because I love eating. So that wasn't easy. But in the end, man, it made such a huge difference in my energy levels just like hardly live any afternoons where I hit a wall. Like most often, I'm so inspired in my work that I have more energy later in the day

than I have at the beginning of the day. So that's one thing I did. In terms of exercising, I was exercising a lot already. The second thing that I did was I really paid attention to how I exercise to make sure that I was exercising in a purposeful way that was good for my body and that gave me a lot more energy than I needed. So that had a huge impact as well. Another thing that I did is that I interviewed 12 different people that had been to the Games before in different roles. I interviewed past coaches, past sports psychs, current athletes, past athletes, I interviewed some administrators that worked for the Canadian Olympic Committee for

Sport Canada, just to have their perspective about what the Games were. And the reason I did this was I wanted them to prepare me for living my first Olympic Games. Because as much as I heard about the Games, you know, there's a lot of things that I didn't know what to expect. So I had about 35 pages of notes. I love it. That was, I mean, it was huge. That was a very important thing that I did. And the fourth thing that I did is I accumulated some sleep. For the last four months before the Olympic Games, I went to bed early

almost every night. Because what people tell me about the Olympic Games, especially the sports sites, they would tell me, you never sleep, it's so exhausting, you never have time for yourself, it's such a tough few weeks. And, Sindhra, like, I can tell you, the only moments that I was tired was the last two days of my 20 days that I was there. I came into the Olympics, I was energized, I was fresh, and I would argue that most

coaches a lot of the IST and professionals that were working with the the athletes they had worked so much in the past three four months before the games they got into the games they were exhausted hmm so many people that were stressed out and yeah like again I wasn't sure how much it was gonna help me but it helped me tremendously. And going into the Olympics, I made sure to bring a lot of food from home because in Brazil I knew that there was going to be a lot of stuff that was not accessible for me.

So I brought a lot of my seeds that I would eat every day, those specific normal bars that I would eat at least once a day. I brought all those with me. I would make sure that I slept eight hours a night, even though it was not easy to do. I did. I worked out every morning at 6am. I think I was able to be a high performer. And I don't judge it on the results of the athletes, because in the end, that it's not the purpose of this. I just think in terms of the energy I had throughout the entire games, and the feedback I got from the athletes that told me that, because we did did some some big debriefs with every athlete's after the games and I you know I

asked them I said do you think there's anything we could have done more or a little bit better and be clear with me because I want to help you prepare better for the next games and all the comments were very positive I didn't get any negative stuff so I was very happy in that preparation that I did before the games. And going through the games, I realized that it was a great investment. You know what, JF? What I heard was that you were a student yourself. You learned from other people who had been at the games.

You were practicing what you preach. I'm sure you'd tell your Olympic athletes to do something similar, whereas talk to people who've already been at the games. Just change some of your habits that you know that will help you when you're at the games. So that's what I heard is that you were a high performer and then you were able to be there for the people that really needed you the most.

Well, thanks for saying that, Cynthia. And, you know, I'll be very honest. Like the last few months before the games, there were some moments where I was freaking out a little bit. Like preparing these five athletes that, like I mentioned a while ago they were they were all pulling in the whole force and um I was going through a lot of stress myself and there was a lot of pressure involved there's high expectations and I reached out to a lot of people um you know as you know I'm part of a mastermind group and you know you you were part of that as well to give me some advice and from from talking about

this pressure I was going through with other sports sites that was very significant as well actually those part of my preparation as well because I can add that as a fifth thing there we go prepare for the games but there's a few things that some of you told me that were really that really hit the spot and I actually um wrote some of those notes down and printed them and brought them with me uh so they were right next to my bed I would read those notes every day so yeah I guess I did focus on educating myself about how to how to prepare for it and in the end it ended up being a good thing what were some of the things that were most meaningful for you and in the end it ended up being a good thing. What were some of the things

that were most meaningful for you and what did you have that you read every day tell us about that and then I want to ask you next about what it what it took for the athletes that you worked with to do well so just tell us a little bit more about what you learned. About handling pressure I mean I talk about this with my clients all the time but sometimes we need to hear it ourselves and one of our colleagues in sports psych to remember ourselves how to handle pressure and you know the main thing that I got was that the reason I'm feeling pressure is because I signed up for this and you know the reason I'm feeling pressure is because these athletes have done so well in the past few years they've earned

this position to to podium and and because I acknowledged it and I talked about it with you guys like what you guys made me realize is that I was the right guy for this um and I was ready myself with all this preparation that I've done before the games and just to hear that from your voices just made you know gave me a lot of comfort and you know I felt my shoulders drop I love it you know because I'm just thinking about how your athletes can use the same mentality in terms of you know hey this is what I signed up for this is what I want to do is perform at the Olympics tell us just about how you prepare them mentally to deal with the pressure and to thrive at the games? I guess there's two things I could add to that.

One is, I don't know if you ever heard the word sisu before. It's a Finnish word that means perseverance. Perseverance or grit or determination. But they take it to a next level. So what I've been told from some of my Finnish colleagues is that the word sisu means never, never, never giving up. And so we use that as a key mantra going into the games where they were going to live a lot of distractions. They were going to go through pain.

For some of the athletes that were more endurance athletes and you know I would tell them like you know someone would be preparing for it was more than four years someone was more kind of like a seven eight year process knowing that you know the real games would be the moment where they would peak in their career and just make them reflect like you know uh three minutes of physical pain is nothing compared to the last eight years that you took to prepare for this moment so you signed up for that so you tell yourself that when you do feel pain it's exactly what you want and you get inspired from it so we actually we worked on that with other competitions before the games and this sisu concept we absolutely love like it's it just made them reflect about like it's true.

Sometimes we limit ourselves from what we can accomplish. It's literally mental barriers. And when we just remind ourselves that we signed up for this, like we want to feel this pain. That was one thing that we, and I don't want to go too much in details because it's going to be a little bit too long for no reason, but that's one thing that all five really liked. And in the end, for some of them, it really helped them in specific moments during the

games. And the second thing was, what I'm about to say is going to be very subtle, but sometimes the subtle things make the biggest difference. A lot of athletes want to go to the Olympic Games and have no fears. Or like no doubts. Or live no distractions. And I think that's the biggest mistake.

Because they will be distracted, they will have doubts, and they will have fears. One thing I would tell the athletes is that they were allowed to let stuff get to them, but they weren't allowed to let stuff get to them, but they weren't allowed to let stuff really get to them. And, again, it's so subtle, but the conversations we had about this little concept,

Senor, you will not believe how well this worked. And they, you know, as they were going through the games, like some stuff didn't get to't get to them like you know how the media was right in their face or whatever it is and nobody likes that and that's okay like we're human beings we're not machines right but then they would literally tell themselves like well the camera got to me but it never really got to me so therefore you know i can stay in the moment and keep doing what I'm doing. About the fear thing, being scared of not performing optimally or this fear of choking or whatever it is, I think you need that because it channels your focus.

And the reason you're scared is because it actually means something to you. If it didn't mean anything, you wouldn't be scared. And this philosophy of athletes wanting to be fearless, I think is very dangerous. And in the end, when you were asking me a while ago about, you know, characteristics of some of my clients that are the best in the world, what do they have in common?

They are not fearless. They just fear less than most people. Again, this is, again, it it's just it's the same word. It's just splitting that word in two and make them understand that you can fear and you want to fear. Just don't fear as much of the other ones. So good. I do think that there is fear of choking. I see just fear in general in terms of even when I work with elite athletes, how they have to channel that and they're going to feel the fear, right? But just feel it less. Fear it less. And you know, like, Cindy, I look back and especially in the last three and a half years where I've been working a lot with Olympic athletes, and some of our best athletes in Canada.

And you know, like, if I look at their best performances in these international championships or those world championships that they won, they were scared. They were scared the days leading into these events. And, you know, people don't know this. Like they say, they see how calm they are and so focused they are when they perform. But, I mean, a few days before, some of them were were really they weren't too sure how it was going to go and you know the metaphor i use for that is if you take a student at school who two or three days before his exam final exam that's worth 60 for the final mark i hope that they're scared of that exam a little bit because one of the huge benefits of that is they're going to prepare better they're going to study a little bit more or they're going to prepare better. They're going to study a little bit more, or they're going to organize their notes a little bit better so they can be a little bit more

efficient in the way they study. So that is something that I've noticed quite often is some of these best performances that my clients have done, they were scared the days before. They just feared less than most of the competitors. Yeah. And what did you see that they were scared about? And maybe what did you see that they weren't scared about? Is there anything that, just to help people who are listening clarify it a little bit more? Being scared is about the future. Any thought that's related to fear, it's about something that's coming up. And what I make them reflect on is that it hasn't happened yet, so it doesn't exist.

You can take that and fuel yourself or prepare yourself better. But if you give it a lot of attention and you let it control you, it's going to affect the way you're prepared leading to this event. And there's some studies that show that about 85% of our fears actually don't happen

or never happen. That means that in 85% of situations where we're scared we're actually scared for no reason and we waste a lot of energy and a lot of focus i and i could talk about fear for several hours there's so much i you know i love talking about this um and there's a big difference between you know real danger and a perceived fear like some people will go into something and there's a real danger. Like, you've really got to be careful. And there's other situations where it's not.

There's no danger. Like, it's just something you really make up in your mind. So we call this famous acronym, and most people know this, but fear means false evidence appearing real. And for some of you who are listening that speak French, en français, we say perception éranée et du chapitre de la réalité, which means exactly the same thing. And I tried to find one in Spanish, and I'm not

there yet. Maybe someday I'll find one. Yeah, it's this whole idea that fear can be your best friend. And it's about the future. It hasn't happened yet. And I just make them think about the reason that they're scared is because they're thinking about something that's coming up, and it's not a fact yet.

They can't grasp it. It's not controllable right now. But what I make them reflect on is that whatever they're scared about, that moment that's coming up, they will be in that moment at some point and you know because they have the tools to manage a moment you know through breathing techniques and these little keywords and etc well they're going to be fine when they're going to enter that moment and then just making think about that like i'm scared about what's coming up but it's true i'm going to be there at some point and i do have the skills to manage the moment so therefore i'll be fine and one question i make them ask themselves is that how much do i really need to be scared and in most cases the answer is i shouldn't be

scared or not as much but do i need do i really need to be that scared and the answer is no and the automatic response of that is it's a release so you know the shoulders drop it's a little bit easier to think about what's coming up. So I could talk about this for hours and hours and hours. Maybe we'll have to do another podcast or something. Exactly, where we can just talk about fear. That sounds really, really good. I was thinking about how I haven't even got to maybe half the questions that I had.

So we'll have to have you on again, JF. That'll be my pleasure. You know, you've already given us so many just nuggets and things to think about in terms of how you talk with your clients and the athletes and performers you work with and entrepreneurs, as you mentioned. Is there a signature technique, you know, something that you typically use or talk about, regardless of perhaps who you're working with? If it's clowns or firefighters eaters or athletes or corporate um leaders athletes olympic olympic athletes what do you think i have so many signature techniques in terms of metaphors or analogies or storytelling or diagrams that i created throughout the years that i use um but but i'm often i'm often asked this question about if there's one skill that I should really zone in and I should really control, what is it?

And the way I see it is everything has to do with perspective. And when an athlete or performer is able to allow himself or herself to see a situation differently and make them understand that there's always a solution to any situation. So the one metaphor or example I give for that is if you think back, and I'll do it with you, Cydra, if you think back when you were in high school and you think of those classes that you absolutely hated, what topic was that you didn't like at all or your worst class that you didn't like at all? Or your worst class that, you know, it wasn't, you didn't like going to that class. There was one English class I just didn't like. It was like a writing class. And it was actually probably more because of the teacher.

Yeah, right, right. Okay. So if you, if that class was from eight in the morning till nine, what was going through your mind just before you walked into the class? I don't like this class. This stinks. I wish I didn't have to take this class. It's going to be long. It's going to be boring. I don't want to be there.

How do you know it's going to be long? And how do you know it's going to be boring? And how do you know you don't want to be there, right? It hasn't happened yet. But you're conditioning yourself about this event that's coming up. So when you think about three things about school that I think are important, one is learning. How much do we really learn in those classes?

I would argue not too much. How entertained or connected are you with what's going on? I would argue you're not very much as well. And in terms of performance, if you think of your final mark at the end of the year on your report card, most often those classes are the classes that we have our lowest marks. Now think of the opposite. Think of the classes that got you excited, the ones you really like. What was that one topic that you absolutely loved? I really liked math. Okay, I'm the same. I love math as well. So same thing. if you think about going into that class what was

going through your mind this is going to be awesome i'm really great at this watch me watch me it's going to be it's going to go by fast i'm going to enjoy it through the questions you're probably sitting right in front of the class because you'd like to be involved you'd like to be connected you're learning a little bit more you're enjoying yourself in terms of performance using those classes is where you have your highest marks i always give this example in terms of perspective to my clients because in the end the class itself has no meaning it's the way you perceive it that's going to determine how it's going to go because the math class syndrome that you and i love, there are a bunch of people that are listening right now

that that was their worst topic. They did not like math at all, and they were going into that class the same way you were going into your English class. And some people were going into that English class the same way you were going in with your math class. So what I tell my clients is if you go into your English class syndrome with a better

mindset you say okay given that this is going to be a class that I don't enjoy so much I'm going to force myself to lift my hand at least three times and ask a question. Because if I do that I'm going to have to listen a little bit more, I'm going to have to grasp what's going on, therefore I'm going to be a little bit more I'm gonna have to grasp what's going on therefore I'm going to be a little bit more connected and if you do that with every single moment in every single class you're going to become a class where you have a 95 average probably not but if you have you have a 75 in that class you might end up with an 82 or 83 average if you do that with every single class your entire average goes up so this one image that I use is the FedEx logo

where I know a lot of people that are listening know this logo but it is so powerful you know how many times have we seen this this logo like thousands and thousands of times the same way that you go into your English class in other classes with the same type of mindset thousands and thousands of times and then if you look at that logo specifically there's a there's a white arrow between the e and the x and just being exposed to the different way of looking at the logo every single damn time you look at that logo afterwards you see that white arrow first and you do that with your mindset about an event that's coming up it does the same thing i like it in terms of just helping us think through, as I'm hearing you, I'm thinking about the perspective I might bring

to things that, gosh, I really don't enjoy versus the things that I do enjoy. We're going to shift that. So people might be listening and think, gosh, JF's been so successful. He's worked with Cirque du Soleil, all these Olympic athletes, you know, corporate leaders, but we also know that not everybody's perfect, right? Or we can't be. So tell us about a time that you failed, that didn't go so well for you and what you learned from it. And I asked you that question because of the idea that, you know, we learn from our failures and nobody's perfect. Great question, Cindra. So there are several uh some bigger some smaller but there's one that i'd like to share because i think a lot of people that are listening are

probably thinking maybe of starting their business at some point and there's one mistake i made in my first uh year in 2013 when i started my business i had an opportunity to work with a superstar i won't mention what sport in in the, obviously, but someone that was very, very well known in Canada. And, you know, when he, when this person called me, I recognized his voice and I knew who he was. And I was a big fan even before I, you know, started working with this client. I didn't do any research about who this person really was in terms of personality and how this person was to work with and that but the mistake I made was oh he's a he's a celebrity so therefore of course I'm going to

work with this person because he's going to make my company known and you know I'm going to I can really build off of that and so I started the process with this with this client and I did not enjoy the experience at all this person was not someone that was enjoyable to work with he was expecting me to drop most well not most of my other clients but he was expecting like if you could call me that he could use an hour my time right away and that I would drop my other clients for him and he would be a priority all the time and because he was so demanding like I ended up thinking a lot about him

on a continual basis. So I even caught myself thinking about what I was going to work with him when I was working with other clients. Sure. And sometimes before I would go to bed, I'd be thinking about like what I was going to work with him

the following day. And so she just consumed a lot of my energy and a lot of my time. And if I could go back, even though I was a fan of this guy and I was looking forward to work with this person, I should have done my research about who this guy really was because there's some people afterwards that told me, well, I'm not surprised that that's the experience you live

because I know some people that live something very similar with this client as well. So just be careful in who you pick. And this one thing I've done very well since this client is making sure that I work with people that are good people. You know, as a consultant, you end up spending a lot of time with these people. So you want to surround yourself with people that are just great people. And I've noticed that when you work with great people, it's very simple to make them very good at what they do. They're engaged.

They're ready to learn. They're eager to get better. So that's one mistake I made that I do a lot of research now before I accept clients and I make sure I know who these people are. Yeah, I like it in terms of just understanding if it's a good fit. And sometimes I think what we have to do is not put our fan hat on, you know, like in terms of sometimes I even do that. And it's like, well, I got to step back for a few minutes and realize I'm not a fan. I'm a person who's helping them perform better. And that means my role is a little bit different. So Jay, if I have a few other questions as we wrap up, you said that you read about 50 books a year, which is awesome. What is one book, or maybe a few if you can think of a few,

that you'd recommend us just checking out? In our role, Sindra, we need to be great communicators. Actually, not great. I think we need to be amazing communicators. Because in the end, our job is to make sure that whatever we give in terms of information to people, it needs to stick to the brain. brain so I realized throughout my life that it's not so much the content that you share it's how we deliver it that has an impact so the one book that I would recommend to anyone that's working with people is made to stick I

thought you're gonna say that and there's several books that are similar to that one and you know there's a lot. And there's several books that are similar to that one. And there's a lot of other books, barbecues that are amazing and sports psych books that are amazing. But this one book, I have used it so much in the past five years, and it really changed the way I communicate and the way I consult. So I highly, highly suggest it to anyone, teachers, coaches, parents, sports psychs, corporate leaders,

anyone that needs to deliver a message, I would argue it's by far the best book that's on the market. How did it help shape what you did in terms of your delivery with individual, meaning, you know, talking to people individually or in your talks? Well, you know, it tells you how to tell stories, you know, tell stories and keep you know keep people engaged in the win when you communicate and how to get people emotional keep your messages concrete you know they use it they use an acronym that's called success and just for the purpose of time I'm going to go through all of them but if you just Google make the stick and you go on Google images or just on any any website that's related to that

that book they they talk about these these acronyms and if people who are listening to us right now if they don't like reading the entire book which i respect um they can just look on the internet they have all kinds of blogs and stuff about this this book that in the end you get the assets of the messages that they they write about i mean there's so much you know that this has done for me, but I would argue that just making sure that, you know, my sessions are entertaining, they catch people off guard, they become emotional about a concept.

Emotional, I mean, like make them laugh, make them maybe cry sometimes, make them be surprised about what I'm teaching them. And it's an art. That's what I realize is communicating is an art and you know as a public speaker I I did not like the pubs people at all and that's one thing I challenged myself the last few years is you know getting into stuff that I'm not good at or challenging myself and trying new things and I went from being someone who Back in high school university when I need to give a when I need to give a

presentation in a class I would pick a spot in the back of the room and just focus on that just you know spread out my message and now I give about 50 speeches a year where I speak to sometimes a thousand people in a room so this book has been really really helpful. All right JF you have given us so much to think about. I liked in terms of what you said about the 50-50% rule and what you took from the clown in terms of just being flexible while also maybe having a game plan, but just being flexible, adapting to the competition or the audience. I like in terms of what you said today about educating yourself and always being a student. And then the example that you provided of when you went to the games this year in terms of what you said today about educating yourself and always being a student.

And then the example that you provided of when you went to the games this year in terms of you talked to 12 people who had been there. You started changing your diet and exercising and accumulated sleep. You were your own student, so you could master the environment there and be there for the people that need to do the most. I liked what you talked about related to fear in terms of, you know, that even the best feel the fear, but they feel it less. Even, you know, when you want to perform at your best at the highest level, there will be distractions and doubt and fear, but it's just, you know, how you manage those. And I just want to thank you more broadly for your work in this field and the great work that you do and just that you're doing just such quality work and, I think we get to do some work that's very special. And we should be honored about what we do. And, you know, it's, I'm actually going to celebrate my 10 years in this coming January in a month. And, you know, I look back and what I've

been through, and I've been so fortunate to be surrounded by amazing people. And I just can't wait to keep, you know, to see what's gonna happen in the next 10 years. Yeah, that's amazing. What final advice do you have for those people who are listening? I know our high performers, they're working to be their best because they wouldn't have listened to this interview for the whole time if they weren't really working to be at their best more often. So what do you have for those people who are listening? Well,

I think it comes back to educating yourself. I think it's very typical and in many fields, not only in sports tech, but for, you know, engineers or accountants or teachers, you know, we go through school,

we learn how to become a professional, and then we might have these workshops once in a while that's offered to our, your company or the best education you can get is is the one you seek out for um you know the books you're going to go get or you know the conference the conferences you're going to attend or the podcast you're going to listen to and nobody's going to tell you to do this it really needs to come from you so um that would be my one my number one recommendation for people if they want to be a little bit more successful in what they do but also be a little bit more equipped because everyone can be better equipped and have more knowledge about what they do and in the end that's within our control.

For sure so how can we get in touch with you JF? Can you tell us your website and any social media handles we can reach out to you at? Yeah so people can find me on Facebook and on Twitter. And my website is kambioperformance.com. Kambio is K-A-M-B-I-O, performance.com. And actually, kambio means change in Spanish. And the reason I'm using it, but it's spelled with a C, and the reason I'm using a K is for marketing purposes. But yeah, so kambioperformanceance.com and anyone that's listening right now,

feel free to contact me. It'll be a pleasure. Absolutely. And what's your Twitter handle for those who are listening? And what I will plan on doing is in sending out some quotes and tweets about your podcast.

And then people can also head over to my website, cindracampoff.com or drcndra, C-D-R-C-I-N-D-R-A.com. And you can find JF's podcast there as well as the show notes. And I have these things listed in terms of the topics that he's talked about

and a good summary there. So you can head over there. What's your Twitter handle? JF Menard, K-M-B-O-P. JF Menard, K-M-B-O-P. And just for people who are listening, I'm a lot more active on Facebook and J.F. Menard, can be O.P. J.F. Menard, can be O.P. And just for people who are listening, I'm a lot more active

on Facebook than Twitter. Okay. Twitter is very popular in the States, not as much in Canada and I use social media but not very much. I'll go on there

a few minutes a day and that's it. So if you want to follow me, it's probably better on Facebook than Twitter. And what's the best way to connect with you on Facebook?

If they search my name, they'll probably find me. Okay. Awesome, JF. Thank you so much for your time and your energy and your commitment to helping us all reach our dreams, JF. My pleasure. Thank you, Sindra. Thank you for listening to High Performance Mindset.

If you liked today's podcast, make a comment, share it with a friend, and join the conversation on Twitter at Mentally Underscore Strong. For more inspiration and to receive Sindra's free weekly videos, check out DrSindra.com.