Under The Surface: Learning mental resilience in life and basketball with Anneli Maley
How Maley's mental strength has helped overcome failure and find success on her path towards the perfect mix of basketball and happiness.
Living your life in the public domain can be challenging. When you do things well, it’s great to have the recognition and adulation that goes with that. When you don’t though, that level of scrutiny can be instantaneous, overwhelming, and all-consuming.
In women’s professional sports, the relentless keyboard jockeys often magnify the pressure those athletes already contend with, purely based on how they perform, unless you have strategies to deal with it. All of that goes to show how important it is to be strong mentally, as well as physically.
Anneli Maley, one of the best female basketball players in Australia, faces mental hurdles every day. She has for a long time and as a result, has had to become incredibly in-tune with the mental side of sports.
It wasn’t just something she chose to do; it was something she had to do.
“When I was 17, I was at the Australian Institute of Sport [AIS] and I had been there for about a year and a half, and that was probably one of my first experiences not really understanding what was going on with anxiety, feeling depressed and having panic attacks. I didn’t really understand what was going on at the time,” Maley told The Pick and Roll last week.
“Then, I actually ended up quitting basketball.
“I remember one day, I just kind of packed up my room and was like ‘I can’t do this.’ I was comparing myself to everyone else and I just felt like, at the time, I didn’t know what it was. I just knew that I wasn’t okay. So, I packed up my room and quit and I didn’t touch a basketball for about a year and a half.”
Maley was diagnosed with depression, anxiety and a panic disorder during that time, spending some time in a psychiatric ward where she began to learn a lot about herself. “I promised myself that I wouldn’t step foot on a basketball court until I knew that it was something that was going to bring me joy,” she said.
While the learning journey on mental wellness and and the mental side of sports was initially forced upon her, she now considers it the most important thing about her ability to play basketball as a professional athlete.
“I wouldn’t say that I took a year and half off and was cured; it’s something that I still battle with,” added Maley. “I couldn’t be as successful as I have been without the work that I’ve put in off the court, but I also think it’s important to note that it’s something that I do still struggle with and I do still manage. It’s an everyday thing for me.”
Under The Surface
She has delved into that mental side of the game much more via her podcast, Under The Surface, which she started in late 2022. It has become very popular, with a large regular audience (including yours truly). She’s had some big names as guests, both from Australian basketball and other sports, including Bryce Cotton, Sara Blicavs, Cayla George, Jade Melbourne, Jay Crouch, Mitch Creek, Maddy Prespakis and Jo Lual-Acuil Jr.
Maley’s ability to connect with her guests and get them to really open themselves up and share is quite unique, and she thinks it’s the approach she takes with her guests that has allowed them to feel comfortable once the microphone is on.
“I spend a little bit of time before I hit record just getting to know the people sitting across from me,” Maley explained.
“A lot of the people that I have done interviews with, I already have a pre-existing relationship with. But the ones that I don’t, I really try to get to know them a little bit before I press record. And then also, it’s important that when I am asking people to be vulnerable and share things about themselves, that I do share things about myself as well.
“I would never ask a question that I’m not prepared to answer and sometimes I feel like if I share a little bit of vulnerability or a little bit of a story in the midst of an interview, they feel more comfortable to maybe share a little bit too. And I really hope that people feel comfortable [when] sitting across from me, that it is just like a casual chat.”
Some of those guests have even surprised Maley in terms of how much they’ve shared on the podcast. One of those more recently was Lual-Acuil Jr - she’d been warned that he had a reputation for being more reserved. Maley recalls that he was super quiet walking into the room, but she felt like he had “a really good vibe.”
“His story just absolutely blew me away, and he was so willing and open to be vulnerable and share about his childhood. He just absolutely surprised me,” she recalled. “And for me, that’s so special. That is why I do the podcast. I end up learning so much about these people and taking so much away from the conversations, that I’m getting like a free psych appointment every time I sit down and have one of these conversations.
“Probably one of the others was when I sat down with Angus Glover. Gus and I have been friends for a long time and have known each other for a really, really long time since I was at the Institute, and I’ve never heard him open up and talk about his struggles with mental health the way he did. We all know about his knee injuries, but he hasn’t spoken much about the mental side. So, for him to open up and tell me that stuff, it was again, so special.”
Maley also started doing bite-sized solo episodes late last year. In those episodes, which tend to run for less than ten minutes, she shares bits of advice - learnings or obstacles through her personal journey, work related to the mental side of basketball, or just life in general. She’s talked about dealing with comparisons, managing anxiety, inclusion and pride round, exercises to help to deal with certain challenges and various other topics.
It was an idea her producers brought to her, because they knew that her listeners wanted to hear from her as well.
“I was like, ‘No, who would want to hear from me? It’s all about the guests.’ But, I kind of preach doing things that I want to do and putting myself in uncomfortable positions and the only reason I wasn’t going to do it was because I was scared of being judged,” admitted Maley. “Who would actually listen to what I’m going to say anyway? [Because] in my head, I’d justified that I’d had some success on the podcast just because I’ve had some pretty awesome guests.
“I did the first solo episode, I thought it was going to suck and then I got awesome feedback from it. The things I’m talking about, whether it’s advice or exercises, whatever, they’ve actually been received super well which is really nice.
“I’ve had some kids come up to me at basketball games and be like, ‘Hey, I did this when I was on the way to my game and I was super, super nervous and then I remembered that you said that it’s just being excited.’ And I was like, ‘Oh my god, I love this so much.’
“I’m looking to do another mini-series with my sports psychologist. She’s amazing and works with WAIS [WA Institute of Sport] and we’ve been in chats about doing a mini-series on some exercises that you can do pre and post game, so stay tuned for that.”
Dealing with failure
A recent solo episode from last month was titled ‘How To Deal With Failure’. Maley wisely shared that any particular failure is just ‘a’ failure at that point in time and just part of the process to achieving your goals.
Ironically, or maybe just coincidentally, that episode dropped the day before Game 2 of the WNBL Grand Final series. Maley, who moved to the Perth Lynx this past season, had a few chances to put her team in front in the dying moments of that game. A win would have closed out the series 2-0 and given Maley a championship in her first season in Perth.
Unfortunately, Maley missed a pair of free throws and then a layup about 10 seconds later, with a follow-up attempt blocked. It led to a buzzer-beating shot from the Southside Flyers to level the series at one game each, as the championship was ripped out of Perth’s hands in devastating fashion.
How did Maley define that moment for herself? Did she define it as a failure? Did she heed her own advice from the podcast, and look at that moment as part of her bigger process to achieving her goal of a championship?
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