"Be a castle, not a tree house!"
This week's interview features a renowned Greek-American long-distance runner, filmmaker, and writer, Alexi Pappas. She is an inspiration for many, demonstrating qualities of resilience, determination, and passion in both running and storytelling. Alexi Pappas was an NCAA All-American athlete at both Dartmouth College and the University of Oregon. She represented Greece at the 2016 Summer Olympics, setting the national record for 10k. In this interview, Alexi opens up about the challenges she has faced, her experiences with puberty, and how she has conquered obstacles throughout her career.
Picture on the left: https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/30/sport/alexi-pappas-mental-health-spt-intl/index.html
Picture on the right: https://twitter.com/AlexiPappas/status/1462899763464990721?lang=bn
Challenges Faced
During her early years as a runner, Alexi faced numerous challenges that tested her mental and physical strength. At a young age, Alexi was pressured to specialize in running. She was kicked off her running team because she didn't want to quit soccer and other sports at that age.
She recalls, "There were times when I felt like giving up, but I knew deep down that I had to keep pushing forward." Despite facing setbacks and injuries, Alexi persevered and continued to pursue her dreams.
Like many young athletes, Alexi went through the challenges of puberty while trying to excel in her sport. She shares, "Puberty was a tough time for me as a runner. My body was changing, and it affected my performance on the track." However, Alexi embraced these changes and learned to adapt her training to suit her evolving body.
Alexi went through puberty normally, as in not having high levels of training and not going on a diet. When she came back to running competitively, that was in college, around 17 to 18 years old, running was super hard for her. Alexi was fast because she continued playing soccer, but the distances in soccer and running were very different. The hard part for Alexi was telling herself and trusting that she wasn’t going to take any shortcuts to become a female athlete.
“I was the worst on my team at Dartmouth for two years. I increased my training very gradually, so I never got injured, but I also didn't score a team point until I was a junior in college.”
Alexi never got injured because she never took shortcuts, which allowed the opportunity for her to compete in the Olympics. However, it was hard for Alexi to trust that shortcuts don’t work.
“ I've seen them shortcuts, drugs, medications, etc. I was always surrounded by people who maybe took shortcuts and it worked until it didn't. And that's, what's dangerous about it. Because, you'll see people, restrict on different ways. And it works, it works, it works, and then they just break. Some people never come back. And I think with puberty, the superpower that people don't really understand is that you're growing your bones like you're building a house.”
Maintaining a positive mindset
One thing that Alexi believes to be really important is to talk about what you’re experiencing. When she was at Dartmouth, if you even talked about body or food, everyone would think you have a problem. However, when Alexi went to Oregon, where they won the national championships, talking about it was normal and mature.
“I remember the coach saying: hey, don't criticize your teammate if she has a piece of pie, and don't criticize your teammate if she has yogurt instead of pie. I think what she was trying to say is to be mature about it and talk about these things. Not as if they're not on our minds and not as if one extreme or the other is actually the healthiest because we can't just completely say these are not weight-bearing sports. So to say that it doesn't matter is irresponsible.”
Picture on the left: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jessicagold/2021/07/29/olympian-alexi-pappas-on-reframing-mental-health-as-an-injury/
Picture on the right: https://kval.com/news/local/former-oregon-star-alexi-pappas-opens-up-about-new-book-bravey-01-13-2021
Food!
Alexi believes that how you absorb food is based on the state that you’re in when you’re eating it. Her friend who started a nutrition company experimented with this. He wore a glucose-monitoring device while eating the same meal in terrible traffic, and sitting the same meal with his friends, overlooking a sunset. The effect on his blood sugar after the experiment was that it made him pre-diabetic when he ate in a stressful environment, compared to when he was eating in a calmer, peaceful place.
“I was impressed, I was like, wow. If they can prove that, then what if we ate with less guilt? What if someone made you a homemade cake and you were like, I'm eating love, would it absorb differently? And so the only reason I'm telling you that is because like, I really think like believing in whatever you're eating, whatever it is, if you end up eating the turkey sandwiches every day, but you believe in it, it's gonna do more for you. I really think that humans think we're in so much more control than we are. You think like this calorie means this or this, but it's actually that mental thought that causes stress.”
A phantom thought
When people urge themselves to not care about the calories but subconsciously do, Alexi metaphorically describes this as a phantom thought. It is a journey to change, but if you have thoughts that say I shouldn’t eat this, that’s totally normal, because you had those thoughts for a really long time and they take time to wear off.
“I think part of the discussion could be that you can't think to have a thought. You cannot control your thoughts and everybody should forgive themselves for their first thought. It's not your fault if the thought occurs because the world is feeding you so much information. You're a thought machine, so the fact that you have the thought doesn't mean that it's you. You are not your thoughts. And I think that's so important because you're going to have the thought. I have the thought. I have the thoughts all the time. But I have a relationship with my thoughts where I'm in charge of them and my actions I'm in charge of. I'm the parent of the thought, the thought is not parenting me.”
Alexi says that “You are so human”, so don’t blame yourself for having these thoughts. She has these thoughts all the time, even though she is so much bigger than she was when she competed in the Olympics. Alexi knows that mentally she is healthy, but sometimes she’s still not used to jogging, it is still an adjustment. But being super, super understanding of yourself causes thoughts to change very slowly.
When you are in such a pressure cooker environment, the thoughts you have make total sense. It would be wild if you didn't have these thoughts. Alexi gives an example: It would be like if you were in a room full of country music all the time and you were like, why is there country music playing in my head? That's not fair to you to say, why is there country music playing in my head? But it's ok to say, oh, I get it. I'm in this environment and I get it. And now I'm going to take a second
and create space between my thoughts and the conversation I have with myself and the thoughts and the actions.
“It’s not even the relationship to food, it’s actually the relationship with your thoughts first.”
Alexi describes it as a learning process. From changing from this particular mindset to more of a what you can do that will be the best for you. For example, being dense doesn't mean you can't fly, it just means you're like a torpedo flying. Think about density and think like you're a castle. A castle is strong so you don't want to be a tree house that is going to last for about five minutes.
Picture on the left: https://www.filmindependent.org/events/coffee-talks-alexi-pappas/
picture on the right: https://katiecouric.com/entertainment/alexi-pappas-bravey-book-olympic-athlete-actress-filmmaker/
Conquering Challenges
Through hard work and dedication, Alexi has conquered numerous challenges in her career. She reflects, "Every obstacle I faced only made me stronger and more determined to succeed." By staying focused on her goals and maintaining a positive mindset, Alexi has achieved remarkable success both on and off the track.
Learn more about Alexi from her book, Bravey!
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