Matt Joseph Diaz

Matt Joseph Diaz

Bio

Matt Joseph Diaz is a public speaker and social media activist tackling the issues of body image and self love. Matt has been working in social media since the age of 15, and has a long history of creating online content for entertainment and educational purposes. Matts videos have accrued over 120 million views in countries all over the world as well as being featured in People, Cosmopolitan, Buzzfeed, Upworthy and numerous other news websites. He now spend a lot of his time traveling and speaking on self love at conferences, colleges and public events. Matt Joseph Diaz currently lives in Brooklyn, NY.   

Matt Joseph Diaz Articles

You can’t force, manipulate, or sneak your way into a romantic relationship. Image: Thinkstock.

An Open Letter To The Women I've Accused Of Friend-Zoning Me

First of all, befriending someone and becoming their confidant while secretly yearning to get in their pants isn’t just fucking creepy, it’s manipulative. The girls I “befriended” opened up to and trusted me because I was patient, sensitive, and seemed to have their best interests in mind.

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Image: Matt Joseph Diaz

Mondays With Matt: Getting Out Of Your Comfort Zone

After spending a long time in nature, it stopped being intimidating. It started being calm. The quiet wasn't something I feared anymore. It was something I wanted to cherish.

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Matt Joseph Diaz. Image: Wilfredo Ruiz/www.flandeguava.com

Where Are All The Body Positive Men?

Vulnerability is a sign of strength, not weakness, and those who see being open and sincere as symbols of fragility have a skewed idea of vulnerability. It takes NO strength to close yourself off from the world — to refuse to be who you are because you’re afraid of the reaction of those around you. Feeling deeply and openly, even in the face of resistance, is what takes true strength.

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Image: Elizabeth Barnwell Photography from her project Still:Life (http://www.elizabethbarnwell.com/)

Body Positivity And The Ebb And Flow Of Self-Worth

Taking the time to find clothes that I liked, to dye my hair, and get tattooed — for the first time I was building a place of my own.

When I lost that ability for a while, being too weak and swollen to really put the effort in, it felt like I’d lost a part of myself. It felt like I’d regressed, like I’d gotten to the finish line and was forced back into the race.

This is the trap we fall into when we discuss recovery, emotional development, mental health, or body image: believing there’s a destination.

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"The body positive movement strives to put forth one idea: that all body types are valid, regardless of their shape, size, or disability." Image: Thinkstock

Your Body Positivity Needs To Include More Than Just You.

It’s pretty easy to see why people would want to rebel against [our current standard of beauty] — it’s unattainable, and even for those who manage to reach something close to it, it’s often unsustainable. However, in rebelling against the oppressive system, we run into situations where people denigrate others who happen to more closely fit the description of what we recognize as the ideal.

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Matt Joseph Diaz

What Major Surgery Can Teach You About Change

When you go through a difficult, traumatic, or transformative experience, there’s a part of you that wants to hold onto the person you were before it happened. You try so hard to hold onto a simpler time–a time when things weren’t so scary. But you can’t.

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Mondays With Matt: Why Do You Work Out?

Not sure how to stay mindful about the motivations behind how you fuel and move your super rad bod? Allow Matt to explain:

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A friendship is a relationship, a dialogue: it's a conversation that's always happening.

#MondaysWithMatt: A Friendship Is A Two-Way Street 

I know, it's Monday. BLECH. But, that also means it's time for #MondaysWithMatt.

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#MondayMotivation With Matt Joseph Diaz: Let's Get Weird

Welcome to Monday Motivation with Matt Joseph Diaz! Every Monday (obviously), I'll be serving up some motivation to get you through the week.

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Life is not a perfect linear story plot. (Image Credit: Think Stock)

If At First You Don't Succeed, That's OK. That's Life.

Success is an uphill climb, but it’s rarely a directly uphill climb. There are cliffsides and plateaus, there are points where you have to adapt and change in order to make things work. These are not steps backwards, nor are they indicative of your failure—they’re simply a byproduct of life. More often than not, this ability to work with the circumstances in order to get by will take you farther than certain “skills” ever could.

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