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

Image Credit: Stephen Arnold via Unsplash

On Passing Privilege & Not Belonging

For a long time, passing privilege made me feel like I didn’t deserve to call myself latino.

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16-year-old, 500-pound me. Image: supplied.

5 Things I Wish I Could Tell My 500-Pound Past Self

One of the most dangerous aspects of positive change is our tendency to demonize the people we’ve been. I don’t know a single person who hasn’t lain awake in bed, plagued with the thoughts of a cringe-worthy move they made in their younger years, or some kind of toxic behavior they exhibited before they knew better.

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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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One of my favorite authors once said: “It is so hard to leave — until you leave. And then it is the easiest goddamned thing in the world.” Image: Thinkstock.

5 Things That Happen When You're About To Move Away

I’m uprooting my life to try something new and different in another city in another state. In the time leading up to the actual move, I’ve found that a bunch of weird fucking shit (for lack of a better term) has showed up out of nowhere.

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"Look, I know it sucks to be rejected — but is social acceptance worth sacrificing the things that separate you from everyone else?" Image: Thinkstock

Your Need To Be Liked May Be Holding You Back

We really want people to like us. It’s just human nature. You may say you don’t care if people like you, and on the surface, that may be true. However, there’s a part of you that understands that openly not caring about being liked immediately makes you more likable — self-assurance is an attractive quality to have.

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New places give us opportunities to grow.

#MondaysWithMatt: Be Your Best Self, Everywhere You Go

You are not where you're from, and you are not your environment.

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We shouldn’t be made to feel ashamed of our pasts, just because they’re different from what we want in the present. Image: Thinkstock.

Stop Asking Your Partners How Many People They've Slept With

I’m not writing this in order to get defensive about my number of partners, by the way. I’ve had sex with around 25 people since the end of 2012 and I’m perfectly proud of and comfortable with that number. However, asking someone you’re dating about how many people they’ve slept with is a question meant to make them feel ashamed.

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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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Every child deserves to know they can be a hero no matter what they look like, because they can be.

On The Importance Of Representation

Representation is one of those persistent issues that will always be argued about. However for people of color, queer people, and those who live outside the gender binary, it’s an issue that ties into our identities as a whole.

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My mother is my number-one fan, and has been since before I’d produced anything to be a fan of. Image: Matt Joseph Diaz.

How Getting Older Improved My Relationship With My Family

There’s almost definitely a better way to begin this, but I can’t think of one more appropriate. Growing up is really fucking weird. One day you’re having a great time arguing if Doctor Doom would beat Darth Vader in a fight (he would,) and next thing you know you’re worrying about taxes and whatever a “mortgage” is.

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