So far, this blog has been an amazing thing. Its purpose is very personal to me. Team TATE is my way of showing who I am, sharing it with others, and holding myself to my own expectations. This is my journey from my darkest times to radiant light to anything imaginable and more. It’s similar to some of the social experiments I studied in college. Basically, we try something and see what happens, see how people respond, and from that we can understand patterns of human behavior. Maybe, we can even predict, preempt, or facilitate human behavior. So, what am I trying here?

One of the most amazing mentors I’ve had to date said to me, “Start to change your life, and be that change. Live it everyday, let people see it, and then watch what happens.” The problem is “being the change” is much easier said than done. Changing your life is very hard, but even more challenging is the fear that comes along with broadcasting it. We fear change. It creates instability, vulnerability, and discomfort. Even when we are moving from a negative situation to something more positive, we are still moving from something that we’ve become accustomed to, somewhere we are comfortable, a place that is predictable, and we are forcing ourselves into the unknown. Fear can immediately halt a movement. It’s a barrier that can stop you in your tracks and send you for the hills. F-E-A-R: Forget Everything And Run.

But, what if, instead of allowing fear to halt our movement, we instead force fear to fuel it? I’ll be honest, this blog and my incessant commitment to broadcast the new me is, on a very real level, terrifying. The fear relates to being vulnerable. In the first few days, I wondered if this was too much for me. Even after the first post, I asked what I had gotten myself into, because now I was formally and publicly committed. However, I heard my mentor in my head: “be the change…and then watch what happens.” Here’s what I’ve learned:

People like vulnerability, especially when it is real and honest. It makes people feel like they are not alone. Vulnerability is a feeling that we all know very well, but often may assume that others don’t feel its potentially paralyzing effect. We jump to the conclusion that others must be stronger than us, built differently, or not affected by the same things we are; so we do our best to keep our vulnerability silenced to appear the same. Yet, while we take great pains to hide our vulnerability, we often reach out and comfort those who let it show. We support our friends who we know are going through a hard time. We comfort someone who is crying. We offer someone strength when we see they are falling apart. And we love someone harder when we think they feel broken and alone. In fact, when we see someone overcome these obstacles, when we actually witness someone live through their vulnerability and come out stronger, we are overjoyed, in awe, inspired. It makes sense then, that once we figure out how to just be vulnerable, we will receive that same love, comfort, strength, and support in return. We will leave people overjoyed. People will be in awe. We will inspire.

I’ve been lucky enough to experience this firsthand even in just the last couple months. A couple quick stories come to mind, although there are probably many. The first occurred on my way back down a mountain after a very strenuous hike. I was still over a mile from the bus and confused about how there were still inclines on the way down. I had been hiking for hours, I was hot and thirsty, and I had run out of calories a long time ago. Keep in mind, I was never a hiker, and on this particular day, I weighed upwards of 380 pounds. I wasn’t sure I could take another step, so I stopped and bent over at the waist, my hands hard on my knees, chest aggressively reacting to my gasps for air, and my heart beating in my eardrums. I knew people were walking up the trail, and normally I would try to act fine, as if a hike up a mountain was an everyday thing for me, but I couldn’t. I didn’t have the energy to care what these real hikers thought of me. Then it happened. What kept me going and actually got me to the bus was the encouragement of a complete stranger. As she passed she said, “you’re doing good, you’re almost there, keep going.” She never would have said that if I sucked it up for 20 more seconds and let her pass assuming I was just fine. It was my vulnerability that created her encouragement that led to me completing a 6-mile hike at 380 pounds.

The second story is one that I wasn’t even aware of until after it happened. This past weekend was the first Team TATE event (more on this later). I was very nervous, largely because I was hosting something I had never hosted before. I wanted it to be a representation of what Team TATE is all about, but that meant I had to speak, give directions, give insight, and share my journey with people I deeply respect and want to make proud. Overall, it was a success. I put myself out there in ways I hadn’t ever before, learned a lot, and left room for improvement next time. Afterwards, I learned that one of my dear friends had been having a very hard week. She had fallen off plan temporarily, struggled with some anger, and somewhat retreated into herself instead of reaching out. When asked how she was able to get back on track, she said it was the Team TATE event, specifically being with positive people who cared for and supported her. So, in the end, our vulnerabilities collided into each other and we both walked away with personal accomplishment.

Ultimately, I’m diving into fear, embracing vulnerability, slowly sharing where I’ve been, where I am, and where I’m going, and inviting you to join along with your own transformation. This isn’t licensed advice. This is just human experience. I am not a professional therapist, trainer, life coach, medical doctor, or nutritionist. Nor do I currently have any letters after my name that instill immediate knowledge and confidence, unless me being an attorney somehow speaks to your internal struggle, which it shouldn’t. The point is, I am just human. I have experienced things in my life just as all of you have. Some good, some bad, some amazing, some terrible, but all worthy of their respective time slots in my past. And all a very integral part of my future. My commitment is to continue to force my fear of vulnerability to fuel my transformation. To be vulnerable, I’ve learned, is very powerful. So, embrace your power.

We are all born with a natural compulsion to get somewhere. From an early age, we begin to master specific skills. We learn how to take care of the baby doll the best, drive a toy truck on a road, put together a puzzle, match the animal with the sound it makes, or develop the coordination to finally hit that ball with the bat or figure out those damn shoelaces. From there, we start school and are expected to learn even more. Whether it be to add numbers together, figure out the lost art of the written word, or even just to follow directions or respect authority, we are expected to receive passing remarks and advance to the next grade, next school, and next degree. Even when we are finally done with school, we strive to climb the professional ladder, or further our personal lives with a spouse, home, and family. This leads to the subconscious perception that our lives are a graphed line that lead somewhere…but where?

It’s true that there are things about our lives that naturally move us forward to a known end. Our age, for example, continues to change us as we grow older, and we all know what “the end” is. But otherwise, our lifeline is full of peaks and divots that we have to work through to get us somewhere. Metaphorically speaking, we want the peaks and divots, of course; for, we all know what a flat line means, no bueno. Ultimately though, how do we ensure that aside from our professional lives and fulfilling our societal norms, we are still headed to where we want to go in our personal world? And, how do we know when we have arrived?

In my opinion, two things are at play here. First, we have to recognize ourselves as wholly independent from anything else. Because before we are mothers, fathers, spouses, friends, entrepreneurs, bosses, subordinates, dancers, athletes, or artists, we are just us. You are just you before you are anything else. Secondly, we have to accept that how we treat ourselves and the expectations we have of ourselves reflect and project onto everyone we come into contact with and every single thing we do. So, how do you create the best life? Create the best you.

I bring this up to further explain what Team TATE is all about. It’s about all of us defining our own transformations, and then Together Achieving [that] Transformation Everyday. So, what is your transformation?

My transformation is learning how to love myself, to take care of myself, and to commit to living a happy and free life everyday. My transformation is defined by eating healthier, being more active, more positive, open, loving, forgiving, letting go of physical and emotional weight, and using vulnerability as a tool to allow myself and others to see and know the real me. Your transformation might be similar. Maybe you too are sick of feeling trapped. Maybe to feel free you also want to lose some weight and live healthier. Or, maybe it’s more about your blood pressure or cholesterol. Maybe you just want to feel sexier. It’s also possible that your transformation has nothing to do with a physical ailment. Perhaps you want to let go of a negative relationship that you’ve been unrealistically relying on for too long. Maybe you’re just trying to be a better person, a better spouse, parent, or friend. All of our transformations are different and personal, but underlying all of them is the want or need to have higher expectations of ourselves and to actually meet those expectations. It’s important that you define your transformation for yourself so you can strive to achieve that transformation everyday.

The point is, I don’t think transformation has an “end.” I think it begins the moment you make the decision to have higher expectations for yourself and it continues every time you commit to meeting those expectations. Therefore, we can actually be our transformations every single day. Make every decision be one that falls in line with your best you. Treat yourself as good as the best you deserves to be treated. Treat others the way the best you would treat others. Work as hard, love as strong, have as much fun, and live as freely as the best you would. Team TATE is about satisfying our natural compulsion to get somewhere, but it redefines the notion that we have to wait to arrive. It may take some time to see the physical body that you want or get the reciprocation you hope for from others, but you can already be the best you in so many ways. Don’t sell yourself short by waiting. Commit to being the best you today, right now.

I remember sitting in class in high school doodling on a piece of paper his initials plus mine and equating it to a forever wholeness. I remember practicing my signature with the last name of my secret crush and assuming that identity was pure happiness. I remember writing poems about that moment my heart would skip a beat when I first saw someone walk into the room after an absence, almost as if I was missing half of myself with the person being away. The same behavior matured and continued into college, into grad school, and in some form or another still exists today. It’s amazing that I was able to get passing grades because I treated nearly every class like it was “Introduction to the Concept of Being Loved.”

For the longest time, I thought that this love would come from an external source, and that’s where I searched for it. I constantly put myself out there too much, hoping that my continued efforts at “being a good person” would eventually pay off with an all-encompassing, over the moon, make other people sick kind of love that only existed in the movies and in my life. To some extent, I thought I found this love a few different times as I was growing up. Looking back, I realized what I defined as “love” was really a one-sided relationship where I settled into giving everything I had and receiving very little of what I wanted in return. Eventually, “being loved” felt very similar to what I imagine the bottom of a shoe feels like as one aggressively scrapes it along concrete or a doormat trying to peel away all the crap that it got dragged through all day. And still, I didn’t realize what I was doing wrong. I didn’t realize that this poor fate was my own fault. I viewed the world as something that was just happening to me, and I was the proverbial “nice guy” in the epic “Night Guy Finishes Last” series.

Until one day, the director had enough, screamed cut, and in walked a brilliant new role in my life. This new story line was genius. Centered around the concept of having the ultimate power, the series name was officially changed to “Just Love Yourself, duh.” This is when I realized what I had been doing wrong all along. I wasn’t loving myself, but instead expecting someone else to do it for me.

Socially speaking, we train the people around us how to treat us by the expectations we have of them and how we handle it when they don’t meet our expectations. The same is true of love. Sure, the people around us- good friends, family- will always tend to see the best in us and therefore love things about us even if we disagree. But, how satisfying is that, really? In my opinion, we each have a huge responsibility in not only showing people what to love about us, but also training them how to. In order to do this, we need to know how we want to be loved. We need to know what makes us feel good, what makes us feel bad, what satisfies us, what we need in a partner, what we want in a partner, what our tendencies are when things get hard, how we act when we are vulnerable, how we let people in, when we tend to push people away, etc. We need to know what qualities we have that make us worth loving, i.e. what is it about us that should make someone feel that all-encompassing, over the moon, make other people sick kind of love for us? In order to figure these things out, we have to love ourselves first.

Learning to love yourself first allows you to stop waiting for that magical day when someone else finally makes you “feel loved.” You get to stop searching for someone to complete you, to fix you, or to convince you that you’re worth something. Instead, you begin looking for someone who is going to enhance the love you already feel, someone who is going to expand on how great your world already is, a person who will share in this awesome adventure of life, who will teach you new things, push you to be your best, support you in what you know you want for yourself, someone who will hold you to your own expectations and who will have their own expectations of you. Because after all, you’re going to want that person to know how to train you to love him/her, too.

So, let’s change what the doodles in class look like. Let’s change what the poems are about. For we no longer need to settle for our half of a heart meeting another half of a heart resulting in a full heart. No way! I want something more. I want my own fully completed heart to collide into another fully completed heart to create the biggest, most amazing love there can be. I want to write about the adventures that love takes me on. I want to feel SO LOVED because not only have I learned to love myself, but I’ve also taught this person how to love me in the best way possible. And because I’m not expecting things that are actually my own responsibility, we can just love each other and swim in happiness.

Because here’s what it comes down to: if YOU don’t love you, then who will? Who will be able to figure out all that is amazing about you if you don’t believe anything amazing exists? Who will learn how to make you feel your best, how to handle you at your worst, how to support you, encourage you, push you to reach your dreams, if you have no idea how to do those things yourself? Who will know what you need if you don’t know what you need? Who will know what you want if you don’t know what you want? We can’t possibly create that necessary expectation of people in our lives if we don’t have that expectation of ourselves.

Loving yourself isn’t always easy. It’s a commitment just like anything else, and it takes work. You will have good days and bad days, but it’s all worth it if it leads you to the life you want. Strive to achieve this transformation everyday and maybe, just maybe, we will be able to influence a new generation who will spend endless class periods doodling about how happy they are all on their own.

Society is nothing if not full of labels. We are compelled to define everything and use such definitions as a social safety net. If something has a label, we immediately know- or think we know- what to expect from it. And from that label, we develop a chain of other expectations based on stereotypes, prejudices, biases, assumptions, etc. For example, being a woman immediately defines you. It’s not simply WHAT you are, but also defines what people might expect from you. Some might expect you to be emotional, motherly, passive, submissive, eager to raise children or please, dramatic, less physically strong, or even inferior. Others know you are reasonable, intelligent, independent, determined, loyal, compassionate, and strong as hell. And this is true for other descriptors as well: your race, your sexual preference, whether you are considered attractive. But labels go a step further. We aren’t only labeled with those things we cannot control, i.e. our gender, but also are subjected to the labels we trip into throughout our lives.

Think about it. Were you an athlete in high school? Were you in the marching band? And what about the cheerleaders, or the kids who always seemed to know people much older? Did you go to college? What degree do you have? Do you have piercings? Tattoos? Did you get drunk before you were 21? Were you a young parent? Are your parents divorced? Or, nowadays, are your parents actually still together? Have you been married more than once? How many significant others have you had? What religion are you? Where do you buy your clothes? Oldest child? Youngest? The labels are endless and each answer will immediately give somebody an impression of what to expect from you, just as you may make immediate assumptions yourself.

Now, don’t get me wrong, some of the labels prove to be rather accurate. Social scientists can nearly terrify you with how easily they can explain your tendencies by your birth order and general family structure. And it’s true that we often accept our labels, even find comfort in them. The labels serve to help define us and give us a path to follow in life. But, these labels can just as easily make us uncomfortable, make us hide, make us feel alone, make us feel hopeless, judged, vulnerable, misunderstood, embarrassed, powerless, or simply unhappy.

So, what do we do when we no longer want to be defined by a label that is ultimately meaningless? We set ourselves free.

The truth is, it doesn’t matter how people define you. It matters how YOU define you. You have the control to decide what labels matter and which ones no longer will. You have the power to determine what each of your labels are going to mean to other people based on how you perceive them yourself. This is a simple concept, but often one that is immediately dismissed as unrealistic. I say that because even I dismissed the notion that my definition of myself would be enough. I’m here to say now, however, that it is. I continue to define myself daily by constantly committing to a new, happy, and free life, and I do that by empowering the labels I accept and accepting the rest as powerless.

Allow me for a moment, if you will, to engage in a written demonstration with you:

As of this morning, I weigh 360.2 pounds. Take a minute to acknowledge everything you think, assume, or question about me based on that fact alone. Do you have an image of what my body must look like? Do you think I’m attractive? What assumptions are you making about my lifestyle? How about my past? Have you thought anything about my confidence level? Intelligence level? Do you think you’d want to be friends with me? How about my emotional well-being? Have you diagnosed me as depressed yet? Are you feeling any sympathy? Sadness? Disgust? Do you feel overly accepting of me? Eager to help? Have I lost credibility? Gained it? Really take a moment to realize what this simple number automatically says about me.

Now, what if I tell you that 360.2 pounds is not my highest weight? In fact, I weighed over thirty pounds heavier just a few months ago. Does knowing that change any of your previous assumptions or feelings about me? Are you impressed with the weightloss? Do you now see me as stronger? Do you feel more hope for me? Has the lifestyle you previously assumed changed? Are you thinking I’m more active than you thought before? Less lazy? Or, has this new fact made any of your previous feelings even stronger?

Does learning that I have a law degree change anything? Or, that I passed the bar on the first try and have been a licensed attorney ever since? How about the fact that I’m a trial attorney, and therefore spend my days publicly litigating issues, or presenting a case to a bunch of strangers?

What if I told you that I played sports through high school? That I still have a good jump shot, can spin a basketball on my finger for a very long time, and l know how to hit a fastball or block a penalty kick? I was the president of my residence hall, president of my pledge class, and then ultimately president of a national co-ed honor fraternity. I am a poet. I can play three instruments decently enough, despite the fact that I never learned how to read music. I’ve written songs. I’ve performed national anthems at sporting events. I can cook and believe that plating is just as important as the taste of the food. I can paint, even draw every now and then, and taught myself how to cross-stitch. I can dance. I can juggle. I can sing. And today was the sixth day I’ve worked out this week and I participated in a 6-hour fitness event.

My point is this: the number 360.2 tells you absolutely NOTHING meaningful about me. So, as part of my transformation, I no longer let that label have power in my life. I have rendered it powerless by the simple act of announcing it publicly. In that way, I have set myself free of all the assumptions that label- my weight- provokes. It is not something I allow to define me, and because of that, not something you can accurately define me by either.

Now it’s your turn. Let go of the meaningless labels that you have allowed to define you for the last time. Announce them and then render them powerless by proving all the assumptions wrong. Trust me, it will absolutely set you free.

I imagine there are many reasons any ordinary person may choose to start a blog. Whether it serves as a personal method to get thoughts on paper, a public movement, or perhaps just the possibility of becoming extraordinary, there is something inspiring about one’s decision to go public. With the growing influence of social media, we take for granted the ability to feel immediately connected to anyone or anything we can like on Facebook or follow on Twitter. We expect to get to know people through their profile pages, what they post on Pinterest, and what theme underlies their status updates. Yet, as individuals, we control this knowledge and how candid or superficial we want it to be. Herein lies the beauty of “going public.” That is, truly welcoming the world, to the extent your privacy settings allow, into real moments in your life.

For me, after years of using Facebook to announce various accomplishments or passively imply less than stellar struggles, my most public moment occurred about a month ago. But that moment was preceded by the decision to truly change my life. So, let me begin there.

Although I would never classify myself as severely depressed, and undoubtedly have a “happy” life compared to some, for a long time I fought the silent battle of loneliness. Though always surrounded by friends, and unconditionally loved by family, something happens to a person when she forgets how to love herself. And thus, a spiraling effect began to take over my life, naturally minimizing all of my accomplishments, and slowly pushing my sense of self into darkness. I became consciously aware of this reality years ago, if I’m honest, but could never figure out how to change it. I fell asleep many nights promising myself that tomorrow would be different, only to wake up without the motivation to actually make a change. But, on May 1, 2015, I woke up differently. It was that day that I committed to changing my life, and I have reaffirmed that commitment every day since. For me, the promise was to gain back control of my life, and this meant learning how to love myself again.

I had every intention of keeping my newfound commitment a secret. Looking back, I think this was my way of protecting myself from judgment, avoiding any expectations, and ultimately establishing a safety plan should I later fail in my endeavors. I quickly realized, however, that to commit to being a “new you,” meant requiring others to realize the new you. That meant screaming from a mountaintop that your life has now changed, you have now changed, and people could accept it or disappear. Of course, there are plenty of mountaintops I could have chosen- I live in Colorado after all- but in today’s day and age, the biggest mountaintop is social media, so that’s where I went to tell the “world” my secret: I’m changing my life.

To my surprise, Facebook exploded with love and support. And with each new post about my change, more and more friends began to feel inspired. My decision to change my personal life slowly began to change the small space I occupy in this world. I realized there’s a movement made up of individuals who strive to live a happy, free, and healthy life. And when others make the same commitment, it inspires all involved.

Obviously, there’s nothing novel about the fitness and health boom that’s been occurring over the last decade. Shows like The Biggest Loser and Extreme Weightloss are common topics of discussion within this movement, and personal trainers are now celebrities in ways they never were before. But what about the people who aren’t on these shows and who can’t, or maybe don’t want to, make it into the spotlight? What about us individuals who join local neighborhood gyms and try to keep up with ever-changing diet trends? How can we too feel connected in a way that empowers transformation on a grand scale? My answer: Team TATE.

Team TATE was born out of my sporadic decisions to go public with my own transformation and the way people responded. It represents a collection of individuals who understand a happy and free life and who recommit to furthering that happiness and freedom everyday. It represents those who are still struggling to learn the secret, but who feel inspired by others working towards the same. It is a place without judgment. A place where you will find strength in the simple concept of true connection.

To be on Team TATE is to commit To Achieving Transformation Everyday.

I welcome you to join me on this journey. It is my hope that together we can just live, connect, be extraordinarily happy, and then spread it like wildfire. My Team TATE continues to give me strength everyday, and that is what I hope this Team TATE will provide to you.