Kagan Dunlap was an insular child who struggled to connect with his peers through middle and high school.
But the 37-year-old always had a strong work ethic and has “metamorphosed” into a confident Officer since joining the US Marine Corps in 2014.
Now a decade later the Officer – who recently returned from a tour of Iraq and Syria – had no issue using clear communication to lead from the front when he commanded a company of 90 Marines and Sailors for 11 months until July.
“I’ve definitely got over that social anxiety I had as a kid,” he said.
“I was a lost soul when I was in middle and high school. I didn’t put my best foot forward and was kind of a lonely guy.
“I grew up in Maine and lived in a rural area and moved down to North Carolina when I was 12.
“It was a culture shock going down south. I didn’t know anybody, I didn’t have any friends and had to learn to talk to people.
“The issue was I didn’t used to talk to people. I wasn’t a social butterfly. I really struggled with it.”
Kagan, who is also a well-known YouTuber, credits working as a server in restaurants in his early 20s as the catalyst for “coming out of his shell”.
Around this time he began weight training around five times a week and following a strict high-protein diet. This dedication saw him finish second place in one category at the Bayou Muscle bodybuilding contest in New Orleans, Louisiana in 2021.
This all gave him the confidence to join the military, initially as an enlisted marine before he became an officer in June 2021.
“I think part of what helped me get over that social anxiety was waiting tables,” he explained.
“Because you have to talk to strangers all day, it gets you out of your shell.
“In the US most restaurants don’t pay their staff enough to live on.
“So they depend on their tips. That means if you are good at your job you will make good money but you won’t if you can’t.
“So I had no choice – it was a baptism of fire but I survived it.”
This confidence grew when he joined the US Marines.
“I think part of the problem was needing to find a purpose and sense of community,” he said.
“I didn’t have that for a long period of time. The marines gave me that and something that I could drive towards both physically and mentally.
“I’ve always loved working out and the Marines gave me the time and drive to push myself physically.
“That’s just as true from a psychological standpoint.
“The military is a very abrasive, aggressive environment. So you have to be a straight shooter.
“It pushed me to be a leader which meant I had to be a clear communicator.”
Kagan now hosts a hugely popular YouTube channel which has more than 500,000 subscribers. He has almost 750,000 on Instagram and nearly 700,000 on TikTok.
This job sees him hold three-hour long live streams with strangers every week and talks at events supporting veterans alongside other celebrities including Tim Kennedy and Andre Rush who was a chef in the White House for Donald Trump and Barack Obama.
Explaining his motivation for using the platforms, he said: “A big reason that got me into social media was to help a Marine who’d lost his mother in an elementary school shooting in Uvalde, Texas.
“His dad passed away the same week and I saw there was a GoFundMe page to help fund the funeral and assist him and his siblings.
“I sent it out to 200 people in the hope that they can get the story out. It was shared by big pages and I watched the donation bar go up by multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars overnight.
“That made me realise that I needed to grow my own social media so I can get to a place where I can do this myself.
“There is a lot of support for veterans but it falls short significantly sometimes because some things aren’t covered like if someone’s parents died.
“That’s not covered by insurance so how are people supposed to afford to pay for that?
“This is why I wanted to build a platform where I can give a voice to people who don’t have one.”
