Mattering summary

Have you ever ruminated on who would even notice if you’re gone? Many of us struggle to identify or notice the positive impact we have on other people. Many of us also conflate responsibility with obligation, hesitant to commit to things out of fear of being tied down. 

But taking responsibility is not about succumbing to outside pressures. It means choosing to become someone others rely on; and feeling relied upon is actually deeply rewarding to human nature. Research backs this up; instead of draining us, being depended on actually increases our energy, sense of capability, and feeling of having enough time. 

There’s a catch to mattering – it only feels truly rewarding if it goes both ways. It’s not enough to make others a priority, humans also need to feel like a priority to others. Many people in caregiving roles, like teachers or nurses, experience a painful gap; society calls them essential, yet their personal needs consistently come last. When demands pile up without support, feeling relied upon to solve everyone’s problems can become a heavy burden to carry. 

Society today is structured in a way that makes this sad situation all too common. Remember the phrase “it takes a village to raise a child”? This used to reflect real, lived reality. Neighbors, extended family and community members used to freely share time and resources when it came to child care. This informal safety net has largely disappeared today. 

Until he was 8 years old, Rehan from Maryland had a happy, uneventful childhood. But then, everything unraveled. His mother abruptly left the family to return to her home in Sri Lanka. His father lost his job, forcing him into exhausting double shifts as a delivery driver. Rehan fell from a straight-A student near the bottom of his class. There were some glimpses of hope in his teens as he had a brief amateur boxing career cut short by injury and the support of a volunteer tutor who recognized Rehan’s intelligence. But by the time the SATs rolled around, Rehan was as lost and burnt out as ever. He ended up bombing the tests and started working in sanitation. 

It looked like that’s where his path would end. But once more, two older coworkers, Bones and Craig, saw something in him that the world had stopped looking for. They praised his quick wit and intelligence; then they started to push him towards college; and, finally, they marched into the boss’s office to demand he help Rehan get into college. And his boss did. 

Have you ever had the experience of someone listening to you intently, yet still not getting the gist of what you were trying to say?

Attunement is another fundamental pillar of feeling like you matter; it's the difference between being acknowledged versus feeling truly understood. Without true understanding, even the most generous acts of kindness can fall flat – like giving someone a gift they don’t actually want.

Talk to older generations and you’ll find that not so long ago, most people used to dread retirement, afraid of losing their sense of worth and meaning. Now, people are rushing towards it, eager to escape workplaces that have already made them feel worthless and invisible. Only about 1 in 3 workers globally reports genuinely thriving; the rest seem to be either struggling or checked out entirely. The rise of AI is pouring salt in the wound, with some CEOs openly signaling their willingness to swap out employees for machines. 

Yet workplace dissatisfaction carries more than just an emotional cost; it’s also extraordinarily expensive for companies. Replacing a senior leader can cost twice their annual salary, and experiments show that a culture of rudeness and dismissiveness costs people critical amounts of executive function – including in high-stakes medical settings.