Jennifer Breheny Wallace

After the need for food and shelter, it is the need to matter that shapes our behavior.

People will go to desperate measures to prove they matter, even in a negative way.

Thanks so much for having me.

Yeah, I thought I knew what it meant to matter.

I had this, you know, it's a word we hear kicked around.

But what I found fascinating is that not only do we all have it, not only is it a universal human need, but that it is...

the driver of human behavior for better or for worse.

So what I mean by that is, after the need for food and shelter, it is the need to matter, the drive to matter that shapes our behavior.

When we feel like we matter to each other, to our communities, to our workplaces, we show up to the world in positive ways.

We wanna contribute, we wanna engage and connect.

But when we are chronically made to feel like we don't matter, which is what we are seeing on a global level today, we often withdraw, we become anxious, depressed, turn to substances to try to alleviate that ache, that pain, or we can lash out in anger

Think of road rage.

Think of online attacks and political extremes.

People will go to desperate measures to prove they matter, even in a negative way.

Yes, so mattering is a felt experience.

So you could matter and not feel like you matter.

And so as you point out, it is critical that we really create this new social norm

where we connect people to the impact that they have.

So the reason people often feel like they don't matter is because no one tells them that they do.

No one sort of circles back.