Jennifer Breheny Wallace

The next ingredient is invested in.

It's the idea that there are people in our lives who are invested in our goals and who are there to support us through setbacks.

And the last ingredient is feeling depended on or relied on.

Are there people in your life who depend on you?

We live in such a hyper individualistic culture that we often don't signal to people how much we rely on them or depend on them.

And so what I would say to anybody listening is to let the people in your life know that you rely on them.

And you can do it in simple ways.

You could send a simple text to someone saying, if it weren't for you, dot, dot, dot.

You know, if it weren't for you, I wouldn't have had the courage to go for that job interview.

Thank you for believing in me before I could even believe in myself.

So the set framework really narrow in on the main ingredients to mattering.

That's exactly right.

The fastest way to feel like you matter again is to remind someone else why they do.

I think about this litmus test.

When I'm feeling like I don't matter or my sense of mattering is taking a hit, I ask myself this one question.

I say, am I letting people in to see me and know me for who I am deep inside?

Am I leaning on my people?

Am I opening up?

Or do I feel like I need to go through whatever struggle or whatever I'm going through in the busyness of life on my own?

People often...