Jennifer Breheny Wallace

Estimate the incline.

Then they had the same individuals stand there with a friend and estimate the incline.

The incline looked less steep when they were standing there together than it did when they were alone.

And that's because we are wired to be resilient in groups, to be resilient in relationships.

And I think part of the male loneliness crisis that we hear today is that men have internalized this idea that you need to be self-sufficient.

You need to be stoic.

Pull yourself up by your bootstraps.

I mean, if you've ever tried to do that, it's literally impossible.

The idea that that's even a thing.

Our resilience is in our relationships.

And I think that's a conversation we need to start normalizing.

Yeah, so many of the people that I interviewed for the book said, oh, the problem isn't that I don't matter.

It's that I matter too much at home, at work.

I'm a caregiver.

And so true mattering, according to the research, requires balance.

Mattering to ourselves matters.

and mattering to others.

So fulfilling our own needs as humans while also fulfilling the needs of others.

There's this balance.

And often with caregivers or leaders or people working as first responders, it is very easy to let that sense of mattering get out of balance.