Knowing that “you matter” is a matter of knowing that your presence, intentions, ideas and actions CONTRIBUTE to someone or something that feels PURPOSEFUL to you. It is about knowing that you have made a difference to someone or something you care about.
The feedback loop of evidence of IMPACT and CONTRIBUTION fuels and sustains AGENCY and PURPOSE
When the feedback loop of evidence reassures you that you are having an IMPACT and CONTRIBUTING to someone or something you care about, this reinforces your sense of AGENCY and PURPOSE and keeps you moving forward.
When you can’t tell if you are having an IMPACT and CONTRIBUTING to something you care about, you risk sliding into listlessness, anomie or even acedia.
Jennifer Wallace shares an illustration in her TED Talk of the important of evidence in creating the sense that we “matter”:
“When we think about the most meaningful jobs in the world, firefighters are among the top of the list, right? While most of us run from danger, they run straight into it, risking their lives to save ours. The impact of their work is undeniable.
At least that’s what I had always assumed, until I met a firefighter named Greg, who told me that even firefighters can struggle to see the impact of their work. “Really? How? How can that be?” I remember asking Greg. And he explained with a story.
When he was a rookie, he and his crew were called to a horrific car wreck. A woman was trapped inside. Her legs were pinned under the twisted steel. Greg’s training took over. He looked for an opening and he found a jagged opening. Slid through to put his heavy bunker coat around the woman to shield her from the glass as they worked to rescue her. Greg promised he would stay by her side and they would get her out, and they did.
But here is the part of Greg’s story that stuck with me. After that intense experience, Greg would never know what happened next. Did the woman survive? Did she ever walk again? Did their efforts that night make any difference?”
—
Based on this experience, Greg started to proactively follow up on what happened to the people he had rescued. He created his own feedback loop of evidence of IMPACT and CONTRIBUTION.
While I admire Greg’s proactiveness, his example reveals our tragic inattention to the real value of feedback loops.
With just a little more awareness and intentionality, we could all do this for each other. We could help each other collect evidence that we do in fact have an IMPACT and CONTRIBUTE to each other’s success and well-being.
Feedback can be a great communication tool for performance management, but it can actually also be something much more valuable. When framed properly, feedback loops enhance our sense of MEANING by providing us with evidence of our IMPACT and CONTRIBUTION.
It helps us confirm what we have CONTRIBUTED to someone or something that matters.
—
Agency (主体性) + Purpose (志) + Growth (成長) + Connection (繋がり) + Contribution (貢献) = Meaning (意義)
In the space between you and me awaits all that will ever be.
人と人の間に全てのもと
—
Wallace also shares research showing that the resilience that comes from knowing that you matter is built upon your inter-personal networks:
“Researchers (at the Mayo Clinic) were testing a simple intervention to strengthen resilience. They recruited a group of medical professionals, and they had them meet for one hour a week to share their struggles and to support one another. After three months, the researchers found significant improvements in these participants’ mental health and well-being. Their cortisol levels, the stress hormone, had dropped. These women also reported feeling like better parents. Why?
Because as caregivers, when we are surrounded by a strong network of support, we’ve become more resilient, and that resilience ripples out to our kids. This is not an isolated finding. Decades of resilience research find that a child’s resilience is rooted in the resilience of the adults in their lives, and adult resilience is rooted on the depth and support of our relationships.
Now as caregivers, we’re often told, put your oxygen mask on first. But this research revealed something deeper to me. Friends are the oxygen. We need one or two or three people in our lives who know us intimately, who can see when we are struggling, and who will reach over and put that oxygen mask on for us. That is a very different level of support than we normalize in our busy culture today.
—
Years ago, I coined a term for the kinds of relationships Wallace is talking about.
I call them inter-dependable relationships. Inter-dependence is a fact of life. Inter-dependability is the choice to make the most of inter-dependence.
Because I am there for myself, I can be MORE for others. By being there for others I CREATE/DISCOVER MORE of myself.
inter-dependability
持ちつ持たれつ
—
Here is a link to Jennifer Wallace’s TED Talk:
© Dana Cogan, 2026, all rights reserved.