Mattering Summit Welcome

Jennifer Wallace

Author of the Instant New York Times Bestseller, Mattering: The Secret to a Life of Deep Connection and Purpose

Dr. Sarah Bennison

Co-founder of The Mattering Movement

Beyond Achievement Culture: Building Mattering-Centered Education

The Mattering Movement is the first leading national organization in Mattering Education — bringing over four decades of psychological and educational research to schools across the United States. When students and educators feel seen, valued, and believe their contributions matter, the results are transformative for mental health, belonging, academic outcomes, and school communities. Dr. Sarah Bennison, educator of over 30 years, NYU faculty member, and pioneer in mattering-based education, will share the research and the practical tools to activate the science of mattering in your school. Participants will leave with a shared language, actionable strategies, and a new lens for thinking about school culture, student wellbeing, and teacher resilience.

Stephen Post

President of Institute for Research on Pure Unlimited Love

Love and Inclusion of Deeply Forgetful People

The real test for the inclusivity of love is love for those with the various diseases that cause dementia. It is so easy to deny these individuals their dignity and to notice the many hints of continuing identity. The very word “dementia” is entirely negative, and invites metaphors like “gone,” “shell,” “husk” and so forth. Drawing on my book such as Dignity for Deeply Forgetful People: How Caregivers Can Meet the Challenges of Alzheimer’s Disease,” and on Pure Unlimited Love, I will consider how to enliven manifestations of self-identity through personalized music, art, and nature. I will also look at how and why such individuals are maltreated and what we can do about it. I consider this the best way to test love, and will draw on a recent Gallup survey of primary caregivers conducted through the Institute for Research on Unlimited Love. As the Dalai Lama urges, forgetfulness is not reason to love anyone less, although it may be challenging.

Braxton Kilgo

Founder of I Believe In You

Belief in Action: How Small Acts Spark Global Impact

Every act of kindness has the power to create ripple effects far beyond what we can see. In this session, I’ll share how the I Believe In You movement uses simple gestures and technology to build cultures of encouragement, connect communities, and measure organizational impact around the world. Together, we’ll explore practical ways to inspire belief and make mattering tangible in our daily lives and organizations.

Jonathan Fields

Host of the Good Life Project; Speaker and Author on Purpose and Meaning

What if the key to feeling like your work truly matters isn’t just what you do—but whether it aligns with what naturally lights you up?

What if the key to feeling like your work truly matters isn’t just what you do—but whether it aligns with what naturally lights you up? In this thought-provoking and energizing conversation, Emiliya Zhivotovskaya sits down with Jonathan Fields, creator of the Sparketype® Assessment, to explore the powerful connection between doing work that sparks joy and experiencing a deep sense of mattering. In positive psychology, mattering is the experience of feeling valued and knowing that you add value. Yet so many people find themselves successful on paper, but disconnected, depleted, or questioning whether what they do really makes a difference. Together, Emiliya and Jonathan unpack why being “good at something” isn’t enough—and how ignoring what energizes you can quietly erode both your well-being and your sense of impact. You’ll discover how your Sparketype reveals the kind of work that naturally fuels you, and why that energy isn’t just a personal benefit—it’s a pathway to greater contribution. When you’re aligned with what brings you alive, you don’t just feel better; you show up more fully, more creatively, and more meaningfully in the lives of others.

Photo by Kathryn Colby

Morning Close

Mattering Summit Welcome

Matthew Emerzian

Founder of Every Monday Matters, Creator of the Mattering Mindset, Keynote Speaker, and Author

Make it Matter: Unleashing Human Potential Through the Mattering Mindset

In this engaging 30-minute session, Matthew Emerzian shares his personal journey from outward success to inner struggle—and the unexpected discovery that changed everything: mattering. Through honest storytelling and practical insight, he introduces the Mattering Mindset™, a framework for understanding how we matter to ourselves, one another, our work, and the world. This session invites participants to reconnect with what truly drives human potential and why it matters now more than ever.

Zach Mercurio, Ph.D.

Leadership and Mattering Researcher, Author of The Power of Mattering and The Invisible Leader

Mattering-Centered Leadership: Key Skills for Building a Culture of Significance

Increasingly, data shows we face a mattering deficit in our workplaces and organizations as more people report feeling unseen, unheard, undervalued, and disposable. The good news is that emerging research shows we can learn and practice the skills to cultivate everyday experiences of mattering. In this session, Zach Mercurio, a mattering-at-work researcher and author of The Power of Mattering: How Leaders Can Create a Culture of Significance, will move us from understanding the concept of mattering to operationalizing it in our leadership approach. You will learn three practices for building interactions that create a sense of mattering: Noticing, affirming, and showing others how they're needed, as well as learn how to assess your skills. Zach will also explore how to scale these skills in workplaces, organizations, and communities.

Rebecca Newberger Goldstein, PhD

Philosopher and Novelist

Welcome to The Mattering Map (Although You’ve Been Here All Along)

Our longing to matter gives human life its existential dimension: alone among earth’s species, we strive for meaningfulness, purpose, and coherence. Our responses to this shared longing are dazzlingly diverse, as represented by what I call The Mattering Map—where we impress, perplex, and sometimes appall one another with the “mattering projects” we pursue. But whether it’s tending one’s garden or one’s cause, one’s relationships or one’s reputation, one’s immortal soul or one’s net worth, these projects become the loci of some of our deepest emotions. We judge how well our lives are going at least partly by how well our mattering projects are going. Are some mattering projects objectively better than others?

Sharon Shelton

Mindfulness Teacher, Coach, and Speaker

Why You Matter: The Science and Wisdom of Human Connection

Many people quietly carry a question beneath the surface of their lives: Do I really matter? In a culture that measures value through productivity and achievement, it’s easy to believe that we have to prove that we matter. Yet both contemplative wisdom and modern science suggest something different: the experience of mattering grows through connection. In this talk, mindfulness teacher Sharon Shelton explores how presence, compassion, and genuine relationships help restore our sense of meaning. In the end, a simple truth becomes clear: your life matters because life itself is sacred and deeply interconnected.

Leslee Frye

CEO of the Young 9 Foundation

What to Do When You Feel Like You Don’t Matter

Do you ever question your own significance? We've all been there — lost, searching, wondering if we truly matter. In this session, Leslee Frye, the executive director of NFL quarterback Bryce Young’s Young Nine Foundation, will create space to be honest about those moments when we don’t feel okay.  Through practical tools and guided reflection, you'll build a personal practice to navigate life's highs and lows with greater purpose and resilience. Leave not just inspired — but equipped.

Vicki O'Grady

Founder of The You Matter Compassion Project, Retired Licensed Mental Health Counselor

You Matter Compassion Project Cards

The You Matter Compassion Project and creating/giving out the You Matter cards.

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Mattering Summit Welcome

Roderick Carey, PhD

Scholar, Teacher and Artist

Do Black Boys Feel They Matter in School? Lessons from the Black Boy Mattering Project

Grounded in the social psychological theory of mattering, or the fundamental human need to feel seen, valued, and significant to others, this presentation explores how Black boys and other marginalized youth experience their sense of significance within school environments and society. Drawing on five years of research from the Black Boy Mattering Project and related studies on mattering among marginalized adolescents, the presentation highlights key findings and offers insights for creating more affirming school communities.

Panel: Louis Alloro, Sarah Tachon, Dr. Talma Shultz, Dr. Kathy Snyder, and Lucy Osborne

Co-Creating Community Mattering Through Wellbeing

This panel brings together four leading practitioners who are turning the idea of “mattering” into lived, community-wide impact. From city-wide wellbeing coalitions to grassroots kindness movements, from embodied practices to positive psychology interventions, this conversation explores what it really takes to create cultures where people feel seen, valued, and able to contribute. Featuring Kathy Snyder (Midland Wellbeing Coalition, Midland, MI), Sarah Tachon (Kindness is Contagious, Evansville WI), Talma Shultz (Positive Psychology Initiative, Palmdale, CA), and Lucy Osborne (intenSati leader, Global), this session will highlight real-world examples of how communities can move from intention to integration. Together, we will explore how mattering is built, sustained, and scaled across systems, relationships, and everyday practices, and what it means for the future of collective wellbeing. Grounded in the Summit’s focus on mattering to self, others, and society, this panel invites participants to reflect, connect, and leave with practical ideas to strengthen belonging and wellbeing in their own communities.

Sonja Lyubomirsky

Author and Professor of Psychology

How to Feel Loved: Mattering to Others

In this interview, Sonja Lyubomirsky shares insights from her book (with Harry Reis), How to Feel Loved, offering a fresh perspective on connection and relationships. Lyubomirsky argues that feeling loved—not being loved—is the key to happiness. They offer a practical framework for how to feel more loved (and make other people feel more loved) in everyday relationships. The book introduces five key mindsets: Sharing (revealing our inner world and vulnerabilities), Listening-to-Learn (truly tuning in to others), Radical Curiosity (showing genuine interest), an Open-Heart (expressing kindness and belief in the other person), and Multiplicity (embracing the messy complexity in ourselves and others). Together, these shifts operate through what Lyubomirsky calls the “Relationship See-Saw,” a dynamic, reciprocal process that reshapes how we communicate so that both partners can feel known and valued.

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Mattering Summit Welcome

Scott Barry Kaufman

Psychologist, Coach, Best-selling Author, Professor and Keynote Speaker

Talking Self-Actualization & Neurodiversity

Can you find meaning in your own existence? This discussion will focus on the beauty of neurodiversity and how people are increasingly embracing their own unique form of neurodiversity and harnessing it for creativity and well-being.

Christine Quinn, PhD

Founder of Living Kindness-Recovery Community for Families

Cultures of Mattering: How Connection Transforms Families

What happens when isolation at 30,000 feet is met by the presence of a stranger? I will share the "airplane moment"—a personal crisis where a plea for help was met not with a manual, but with the transformative power of being seen by others. We will explore how connection is a fundamental human requirement and how Living Kindness builds intentional spaces for families to move from private struggle to shared significance. Discover how the simple act of presence can build a culture where no one walks their hardest roads alone.

Joe Primo

CEO of Grateful Living

Mattering to Others: Living Gratefully Is An Act of Resistance

Science is now catching up with what spiritual traditions have known for millennia: being grateful rewires the brain, shifts perspective, and helps us care for others. Rather than only being grateful for the outcomes we want, we are now learning that living gratefully is a transformative way of orienting our lives and caring for one another. In this session, we will explore why living gratefully is a powerful act of resistance in an age of othering, and how this practice deepens our understanding of both ourselves and those around us.

Mary Ceccanese

Owner of Dynamic Connections, LLC

Mattering to Others: Creating and Sustaining High-Quality Connections

Every day we have numerous interactions with others – in person, via email, text, phone, etc. When these interactions include trust, respectful engagement, and mutual regard, they light us up – they are called High-Quality Connections.  The research of Professor Jane Dutton from the Center for Positive Organizational Scholarship at the University of Michigan shows that there are organizational (enhanced cooperation and increased adaptability), departmental (more creativity and better learning), and individual benefits (broader thinking, job satisfaction, and improved physiological/psychological health) when people are engaged in HQCs.

Jodi Silverman

Mindset and Happiness Coach

Dare to Matter: 3 Small Acts That Strengthen Self-Worth and Human Connection.

Feeling like we matter often begins with small moments of connection. In this uplifting talk, mindset and happiness coach Jodi Silverman introduces three simple but powerful “Dares”: Smile, Laugh, and Look for the Good. These everyday actions help shift self-perception, open the door to authentic connection (with self and others), and create ripple effects of kindness and belonging. Participants will discover how small intentional choices can remind both ourselves and others that they matter.

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Mattering Summit Welcome

Panel: Dr. Kathy Snyder, Andrew S. Frick, and Rabiya Karamali, EdD

Director of the Midland Area Wellbeing Coalition

Youth Matter and What Matters to Youth: Implications for Practice

This conversation explores current research on why mattering is a critical protective factor during adolescence, a period marked by rapid identity development and increasing social and academic pressures. Featuring Andrew S. Frick (Doctoral student) and Rabiya Karamali (EdD, MAPP, Instructor), this talk examines how feeling valued and having opportunities to add value within relationships shapes youth mental health and well-being. The session also highlights practical ways peers, families, schools, and communities can intentionally foster mattering to reduce loneliness, anxiety, and disengagement among young people.

Nedra Fetterman, PhD

Psychologist, Imago Faculty, and Author & Teacher of Conscious Love and Relational Repair

You Matter: Structures That Let Love Land

Nedra Fetterman, PhD, explores how relationships can become places of healing, growth, and conscious partnership through the structure and flow of genuine dialogue.

Kristoffer Carter

CEO, Executive Coach, Author of Epic Leadership

Self-Acceptance to Self Love: The Spiritual Practice of Perseverance

What if mattering to yourself wasn't a destination, but a daily practice? Two years ago, Kristoffer Carter experienced a down-to-the-studs life renovation. Divorce after 25 mostly happy years of marriage. Full surrender to 12-step recovery. What emerged wasn't a comeback story. It was something quieter and more durable: a pilot light. In this talk, drawing on conversations with world-class experts and the research behind his podcast Hell Yeah, You Will, Kris offers three practices for keeping that light burning when everything goes dark.

Emily Kasriel

Deep Listener, Visiting Fellow, King’s College London

From Polarisation to Connection: The Eight Steps of Deep Listening

How do you make someone feel they truly matter? By listening, really listening. In this interactive session, author and former BBC journalist Emily Kasriel introduces her eight-step Deep Listening approach, demonstrated in a peer-reviewed study across 100 countries. It helps people feel safe, understood, and truly heard, even amid profound disagreement. Through stories from her work with communities facing polarisation, from the USA to Lebanon to Ethiopia, and a live demonstration, Emily shows how Deep Listening transforms relationships and gives people dignity.

Cheryl Rice

Founder of the You Matter Marathon and President of Cheryl Rice Leadership

What 12 Years of the You Matter Marathon has Taught Me

Who would have thought a random encounter with a woman in a grocery store in 2015 would turn into a global movement leading all the way to the Mattering Summit?

This is the story of the You Matter Marathon.

In this inspiring interview, Cheryl shares some of the most moving experiences that shaped her journey, the lessons she’s learned as a social entrepreneur, and insights she's gained about human connection, belonging, and the powerful impact of reminding people that they matter.

Brad Aronson

Author, Teacher and Speaker

Transform the World …and Yourself.

What if changing the world didn’t require a grand gesture, but simply a small, intentional act? This inspiring talk shares powerful real-life stories that reveal how even the simplest moments can create a ripple effect far beyond what we imagine. If you’re feeling the weight of the world, this session will shift your perspective with an uplifting reminder of what really matters and of how easily you can change a life—including your own.

Selena Rezvani

Leader and Speaker

Quick Confidence: Small Moves That Change Everything

You don’t need a personality overhaul to become more confident. In this fun and fast-paced session, you’ll learn small, strategic shifts - in your mindset, body language, and communication - that can quickly elevate how you show up. Practical, memorable, and immediately usable.

Emiliya Zhivotovskaya

CEO and Founder of The Flourishing Center

Belonging vs. Mattering: What’s the Difference—and Why It Matters

We know belonging is a fundamental human need—but what if belonging alone isn’t enough? In this session, Emiliya Zhivotovskaya explores the critical distinction between belonging—feeling accepted and included—and mattering—feeling valued and knowing you make a difference. Through a clear and compelling framework, you’ll discover why these two experiences, while deeply connected, are not the same—and how lacking either one can leave you feeling disconnected, invisible, or unfulfilled. You’ll learn how to identify where you currently stand, what may be missing, and how to activate both belonging and mattering as pathways to greater meaning, contribution, and flourishing. You’ll also learn how to intentionally create environments where others don’t just feel included, but truly valued and impactful—whether in your workplace, your relationships, or your community. Walk away with practical ways to foster both connection and contribution so that the people around you experience a deeper sense of being seen, needed, and significant.

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