No More Fighting to Matter
The Fight to Feel Seen Every conflict—whether a workplace clash or a family argument—stems from one core struggle: the fight to know we matter. Have you ever felt crushed when someone didn’t notice your hard work? We all crave to feel significant, at work, at home, anywhere. As a software engineer, I felt this sting deeply. After earning a promotion to Senior Engineer, a new manager called me an “overvalued middle engineer”—a oblique statement saying I was being paid above my value. I brushed it off, assuming he hadn’t seen my contributions. I kept building features and improving our team’s workflow, expecting recognition. A few years later, he repeated the same judgment. I was stunned. My work felt invisible, and I spiraled: Should I leave? Will anyone see my worth? That desperate need to be seen threw me into an existential crisis. Why We Fight for Proof Why do we tie our worth to others’ recognition? We all need to know we matter. But we only know it when we feel it. And those fe...