In today’s workplaces, we’re surrounded by conversations about who’s right and who’s wrong, who agrees and who disagrees, who is better or worse. But what if we redirected those conversations? What if, instead of debating positions, we centered our lives and work on What Matters, not just as individuals, but as teams, organizations, and communities?

The truth is simple but often overlooked: we not only need to live out What Matters, we need to talk about it — often, and together.

Why Talking About What Matters Is Just as Important as Living It

A successful entrepreneur and CEO once remarked that you can never share your vision too much, because vision is the lifeblood of a business. Without constant communication, people drift, lose direction, and forget the “why” that fuels their work.

The same principle applies to What Matters. Living it is essential. But talking about it and weaving it into meetings, daily conversations, and casual check-ins, enhances it. It shapes culture, reinforces priorities, and strengthens resilience.

Unfortunately, too many workplaces sideline this. We’ve normalized conversations about outcomes, performance, and disagreements while neglecting the deeper human stories that help us understand one another’s values and lived experiences.

Lessons From the Blue Zones

Research on the world’s “Blue Zones”  (regions where people live longer, healthier lives)  points to a shared characteristic: purpose and meaning in daily living. People in these communities don’t just stay active and eat well; they have a reason to get up in the morning (ikigai in Okinawa, plan de vida in Costa Rica). Just as importantly, they talk about their purpose with the people who matter most to them (Buettner, 2012).

This isn’t just inspiring folklore. Studies show that having purpose in life is strongly associated with better health outcomes, quality of life, and even reduced risk of mortality (Kim et al., 2014; Lopez et al., 2024). In other words, living out What Matters with people who matter — and talking about it often — is a formula for resilience and longevity.

What Teams Can Learn

If this is true for long-lived communities around the world, imagine the power it holds for your team:

• Balance and well-being. Encouraging employees to live out What Matters inside and outside of work creates healthier balance, reducing burnout and turnover.
• Culture of listening. Redirecting conversations away from judgment (right/wrong, agree/disagree) toward curiosity (“What matters to you?”) fosters trust and collaboration.
• Shared alignment. Just as leaders must repeat vision until it becomes second nature, teams must continually return to What Matters as their guiding compass.

A Call to Action

The Surgeon General has warned that loneliness and disconnection are now public health crises in America. Teams are not immune. If we want organizations to thrive, we must reorient both our practices and our conversations toward meaning, purpose, and human connection.

That means encouraging your team to live What Matters as much as possible, including at work, at home, and in their communities. And it means redirecting conversations back to What Matters, so dialogue becomes less about proving who’s right and more about understanding one another’s perspectives and lived experiences.

How Dr. Holloway Can Help

Dr. Jeremy Holloway has spent his career studying health equity, intergenerational connection, and the science of social well-being. He brings the principles of Blue Zones, resilience research, and workplace leadership together to help teams:

• Align around What Matters in work and life.
• Create healthier, more connected workplace cultures.
• Strengthen purpose and resilience in the face of daily pressures.

Invite Dr. Holloway to work with your team and discover how living —and talking about — What Matters can transform your workplace into a place of both productivity and authentic synergy together.

References

• Buettner, D. (2012). The Blue Zones: 9 Lessons for Living Longer from the People Who’ve Lived the Longest. National Geographic Books.
• Kim, E. S., Sun, J. K., Park, N., & Peterson, C. (2014). Purpose in life and reduced incidence of stroke in older adults: “The Health and Retirement Study.” Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 77(3), 219–225. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpsychores.2014.06.009
• Lopez, J., Romero-Moreno, R., Márquez-González, M., & Losada, A. (2024). Psychological well-being and quality of life in older adults: A structural equation model. BMC Geriatrics, 24(1), 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12877-024-05401-7