Man’s Search for Meaning
By
Viktor E. Frankl
Publisher:
Year: 1984
Summary of the book and lessons
The book is organized in 2 parts. In the first, the author describes his own experience as a prisoner in the Nazi concentration camps for 3 years. He describes how the prisoners behaved to the atrocities and humiliation they faced. How they received a single meal per day – a piece of bread an a watery soup – worked for 12 h or more, had a single wrath as cloth for summer and winter, how they were continuously humiliated either by the SS or by the Capos - the fellow prisoners appointed for maintaining order - and continuously expecting being killed, for the only thing that could keep them alive was looking fit for work despite all these circumstances. Although the author doesn’t go much into details, probably saving the reader lots of pain, this part is attractive, that one goes on reading, wanting to know more. Maybe because I’ve never read, or known about what really happened in those camps, that’s way I found it interesting, but I’d also say that his style and narrative was simple and attractive.
In the second part, he talks about “logotherapy”, a method of analysis that he formulated based on his experience in those camps.
The main idea is, if a prisoner’s loses everything-”every possession lost, every value destroyed, suffering from hunger, cold and brutality, hourly expecting extermination, how could he find life worth preserving?”. This is the question that the author tries to answer. Although this is an extreme situation that pushes a human being to the limits of sanity, it unravels some facts that lie deep inside us about the meaning of life and that cannot be exposed unless one faces such experience. The author saves us the trouble and shares this experience with us.
Important questions:
Why did the author write this book? What does he want me to do, believe or experience?
He wrote his book with the intention of introducing his logotherapy concept, which considers man as a being whose main concern consists in fulfilling a meaning, rather than in the mere gratification and satisfaction of drives and instincts. To him, the ability to realize meaning can be achieved in three different ways (1) by creating a work or doing a deed; (2) by experiencing something or encountering someone (for example loving someone, be it a wife, husband, children, parents … etc); and (3) by the attitude we take toward unavoidable suffering. The latter is an important concept for the author, for he thinks that suffering is an indispensable part of human life, and that this too, despite its obvious cruelty, must have a meaning. He divides suffering into the “tragic triad” ; 1) pain, 2) guilt and 3) death. He sees the opportunity in attaining meaning from pain is by turning suffering into a human achievement and accomplishment; or deriving from guilt the opportunity to change oneself for the better; and deriving from life's transitoriness an incentive to take responsible action.
Responsibility is another important concept for the author. He states that when man is deprived of everything, as he states in the case of the prisoners of Ausschwitz, they have one thing left, their freedom to choose their responses and attitudes, and they have the responsibility to use it according to human morals and values.
He also stresses that we are not just the products of biological and social circumstances, and that although our freedom is limited, we have the responsibility to choose within this limited space.
To him, when a man finds that it is his destiny to suffer, he had to “accept” it as his task. His unique opportunity lies in his attitude to his burden. If one adds to this the author’s idea of living an active life to “realize values”, then sounds to me like a positive submission in the Islamic sense, i.e. acceptance and a will to transform
“يحارب قدر الله بقدر احب الى الله“ كما قال عمر بن الخطاب
Also, to him happiness, as well as success, are not goals, but are rather consequences. They come as a consequence to our search for meaning, and our correct answers to the questions of life that we face continuously. Happiness must happen.
Did he succeed in his intentions? Am I convinced?
Although he requested more than once not to ask about the meaning of life, his alternative was actually a reply, where he considered life is asking us questions and requesting our correct replies. That is the Islamic vision, where humans are examined and asked to answer correctly.
I also find this request contradicting with his advocating that humans should seek meaning in life. If I should only answer the questions thrown on me by life, and if I have even to suffer, why should I bear all of that? There was then this idea of super-meaning, i.e. religious conviction, which he said he can appeal to treat his patients, but would not try to convince someone with.
What is the take home message?
Look for meaning and value in what you are supposed to do in each and every act.
Suffering is a meaningful part of life and can be used for transformation.
Quotations
„Don’t aim at success - the more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one's personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one's surrender to a person other than oneself. Happiness must happen, and the same holds for success: you have to let it happen by not caring about it. I want you to listen to what your conscience commands you to do and go on to carry it out to the best of your knowledge. Then you will live to see that in the long run - in the long run, I say! - success will follow you precisely because you had forgotten to think of it.”
“We really had nothing now except our bare bodies - even minus hair; all we possessed, literally, was our naked existence.”
“we had nothing to lose except our so ridiculously naked lives.”
“One prisoner, the doctor of a block of huts and a man of some sixty years, told me how he had entreated Dr. M---- to let off his son, who was destined for gas. Dr. M---- coldly refused.” ……… I know how this feels !!!
“If you want to stay alive, there is only one way: look fit for work.”
“A man's suffering is similar to the behavior of gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into an empty chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. Thus suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether the suffering is great or little. Therefore the "size" of human suffering is absolutely relative.”
“Is that theory true which would have us believe that man is no more than a product of many conditional and environmental factors - be they of a biological, psychological or sociological nature? Is man but an accidental product of these? Most important, do the prisoners' reactions to the singular world of the concentration camp prove that man cannot escape the influences of his surroundings? Does man have no choice of action in the face of such circumstances? ………… We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way ……. And there were always choices to make. Every day, every hour, offered the opportunity to make a decision, a decision which determined whether you would or would not submit to those powers which threatened to rob you of your very self, your inner freedom; which determined whether or not you would become the plaything of circumstance, renouncing freedom and dignity to become molded into the form of the typical inmate.”
“Only the men who allowed their inner hold on their moral and spiritual selves to subside eventually fell victim to the camp's degenerating influences. The question now arises, what could, or should, have constituted this "inner hold"? ……… It is a peculiarity of man that he can only live by looking to the future - ….. And this is his salvation in the most difficult moments of his existence, although he sometimes has to force his mind to the task.……… The prisoner who had lost faith in the future – his future - was doomed. With his loss of belief in the future, he also lost his spiritual hold; he let himself decline and became subject to mental and physical decay.“
“Any attempt to restore a man's inner strength in the camp had first to succeed in showing him some future goal. Nietzsche's words, "He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how,"
“It did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life - daily and hourly. Our answer must consist, not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfil the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual. These tasks, and therefore the meaning of life, differ from man to man, and from moment to moment. Thus it is impossible to define the meaning of life in a general way.” …….. He says there’s no point in asking what the meaning of life is, when he, by his suggested alternative, has already presented an answer. We are in a test, and we have to answer the questions correctly.
“When a man finds that it is his destiny to suffer, he will have to accept his suffering as his task; his single and unique task. He will have to acknowledge the fact that even in suffering he is unique and alone in the universe. No one can relieve him of his suffering or suffer in his place. His unique opportunity lies in the way in which he bears his burden.” ……. “Accept suffering as his task.” This sounds like submission, like accepting God’s will, like Islam. As if the aim is to submit to his will, accept what He gives us, and answer correctly to the questions. But it adds something more, “the way he bares his burden”. It should be one of “active life”, trying to make something good and useful out of it. So if one only “accepts”, this would be a good answer, but not the best. The best would be to “accept and transform”. Then you get the full mark!
“Long ago we had passed the stage of asking,” What was the meaning of life”, a naïve query, which understands life as the attaining of some aim through the active creation of something of value. For us, the meaning of life embraced the wider cycles of life and death, of suffering and of dying.” ……. Life is about submission. An active life is about creation and a passive one is about enjoyment. The prisoners had to accept their suffering (submit), and in each moment they had the decision, the opportunity for an active life, by holding to the morals, by giving example, by helping others … they were “realizing values”, where realize stands for making real.
“A man who becomes conscious of the responsibility he bears toward a human being who affectionately waits for him, or to an unfinished work, will never be able to throw away his life. He knows the "why" for his existence, and will be able to bear almost any "how." ……. “Responsibility” reminds me of “khelafat Allah fe alard” and of alamanah which humans have accepted but nothing else in the universe did. Man accepted it and consequently was responsible for his actions.
“Logotherapy focuses rather on the future, that is to say, on the meanings to be fulfilled by the patient in his future.”
“Man's search for meaning is the primary motivation in his life and not a "secondary rationalization" of instinctual drives. This meaning is unique and specific in that it must and can be fulfilled by him alone”
“Logotherapy deviates from psychoanalysis insofar as it considers man a being whose main concern consists in fulfilling a meaning, rather than in the mere gratification and satisfaction of drives and instincts”
“What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for a worthwhile goal, a freely chosen task. What he needs is not the discharge of tension at any cost but the call of a potential meaning waiting to be fulfilled by him.”
“The existential vacuum manifests itself mainly in a state of boredom …… Such widespread phenomena as depression, aggression and addiction are not understandable unless we recognize the existential vacuum underlying them. This is also true of the crises of pensioners and aging people ……… Sometimes the frustrated will to meaning is vicariously compensated for by a will to power, including the most primitive form of the will to power, the will to money …… the place of frustrated will to meaning is taken by the will to pleasure. That is why existential frustration often eventuates in sexual compensation.”
What is the meaning of life? …… “To put the question in general terms would be comparable to the question posed to a chess champion: "Tell me, Master, what is the best move in the world?" There simply is no such thing as the best or even a good move apart from a particular situation in a game and the particular personality of one's opponent. The same holds for human existence. One should not search for an abstract meaning of life. Everyone has his own specific vocation or mission in life to carry out a concrete assignment which demands fulfilment. Therein he cannot be replaced, nor can his life be repeated. Thus, everyone's task is as unique as is his specific opportunity to implement it.”
“I wish to stress that the true meaning of life is to be discovered in the world rather than within man or his own psyche, as though it were a closed system. I have termed this constitutive characteristic "the self-transcendence of human existence." It denotes the fact that being human always points, and is directed, to something, or someone, other than oneself - be it a meaning to fulfil or another human being to encounter. The more one forgets himself - by giving himself to a cause to serve or another person to love - the more human he is.” ……. Indeed, this is true. But again, why should I feel human? If I were only a monkey that evolved, as some people claim, why should I care to be a human (something that we use as an antonym to an animal which has a –ve sense). Is it something that evolved as our collective consciousness evolved? And how come that ants and bees do it without even having a consciousness? How come that they have it, despite the absurd simplicity of their nervous systems?
“Thus far we have shown that the meaning of life always changes, but that it never ceases to be ….. we can discover this meaning in life in three different ways: (1) by creating a work or doing a deed; (2) by experiencing something or encountering someone; and (3) by the attitude we take toward unavoidable suffering ………. -(2) as in the case of loving someone- Thus love is not understood as a mere side-effect of sex; rather, sex is a way of expressing the experience of that ultimate togetherness which is called love ….. (3) suffering …….. what then matters is to bear witness to the uniquely human potential at its best, which is to transform a personal tragedy into a triumph, to turn one's predicament into a human achievement. When we are no longer able to change a situation - just think of an incurable disease such as inoperable cancer - we are challenged to change ourselves.”
“Man’s main concern is not to gain pleasure or to avoid pain but rather to see a meaning in his life. That is why man is even ready to suffer, on the condition, to be sure, that his suffering has a meaning.”
Edith Weisskopf-Joelson said "our current mental-hygiene philosophy stresses the idea that people ought to be happy, that unhappiness is a symptom of maladjustment. Such a value system might be responsible for the fact that the burden of unavoidable unhappiness is increased by unhappiness about being unhappy”
“The pessimist resembles a man who observes with fear and sadness that his wall calendar, from which he daily tears a sheet, grows thinner with each passing day. On the other hand, the person who attacks the problems of life actively is like a man who removes each successive leaf from his calendar and files it neatly and carefully away with its predecessors, after first having jotted down a few diary notes on the back. He can reflect with pride and joy on all the richness set down in these notes, on all the life he has already lived to the fullest. What will it matter to him if he notices that he is growing old? Has he any reason to envy the young people whom he sees, or wax nostalgic over his own lost youth? What reasons has he to envy a young person? For the possibilities that a young person has, the future which is in store for him? "No, thank you," he will think. "Instead of possibilities, I have realities in my past, not only the reality of work done and of love loved, but of sufferings bravely suffered. These sufferings are even the things of which I am most proud, though these are things which cannot inspire envy."
“Pleasure is, and must remain, a side-effect or by-product, and is destroyed and spoiled to the degree to which it is made a goal in itself.”
“An incurably psychotic individual may lose his usefulness but yet retain the dignity of a human being. This is my psychiatric credo. Without it I should not think it worthwhile to be a psychiatrist. For whose sake? Just for the sake of a damaged brain machine which cannot be repaired? If the patient were not definitely more, euthanasia would be justified.” …. This is also an important thing. We care much about the terminally or incurably ill, we try to treat them, although euthanasia would be better for them and the society in this case, however, this care gives individuals a sense of security, because anyone could fall in the same situation, and thus would feel better if the society would take care of him then.
“We watched and witnessed some of our comrades behave like swine while others behaved like saints. Man has both potentialities within himself; which one is actualized depends on decisions but not on conditions.”
The “tragic triad, 1) pain, 2) guilt and 3) death ……. (1) turning suffering into a human achievement and accomplishment; (2) deriving from guilt the opportunity to change oneself for the better; and (3) deriving from life's transitoriness an incentive to take responsible action.”
“A human being is not one in pursuit of happiness but rather in search of a reason to become happy, last but not least, through actualizing the potential meaning inherent and dormant in a given situation.” … From “stumbling on happiness”, Sigmund Freud notes,”The question of the purpose of human life has never been answered satisfactorily. A less ambitious question would be what does it look like that human beings are living for. The answer is undoubtedly, people are after what they call “happiness”” …. This is not true. Happiness is not the goal, but meaning (al7ekma dallat al mo2men). This Freudian view is being supported because it fits quite well with the new religion called “consumerism”. Buy this to be happy, get that to feel satisfied. That’s after all why you are living on earth.
“People have enough to live by but nothing to live for; they have the means but no meaning.”
“Being jobless was equated with being useless, and being useless was equated with having a meaningless life.”
“Even if things only take such a good turn in one of a thousand cases," my explanation continues, "who can guarantee that in your case it will not happen one day, sooner or later? But in the first place, you have to live to see the day on which it may happen, so you have to survive in order to see that day dawn, and from now on the responsibility for survival does not leave you." ……. We are responsible to live because our life may one day make a change, may one day make life a little bit better for someone else, if if this is only for one day, one hour or one minute. One must take this responsibility, because it is worth it.
“Consider a movie: it consists of thousands upon thousands of individual pictures, and each of them makes sense and carries a meaning, yet the meaning of the whole film cannot be seen before its last sequence is shown. However, we cannot understand the whole film without having first understood each of its components, each of the individual pictures. Isn't it the same with life? Doesn't the final meaning of life, too, reveal itself, if at all, only at its end, on the verge of death? And doesn't this final meaning, too, depend on whether or not the potential meaning of each single situation has been actualized to the best of the respective individual's knowledge and belief?” ….. Does this mean we cannot understand the meaning of human life except at its end?, and does this also imply, that we, actors in the movie, cannot by any means realize what the movie is about, because we are simply part of it? Do we have to get out to understand?
If I send this book to others, I would expect that each and everyone would understand it in a different way. It is like art, where one’s own culture, knowledge, experience and state of mind determine how one would judge, or understand, a piece of art, or the message of a book. It is a very unique experience and certainly differs from one to another. Perhaps it’s as George Orwell says “The best books, he perceived, are those that tell you what you know already.”
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