Man's Search for Meaning

The Book in 3 Sentences

Surprisingly, even people in the worst situations (such as concentration camps), can find hope and meaning in their daily lives by looking toward the future and taking responsibility for whatever they retain control over.
Life is about finding meaning, and regardless of your situation, there is always something left to attach meaning to because you always have at least some tiny choices and influence left on the world and others.
There is an increasing understanding of ourselves as machines due to technological and scientific progress, and this makes it easy to feel as though everything is meaningless, but you are lucky enough to be one of the people being asked what the meaning of life is, so you have some say in it.

Who Should Read it?

If you are feeling nihilistic and existential, or are interested in the truth and practical aspects of optimistic nihilism.
If you are interested in the nature and alleviation of mental suffering.

My Top 3 Quotes:

"Life is not primarily a quest for pleasure, as Freud believed, or a quest for power, as Alfred Adler taught, but a quest for meaning. The greatest task for any person is to find meaning in his or her life. Frankl saw three possible sources for meaning: in work (doing something significant), in love (caring for another person), and in courage during difficult times. Suffering in and of itself is meaningless; we give our suffering meaning by the way in which we respond to it. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, loc. 28-31"
It is a peculiarity of man that he can only live by looking to the future—sub specie aeternitatis. And this is his salvation in the most difficult moments of his existence, although he sometimes has to force his mind to the task.
"What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for a worthwhile goal, a freely chosen task."

Impressions:

Quick read, science wasn't too convincing, but pragmatically I think the big ideas apply, although the smaller ideas were often shallow and not super clearly conveyed (using just one example as a proof)

How the Book Changed me

More convinced of optimistic nihilism, and no longer afraid of questions regarding the meaning or meaninglessness of life, which before seemed completely unanswerable.

Cited References

to follow up on (cite those obviously related to your topic AND any papers frequently cited by others because those works may well prove to be essential as you develop your own work):

Key Ideas

There is always something left to attach meaning to Framing your current struggles as future growth

To be moral is to actualize your potential

Life as a quest for meaning

Notes

The book suggests that things like happiness and success can't be aimed for directly. Much like the necessary paradoxical attention of trying so hard to do something that you mess it up.
- I think this is definitely true to an extent but I don't think that it is entirely true
Life as a quest for meaning
- "Life is not primarily a quest for pleasure, as Freud believed, or a quest for power, as Alfred Adler taught, but a quest for meaning. The greatest task for any person is to find meaning in his or her life. Frankl saw three possible sources for meaning: in work (doing something significant), in love (caring for another person), and in courage during difficult times. Suffering in and of itself is meaningless; we give our suffering meaning by the way in which we respond to it. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, loc. 28-31"
  - This seems reasonable but I am not entirely convinced. It seems more true than most other ways of describing what life is though.
  - Totally agree that Work Love and Courage are going to be the things that most commonly bring us meaning. Connected to What matters morally
  - Also applies to "there is always something left to attach meaning to"
Humor has such great strength in being able to improve the framing of a situation/ ?The Strength of Humor
- It is well known that humor, more than anything else in the human make-up, can afford an aloofness and an ability to rise above any situation, even if only for a few seconds. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 43, loc. 591-92
There is always something left to attach meaning to, you always have a way left to impact the world and others and at the very least yourself and your own suffering. Suffering your own suffering "honorably" can be your craft or mission. Related to Rationality under Uncertainty still works
Framing your suffering in terms of persevering it now for the future Framing your current struggles as future growth can be extremely helpful. This is related to the movie metaphor: Even though right now seems like pointless suffering, there is no saying how you might grow from this or how your endurance of it may lead to future moments where this was worth it or even important. And that relates to We have no idea what's lucky or unlucky.
- It is a peculiarity of man that he can only live by looking to the future—sub specie aeternitatis. And this is his salvation in the most difficult moments of his existence, although he sometimes has to force his mind to the task. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 73, loc. 949-50
  - Vipassana Equanimity
To live life is to face each challenge fully and take responsibility for and use the little control you have
- changing yourself if you can't change the situation
- The courage to suffer -> crying
- And in suffering you choose how honourably you will suffer, how you will face it
- Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 77, loc. 1000-1001
You have so much work left to do on this planet, so much positive impact left to give.
- 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. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 79, loc. 1033-36
There is no good in wronging someone else no matter how much they've wronged you. related to Rationality under Uncertainty still works
- You always have some power left to make the right decision, to do the right thing, and no matter how hard it seems, there is no good in doing the wrong thing. or trying to hurt someone else. You may as well get mad at a fig tree for secreting juice. ?Lack of Free Will
- no one has the right to do wrong, not even if wrong has been done to them. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 91, loc. 1163
Some of us are willing to die for our ideals and values, clearly they have a large impact and clearly we can derive a lot of meaning from them.
The meaning in struggle
- Our well-being really tends to be based on this striving, but this is also exactly where our suffering comes from....
- "What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for a worthwhile goal, a freely chosen task."
- "The gap between what one is and what one ought to be"

-The existential vacuum!!!!!! - We are losing the traditions, religions, and obvious mystery in our world that used to tell us what to do, but now we must deal with the terrifying ordeal of deciding that ourselves. We must decide what we want the future to look like, what the hell I want to do with my life. The absolute freedom is paralyzing. - In addition to this, however, man has suffered another loss in his more recent development inasmuch as the traditions which buttressed his behavior are now rapidly diminishing. No instinct tells him what he has to do, and no tradition tells him what he ought to do; sometimes he does not even know what he wishes to do. Instead, he either wishes to do what other people do (conformism) or he does what other people wish him to do (totalitarianism). -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 106, loc. 1309-12

I get to determine the impact and meaning of my life. I am being asked. Like the student in class who is scared to say what they think because "how could I know?" Well of course you aren't sure, but you were lucky enough to be born on this planet, so you get a say in how it goes. You were lucky enough to even have a life, so get to determine a piece in the meaning of it. Ultimately, man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather he must recognize that it is he who is asked. In a word, each man is questioned by life; and he can only answer to life by answering for his own life; to life he can only respond by being responsible. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 109, loc. 1342-44 Life is about actualizing your potentials "By his love he is enabled to see the essential traits and features in the beloved person; and even more, he sees that which is potential in him, which is not yet actualized but yet ought to be actualized. Furthermore, by his love, the loving person enables the beloved person to actualize these potentialities. By making him aware of what he can be and of what he should become, he makes these potentialities come true". -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 111, loc. 1372-75 !!! “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.” -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 121, loc. 1492-94

Self-actualization through self-transcendence. The degree to which you are successful in life is the degree to which you don't identify with the ego. All of the things that bring us meaning clearly have a degree of self transcendence. Watching movies, playing sports, art, deep work, conversations, relationships, volunteering, helping others, suffering?, "The more one forgets himself—by giving himself to a cause to serve or another person to love—the more human he is and the more he actualizes himself". -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 110, loc. 1362-63

Paradoxical intention “The neurotic who learns to laugh at himself may be on the way to self-management, perhaps to cure.” 11 -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 125, loc. 1529-30 Nothingbutness Our increased understanding of ourselves and the worlds as machines makes it clear there is no inherent overarching meaning in the world aside from that which comes from the first person

Seeing opportunity in challenge

If you feel there is no meaning now, there is a good chance you will in the future, and in that case, your perseverance in this moment will have deep meaning for you future self, for your suffering gave birth to his well-being

All Quotes

Life is not primarily a quest for pleasure, as Freud believed, or a quest for power, as Alfred Adler taught, but a quest for meaning. The greatest task for any person is to find meaning in his or her life. Frankl saw three possible sources for meaning: in work (doing something significant), in love (caring for another person), and in courage during difficult times. Suffering in and of itself is meaningless; we give our suffering meaning by the way in which we respond to it. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, loc. 28-31

Forces beyond your control can take away everything you possess except one thing, your freedom to choose how you will respond to the situation. You cannot control what happens to you in life, but you can always control what you will feel and do about what happens to you. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, loc. 35-36

“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 dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one’s surrender to a person other than oneself. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, loc. 80-82

The salvation of man is through love and in love. I understood how a man who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved. In a position of utter desolation, when man cannot express himself in positive action, when his only achievement may consist in enduring his sufferings in the right way —an honorable way—in such a position man can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his beloved, achieve fulfillment. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 37, loc. 521-24

It is well known that humor, more than anything else in the human make-up, can afford an aloofness and an ability to rise above any situation, even if only for a few seconds. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 43, loc. 591-92

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. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 66, loc. 862-63

An active life serves the purpose of giving man the opportunity to realize values in creative work, while a passive life of enjoyment affords him the opportunity to obtain fulfillment in experiencing beauty, art, or nature. But there is also purpose in that life which is almost barren of both creation and enjoyment and which admits of but one possibility of high moral behavior: namely, in man’s attitude to his existence, an existence restricted by external forces. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 67, loc. 875-78

Varying this, we could say that most men in a concentration camp believed that the real opportunities of life had passed. Yet, in reality, there was an opportunity and a challenge. One could make a victory of those experiences, turning life into an inner triumph, or one could ignore the challenge and simply vegetate, as did a majority of the prisoners. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 72, loc. 944-46

It is a peculiarity of man that he can only live by looking to the future—sub specie aeternitatis. And this is his salvation in the most difficult moments of his existence, although he sometimes has to force his mind to the task. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 73, loc. 949-50

Emotion, which is suffering, ceases to be suffering as soon as we form a clear and precise picture of it. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 74, loc. 963-64

As we said before, 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,” could be the guiding motto for all psychotherapeutic and psychohygienic efforts regarding prisoners. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 76, loc. 991-93

Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 77, loc. 1000-1001

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. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 77, loc. 1009-11

But there was no need to be ashamed of tears, for tears bore witness that a man had the greatest of courage, the courage to suffer. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 78, loc. 1020-21

When the impossibility of replacing a person is realized, it allows the responsibility which a man has for his existence and its continuance to appear in all its magnitude. 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. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 79, loc. 1033-36

no one has the right to do wrong, not even if wrong has been done to them. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 91, loc. 1163

But as for myself, I would not be willing to live merely for the sake of my “defense mechanisms,” nor would I be ready to die merely for the sake of my “reaction formations.” Man, however, is able to live and even to die for the sake of his ideals and values! -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 99, loc. 1228-30

Thus it can be seen that mental health is based on a certain degree of tension, the tension between what one has already achieved and what one still ought to accomplish, or the gap between what one is and what one should become. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 104, loc. 1290-92

So if therapists wish to foster their patients’ mental health, they should not be afraid to create a sound amount of tension through a reorientation toward the meaning of one’s life. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 105, loc. 1300-1302

In addition to this, however, man has suffered another loss in his more recent development inasmuch as the traditions which buttressed his behavior are now rapidly diminishing. No instinct tells him what he has to do, and no tradition tells him what he ought to do; sometimes he does not even know what he wishes to do. Instead, he either wishes to do what other people do (conformism) or he does what other people wish him to do (totalitarianism). -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 106, loc. 1309-12

Ultimately, man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather he must recognize that it is he who is asked. In a word, each man is questioned by life; and he can only answer to life by answering for his own life; to life he can only respond by being responsible. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 109, loc. 1342-44

“Live as if you were living already for the second time and as if you had acted the first time as wrongly as you are about to act now!” -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 109, loc. 1346-47

The more one forgets himself—by giving himself to a cause to serve or another person to love—the more human he is and the more he actualizes himself. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 110, loc. 1362-63

By his love he is enabled to see the essential traits and features in the beloved person; and even more, he sees that which is potential in him, which is not yet actualized but yet ought to be actualized. Furthermore, by his love, the loving person enables the beloved person to actualize these potentialities. By making him aware of what he can be and of what he should become, he makes these potentialities come true. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 111, loc. 1372-75

For 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. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 112, loc. 1382-84

“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.” -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 121, loc. 1492-94

Logotherapy bases its technique called “paradoxical intention” on the twofold fact that fear brings about that which one is afraid of, and that hyper-intention makes impossible what one wishes. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 124, loc. 1515-17

“The neurotic who learns to laugh at himself may be on the way to self-management, perhaps to cure.” 11 -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 125, loc. 1529-30

As for psychotherapy, however, it will never be able to cope with this state of affairs on a mass scale if it does not keep itself free from the impact and influence of the contemporary trends of a nihilistic philosophy; otherwise it represents a symptom of the mass neurosis rather than its possible cure. Psychotherapy would not only reflect a nihilistic philosophy but also, even though unwillingly and unwittingly, transmit to the patient what is actually a caricature rather than a true picture of man. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 129, loc. 1581-84

After all, man is that being who invented the gas chambers of Auschwitz; however, he is also that being who entered those gas chambers upright, with the Lord’s Prayer or the Shema Yisrael on his lips. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 134, loc. 1634-36

(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. -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 137, loc. 1677-79

I explain to such a person that patients have repeatedly told me how happy they were that the suicide attempt had not been successful; weeks, months, years later, they told me, it turned out that there was a solution to their problem, an answer to their question, a meaning to their 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.” -- Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, pg. 142, loc. 1732-37