“He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.” – Nietzsche
Above quote is the refrain of the entire book. Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning is considered as one of the most important books written in last century. For such a short book, it carries so much weight. This review can not do justice to what the author has gone through and how immense his contribution is to the millions around the world with his pioneering work. Viktor Frankl, a Jewish psychiatrist and neurologist, was interned in a number of concentration camps during World War II, including the infamous Auschwitz. His parents and young wife were also interned, though Frankl was the only member of his family who survived long enough to see freedom. Man’s Search for Meaning is, in part, a memoir of this period.
For a book with just 150 odd pages, what makes this book great is author’s perspective. One can only marvel at the way Frankl has integrated his own highly traumatic experiences with the analysis and understanding of the psychological dynamics of a concentration camps. The book opens with Frankl’s entry into Auschwitz. Those who are familiar with books on concentration camp can guess what follows next. Frankl and thousands of other prisoners are subjected to an endless process of degradation and dehumanization by the camp’s staff. All the inmates are stripped of their freedom, possessions, body hair and even their names. They are no longer recognized as human beings. They are merely numbers; just a primitive, naked form of existence. As Frankl’s hopes and illusions are cut down one by one, he starts reflecting on his situation.
I almost felt bewildered with Frankl’s sense of objective curiosity amidst the suffering and humiliation. Having been in a camp when matters of life and death was always hanging by a slender thread, he is gripped by a grim sense of humour. Instead of succumbing to hopelessness, Frankl starts making jokes. It’s more like a scientist observing an experiment with complete detachment from his pain. He finds it miraculous how his body managed to carry on despite being subjected to a perilous combination of exhaustion, starvation, forced labour, sleep deprivation, filth, and sub-zero weather. It is so intriguing to read Frankl’s description of psychological factors inside a camp.
The first section of the book deals with camp suffering and finally, Frankl’s liberation at the hands of American soldiers. The second half of the book talks about Frankl’s theory of Logotherapy. From the insights he developed in concentration camps, he offers a new model of the human psyche, which is in complete contrast to what Freud, Jung and Adler had to say. If Freud theorises that humans are driven by a will to pleasure then Adler talked about humans’ need to be driven by a will to power but Frankl emphasized upon “will to meaning”. He says,
“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..”
Frankl puts across his theory that though man is limited in many ways – biologically, socially, psychologically – but holds that his observations in German concentration camps provide evidence to “the unexpected extent to which man is capable of defying and braving even the worst conditions conceivable.” Many other accounts of concentration camps corroborate his experiences; tales of incredible kindness, strength, and integrity in the most horrific of environments.
There is so much one can gain from this book. It would take pages to jot down the learning one can distil from “Man’s search of meaning”. I will try to mention a few important ones, though each one of them deserves thorough description.
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It is an acceptance of the situation, with a solid future goal that makes life as bearable as it possibly could be.
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You may not have a choice in the experiences you encounter in life, but you have a choice in how you react to them.
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You are capable of doing much more than you think
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No man should judge unless he asks himself in absolute honesty whether in a similar situation he might not have done the same.
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A sense of humor can get you through tough times.
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You can resist your environment’s influence.
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Don’t make success your goal because you’ll never attain it.
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The salvation of man is through love and in love.
I will quote some wonderful passages from the book:-
“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 an I intended side effect of ones personal dedication to a cause greater than ones self or as a by-product of ones surrender to a person other than ones self”.
I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: 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 honourable way – in such a position man can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his beloved, achieve fulfillment.
“Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answers to its problems and to fulfill the tasks it constantly sets for each individual. These tasks, and therefore the meaning of life, differ from man to man, and from moment to moment to moment. Thus it is impossible to define the meaning of life in a general way.”
“…the damage to their inner selves was less. They were able to retreat from their terrible surroundings to a life of inner riches and spiritual freedom. Only in this way can one explain the apparent paradox that some prisoners of less hardy make-up often seemed to survive camp life better than did those of robust nature.”
“the generous and heroic actions of a minority offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing, the last of human freedoms, to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
What was really needed was a fundamental change in our attitude toward life. We had to learn ourselves and, furthermore, we had to teach the despairing men, that 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.
No man and no destiny can be compared with any other man or any other destiny.
The medical men among us learned first of all: “Textbooks tell lies!” Somewhere it is said that man cannot exist without sleep for more than a stated number of hours. Quite wrong! I had been convinced that there were certain things I just could not do: I could not sleep without this or I could not live with that or the other. The first night in Auschwitz we slept in beds which were constructed in tiers. On each tier (measuring about six-and-a-half to eight feet) slept nine men, directly on the boards. Two blankets were shared by each nine men.
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 human freedoms – to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s way.
You may not have a choice in your circumstances and environment. But you always have a choice in how you react to those imposed upon you.
If there is meaning in life at all, then there must be a meaning in suffering. Suffering is an ineradicable part of life, even as fate and death. Without suffering and death human life cannot be complete.
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 […] In this approach the phobic patient is invited to intend, even if only for a moment, precisely that which he fears.
“…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 a plaything of circumstance, renouncing freedom and dignity to become moulded into the form of a typical inmate.”
Man’s Search for Meaning is a great read for people who are looking to reflect upon the content and direction of their life. It is a book full of genuine positivity. Viktor Frankl provides so much hope that it’s impossible to not be uplifted by his story, and that of his view of our ability to rise above the situation and maintain our own humanity and meaning. And if you have a why for life you can weather any storm; what’s the why for your life? Book leaves me pondering, “What does my life mean to me?”
Happy Reading, folks. Cheers.