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Summary: A Book to Provoke, What is Your Life's Meaning?
Review: I wish I read this 20 years ago, it would have created a whole new perspective on my life. I won't repeat what many of the other fine reviewers have mentioned, but will add the following:According to Frankl, man's search for meaning is his primary motivation for life, not a secondary rationalization. Existential Vacuum, in today's Modern Society, we all have basic food, and shelter, we all can survive (thank goodness we don't have to endure what Frankl had to), we are all comfortable in our existence, and yet this comfort creates boredom, and therefore, our search for meaning is even more compounded. Thus is what Frankl refers to as existential vacuum, we exist today day to day, but do so in a vacuum of existence, until we know our meaning. Man should not ask what is the meaning of life, but rather BE asked. In response, man must answer in his responsible, to whom is he responsible to, to what, to whom? True meaning is discovered in the world, not within man himself. Seek out your experiences, the meaning is out there in the world, not within yourself. You cannot avoid untentional suffering, but you can change your attitude towards it, to give suffering a meaning to you. Live your life as though you were living it the second time. View life as a series of movie frames, the ending and meaning may not be apparent until the very end of the movie, and yet, each of the hundreds of individual frames has meaning within the context of the whole movie. View your life from your funeral, looking back at your life experiences, what have you accomplished? what would you have wanted to accomplish but didn't? what were the happy moments? what were the sad? what would you do again, and what you wouldn't? A must read for anyone searching for a deeper meaning in life. The book won't give you the meaning, only you can, but it will certainly help you get started.
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Summary: Weaving Meaning
Review: "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." (p. 123) My connection to Viktor Frankl dates back to a Hannukah party in which I found myself conversing with a baker who used to deliver his bread. It took me a few more years to discover this absolute gem of a book, itself both bread for the soul and leaven for the mind. The first half of this book consists of Frankl's reflection on his time in a Nazi concentration camp. "An abnormal reaction to an abnormal situation is normal behavior," (p. 18) he notices, "Yet it is possible to practice the art of living even in a concentration camp, although suffering is omnipresent." (p. 43) Distilling the essence of his experience at the hands of the Nazis and the resilience of his soul, he states, "If there is a meaning in life at all, then there must be a meaning in suffering." (p. 67) Finally, he notes 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." (p. 65) He segues into the second part of the book, a description of "logotherapy," based on the challenge learned behind barbed wire, downwind from the ovens "Whenever there was an opportunity for it, one had to give them a why--an aim--for their lives, in order to strengthen them to bear the terrible _how_ of their existence." (p. 76) Frankl states that "Man's search for meaning is a primary force in his life and not a 'secondary rationalization' of instinctual drives." (p. 99) He finds this meaning specific & unique to each individual. Logotherapy focuses on the future, the assignments and meanings to be fulfilled by the patient in _his_ future, breaking up the self-centeredness of the neurotic instead of fostering and reinforcing it. He believes that "the meaning of our existence is not invented by ourselves, but rather detected," (p. 101) that "_logos_, or 'meaning', is not only an emerging from existence itself but rather something confronting existence." (p. 100) This _logos_ frustrates by not being available to finite minds, but nevertheless continues to confront man. In wrestling with this confrontation, each individual enacts their "will to meaning," defining a "meaning of life [that] differs from man to man, from day to day and from hour to hour. What matters, therefore, is not the meaning of life in general but rather the specific meaning of a person's life at a given moment." (p. 110) Logotherapy sees responsibility as the very essence of human existence: "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." (p. 111) Thus, the "categorical imperative" of logotherapy is "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!" (p. 111) Beyond the philosophy of logotherapy, Frankl discusses technique briefly, addressing anticipatory anxiety, "it characteristic of this fear that it produces precisely that of which the patient is afraid." (p. 123) The mechanism for this is "hyper-intention," which, by focusing on the problem, magnifies the problem. He confronts this with "paradoxical intention," suggesting that the insomniac try to stay awake and that the phobic patient "intend, if only for a moment, precisely that which he fears." (p. 125) He concludes the book with "Our generation is realistic for we have come to know man as he really is. After all, man is that being who has invented the gas chambers of Auschwitz; however, he is also that being who has entered those gas chambers upright, with the Lord's Prayer or the Shema Yisrael on his lips." (p. 136) I find this short book incredibly full of life and meaning; it's one of the most powerful I've ever read. The act of creating a philosophy and psychology of life out of the horrors of Auschwitz confronts my own whinings about the discomforts I find in life. I find courage here, not just Dr. Frankl's courage, but an inspiration to my own courage, and a challenge to live more fully, to create more meaning, instead of simply accepting the meanings thrust upon me by TV sitcoms, billboards, and internet banality. The epitome of a five star book. Worthy of more if Amazon would allow it. (If you'd like to dialogue about this book, please click on the "about me" link & drop me an email. Thanks!)
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Summary: A Powerful Inspiration of Life
Review: This is a great book written by the worlds greatest psychiatrist since Sigmund Freud... Frankl, Victor E. (1905-1997), Austrian psychotherapist, who developed the concept of logotherapy, Ph.D Pyschology, M.D Neurology 29 honorary doctorates He explains his experiences in concentration camps and how he was imprisoned for being Jewish by the Nazis, he helped many through the difficult times regardless of his own suffering. Victor explains how everything can be taken from a man except his own will. He explains his founded logotherapy, the simplest and most effective working therapy yet invented. Logotherapy can be self-inflicted and improve anyone's life. it can provide confidence in how you percieve and look at life. Learn as I have how life is something very beautiful, very precious. One can be overwhelmed by the greatest of depression only to find a new powerful evolved understanding of themselves bringing a peace of mind. Man's Search for Meaning has inspired and helped many to find it within themselves to become great doctors. I can almost promise anyone's heart would be warmed and nurtured as mine has by this amazing book.
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Summary: Profound and Inspiring
Review: This book is full of philosophical insights. Based on the author's experiences in German concentration camps during the second world war, Viktor Frankl gives the reader a greater understanding of happiness in life by showing how people can find meaning not only through love and serving others, but even through hardship and suffering. He mentions how although the majority of people in the camps became depressed and bitter because of their trials, there were others who preserved a spark of hope by turning their focus of attention outward. This is an inspiring book full of valuable lessons.
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Summary: From the author of The Spirit of Joy
Review: Victor's writing in Man's Search for Meaning helped me make one of the most important realizations of my life, one that would ultimately change its course and my experience of it. It brought home, with certainty, the notion that in life, it is not what happens to you that matters most, but how you respond to it. Watching Victor discover and live that in a concentration camp is a story not to be missed. It is, in part, because of this book, and my commitment to live the ideas in it, that I now run my own wellness center and have authored of The Spirit of Joy, an intimate story of spiritual awakening.
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Summary: Beyond Subtitles
Review: I have an natural aversion to psychology books. I was recommended this book and when I first time I picked up I made it to the title page and lost interest after seeing the subtitle: an introduction to logotherapy. A while late the book was again recommended to me, this time by another person, and I became determined to read past the subtitle. Although this is "An introduction to Logotherapy" the implications of this book are much more profound then simply a psychology text-book or a do-it-yourself self-help book. This book does not play the part of creating a sugared life, denying that real struggles, real trials, and real pain do exist. But in acknowledging suffering, this book does not attach meaninglessness to life, which is so easy to do when a person does profoundly suffer. Instead Frankl asserts a beauty to life that is inclusive of both suffering and meaning. In one of the many beautiful passages in the book, Frankl states that, "What is demanded of man is not, as some existential philosophers teach, to endure the meaninglessness of life; but rather to bear his incapacity to grasp its unconditional meaningfulness in rational terms." This book manages to transcend psychology and the usual "self-help" books to express in sincere and honest terms that life is worth living. Regardless.
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Summary: Powerful spiritually, emotionally and therapuetically
Review: I have used this book in all 3 ways, spiritually, emotionally and in my therapy practice. Spiritually the existential philosophy is made practical and relateable to the real world. He has taken the essence of existentialism without the dark brooding arrogance of the modern day philosopher to seperate from the ideas. Emotionally, Frankl faced horrors we can never know and remained a caring man. He blazed a path for others to follow by finding a purpose to live for and accepting both responsiblity AND freedom of choice in all situations. In therapy, I found Frankls ideas useful when my client is overwhelmed with the question of "why?" Frankls lessons have led me to ask the return question "how will you respond in the face of this, even if you never know why?" His book is about philosophy applied to tradgey and the human spirit. I highly recommmend it.
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Summary: Small book, big impact
Review: My copy of Viktor E. Frankl's book is dog-eared through constant re-reading. Never has such a short book had such a long-reaching effect on my life. The story of his survival against formidable odds in Nazi concentration camps may be compared with other great survival stories and stories of people with extraordnary handicaps who make their lives a resounding success. I never understood how they did it. And now I know and I feel inspired because I know. They gave their lives meaning, and worked on that every waking moment. Some aspects of logotherapy do, as one reviewer notes, sound a bit like reverse psychology. But if it works, who cares about the label? I'm cynical about self-help books and self-styled gurus but Dr Frankl and his book don't even belong in that genre. The Los Angles Times is right: "If you read but one book this year, Dr Frankl's book should be that one".
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Summary: A God-send
Review: This is an awesome book, written by a survivor of Auschwitz death camp in Nazi Germany, and a man who is surely one of the most gifted and insightful psychiatrists who has lived. Indeed, a psychiatrist who has personally faced such extremity, is a psychiatrist worth listening to. Frankl is a man of faith, and he explains that there exists a deep, spiritual core within each of us which cannot be crushed or taken away from us - no matter how grim or awful our external circumstances may be. He says that from the soul's reckoning, tragedy can be the greatest opportunity for triumph. While in the camp, even though Frankl had no idea how many hours, days or years he had left to live, he realised that during the moment now, he had a choice whether to be free, or whether to be imprisoned. That is, to be free in his spirit. During his experience in Auschwitz, Frankl literally found himself on the bottom line, and from there, he made the most amazing discovery of all. He discovered the truth of his own spiritual awakening. The most effective way I can convey the Frankl's message, and the profundity of his work, is to share some quotes from the book itself. Frankl says... "The way in which a man accepts his fate and all the suffering it entails, the way in which he takes up his cross, gives him ample opportunity - even under the most difficult circumstances - to add a deeper meaning to his life." ... "One of the main features of human existence is the capacity to rise above such conditions, to grow beyond them." ... "Often it is just such an exceptionally difficult external situation which gives man the opportunity to grow spiritually beyond himself. ... To be sure, a human being is a finite thing, and his freedom is restricted. It is not freedom from conditions, but it is freedom to take stand toward the conditions." ... "Even the helpless victim of a hopeless situation, facing a fate he cannot change, may rise above himself, may grow beyond himself, and by doing so change himself. He may turn a personal tragedy into a triumph." Frankl closes the book with a profound, bedrock refutation against Sigmund Freud's theory, and also against materialists' theories that human beings are 'conditioned' by their external surroundings. He quotes Freud, who had asserted, "Let one attempt to expose a number of the most diverse people uniformly to hunger. With the increase of the imperative urge of hunger, all individual differences will blur, and in their stead will appear the uniform expression of the one unstilled urge." Frankl replies, "Thank heaven, Sigmund Freud was spared knowing the concentration camps from the inside. His subjects lay on a couch designed in the plush style of Victorian culture, not in the filth of Auschwitz. There, the 'individual differences' did not 'blur' but, on the contrary, people became more different: people unmasked themselves, both the swine and saints. ... We may predict the movements of a machine, of an automation; more than this, we may even try to predict the mechanisms of the human psyche as well. But man is more than psyche." Frankl's conclusions are profound: "The self transcendence of human existence ... denotes the fact that being human always points, and is directed, to something, or Someone, other than oneself." Overall, this is an extraordinarily profound and unique book which, at times, proves quite heavy and difficult to digest, but once one gets in tune with the author's message, then its truth and light becomes fully clear, apparent and undeniable. Certainly not a light read, yet highly recommended.
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Summary: The most important book I've ever read
Review: Of the many thousands of books I have read this is the most important. Frankl survived Auschwitz and derived meaning from the experience. Can we do any less in the face of our own small problems? The book, to a large degree, is based on a quote from Friedrich Nietzsche, "He who has a why to live can bear with almost any how." It's true, and Frankl's life proves it. Frankl doesn't provide a road map for finding the meaning in every experience. He does something better. He asks us to ask ourselves what our experiences mean. We already know, if only we will stop to think. My favorite example is that of a man who greaves the loss of his wife. Frankl asks him why he greaves. The man answers that he greaves because he loved his wife. Frankl asks him, "Isn't that a good thing?" A light goes on in the man's mind, he nods, and gets up and leaves. Frankl's book can make a light go on in all of our minds. All we have to do is spend a couple of hours reading this wonderful book.
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