Man's search for meaning

Not sure how many of you out there have read Frankl’s “Man’s search for meaning,” but I just finished reading it for the first time and it is a fascinating insight. To be under such an environment without any possessions, dignity, and minimal hope with such overbearing alterations really encourages some insight into the human condition. Relating meaning was essential to what kept so many alive during that time draws out a level of introspection for what we ourselves find meaning in.

As for logotherapy, I find that encouraging meaning can have a therapeutic effect. Of course it is not a panacea although it seems it would be of use to evaluate what we hold meaning in from time to time.

Meaning though perhaps an illusion can be an important survival tool as people like Nietzsche saw. I have not read the book. What was the most interesting part of the book for you?

If you are into Nietzsche, then you would probably find the book of interest because Frankyl quotes Nietzsche as being one of his significant influences and quotes Nietzsche throughout the book.

As for my interest in the book, I read the entire thing in one setting. It is not a very large read with just about 179 pages. The book itself is divided into two portions: the first portion regarding Frankyl’s experience in Nazi death camps and how he evaluated the experience on a philosophical and psychological level. This portion, to me, was rather gripping. This guy (and those around him) had literally nothing except his bare existence and even that was in question. It really is a horrible and gruesome tale, but it is probably the greatest depiction of meaning I have come across in awhile. To see how one responds to the seperation of virtually everything on a philosophical and psychological level really brings into focus the meanings we hold ourselves.
The second part of the book is regarding logotherapy which is a form of existential psychotherapy related to encourage meaning in your life to accept (not “overcome”) adversity. Adversity is inevitable to Frankl. It is a part of life that can be dealt with through meaning. Meaning, according to Frankl, was the primary force to carry people through the nazi death camps and Frankyl noted that they could observe very accurately those who gave up on meaning in their life because they would die shortly thereafter based upon exhibited behavior. He makes a very strong case for this based upon empirical points.

Great book not only for it’s philosophical and psychological application, but insightful in a historical sense as well.

Hey Enigma…Man’s Search for Meaning is one of my favorites too.

Sup Marshall…

This might be relevant to the question of what exactly Frankl’s view of meaning entails–I posted it a while back.

Hey, thanks for the insights logo. It really is a fascinating book. Always nice to encounter a work of literature that absorbs you as much as this one did for me. I literally could not put the book down. I read a lot, but this was one of the few books I read in which I found so great of pleasure seeking out.

One can really draw a lot from this book and the way it was formulated really left it to be something to be acceptable by all type of readers regardless of your philosophical preference. Frankl takes the reader to the lowest point a human being could possibly be taken to, reflects upon it, survives it, and encorporates the experience into something relative to everyone. Worth the read and draws light to how we consider meaning.

Enigma. I’ll have to check that book out.

Logo. what’s up dawg. Interesting post, the myth of sysiphus remains one of the great philosophical essays of our time.

So basically one can create meaning through 1.) work 2.) by experiencing something or encountering someone. It seems to me that love is only a subset of , although admittedly a very important part of these experiences.
3.) the attitude towards unavoidable suffering. this seems to me to come close to the tragic sense of existence. Camus (who incidentally once ran a theater) was profoundly interested in the tragic in his plays. The tragic has at times been a veritable fount of meaning in my own life as well as work and experience.

Totally. What is it to “enable the self creation of the other” if not work?

But I think love becomes unique when it is rewarded by the reciprocal affirmation of the other. Love, when it is unappreciated, is toil that makes Sysiphus’ situation look like a damn walk on the beach. But when you experience a sense of BEING loved…well I think the conviction, “life has meaning” is internal to that experience–which puts love in a class all by itself.

Frankl calls it “tragic optimism.” Our absurd (but awesome) ability to hope in the face of sheer despair.

…but yeah. Definitely read the book. You seem like the kind of guy who would eat it up.

Logo wrote:

But how does that sense develop? When someone loves you? I doubt whether that is the case. For take note, a person may be loved but lack the sense of being loved or feeling loved, right? Also notice that in order to feel love comming from the person they love they do not even need be alive. So what is it then that gives us this feeling of being loved? Is it not when we love. The sense of being loved therefore depends on no one external rather it is an internal by-product of loving someone else.

What do you think?

Well you don’t have that sense–or at least you don’t really appreciate it–unless you love the other to begin with. But as I said, unrequited love is hell. Unless you have the conviction (rightly or wrongly) that the other loves you, and unless you return that love, I don’t think that love can really create meaning.

That’s really cool eh? Frankl’s phrase, “when we are no longer able to change a situation…we are challenged to change ourselves.”

To me that means that we recreate our identity, one we can identify with now regarding our present situation. This way since we would now identify with our situation, we would find it bearable as in the case of the holocaust victims. But I don’t think that we would still find meaning from our situation or activities though. The new identity would help us get through our changed circumstances, but to find meaning from those circumstances, how? How can we find meaning from circumstances that our original identity did not even identify with and because of which we had to recreate ourselves and form a new identity. Frankl has to be wrong. Sorry! I mean you can create a new identity when undergoing adverse circumstances but you cannot find meaning from those circumstances or you would not have needed to recreate yourself in the first place. Look I never read that book so read it in that context, I was only responding to the posts above. Ok?

To me meaning in life can ONLY come, when our actions and feelings are reciprocated by another so we feel loved, needed, desired, admired, liked, etc. When we see that, that’s when life has meaning in our eyes, otherwise not. Anything that happened in the Holocaust for example, how can one find meaning from that? One can’t. That’s a fact I know, you tell me otherwise, you’ have to be in denial.

Now, a person can call that movie about the Holocaust, “Life is beautiful” about which there was a lot of controversy as to why he titled it that way. Now people can deceive themselves and say oh! But we can still find moments of joy and stuff and that’s why. But the fact is that life was NOT BEAUTIFUL in the nazi death camps for the simple reason one would not CHOOSE to live a life like that, given a choice. But if something gives meaning to life, yes, we would all make that choice again and again and again! So, what Frankl says in my view is wrong. But then I never read the book, just what is here so read in that context please!

I highly recommend the book and it isn’t something that can be conveyed in just a few short paragraphs. The essence of the point is really gather by reading the entire book. It’s real easy to say something is “wrong” if you do not have the entire context. I think you are depriving yourself of some very profound insights if you are hasty to draw conclusions before absorbing the entire scope.

However, from my viewpoint, I don’t see meaning as being something entirely static and unchanging. Meaning, at least portions of it in my opinion, is fluid and always evolving . Meaning is altered with experience and it is up to us to alter what we can externally to adapt to our meaning or, if that isn’t feasible depending on our limitations, adapt our meaning to the external.
Meaning goes both ways. And I don’t think Frankl claims that we have to scrap our entire identity and start from scratch whenever we encounter unalterable external barriers, but there are cases in which we have to adapt and alter our perspectives somewhat throughout life to carry on. We have to adapt.

We are just scratching the surface on this thread. A friend of mine and I just had great conversation about this book last weekend. The only way you are truly going to grasp the entire concept is to read the book. I have never really heard anything negative regarding the text from anyone who has read it. It’s one of those books that ring in your mind for quite some time.

I wasn’t trying to put the book down when I haven’t even read it, just disagreeing with some concepts in it like man’s inherent need to find meaning. I meant to say that man is forced to find meaning in adverse circumstances and so he re-creates himself with a new identity that can identify with the present situation because the previous identity does not. And so I was saying that, where you are forced to find meaning to make life bearable, this meaning cannot mean much, it is only there to see you through the hard times. Man’s real search for meaning will always be under normal circumstances because then he is not forced to find meaning but just desires so. Whatever…

Again, read the book. I think you completely miss the mark as would be expected regarding someone who is attempting to give insight on something that they are not thoroughly familiar with.

I think anyone who has actually read the book and see someone declare that the meaning Frankl came away with from his concentration camp experience “cannot mean much” could not take such criticism seriously. The meaning derived from that experience is the essence of the book and is quite profound. Frankl’s claim is that man’s search for meaning thrives in all circumstances and not just “normal circumstances” as you seem to be implying (whatever those are).

Please, read the book, and then come back and declare the same criticism. I doubt that you can.

Look, nowhere am I saying that man’s search for meaning does not “thrive in all circumstances.” It has to thrive at all times, that’s why you are able to create a new identity when faced with adverse circumstances, and thus find meaning even in those unbearable times to live through them. All I was emphasizing was, that the meaning we create from adversity cannot become the meaning of life or in other words, (man’s search for) REAL meaning in life.

And nowhere am I suggesting that Frankl’s experience in the camp cannot mean much, don’t re-phrase wrongly, ok? Now you started talking about experience? When we were talking about finding meaning to be able to survive? His finding meaning to survive and his experience are two different things, you are confusing the two, not me.

And I’m not trying to give insight into the book anywhere, I’m saying everywhere that I never read the book and so read everything in that context, alright? YOU are the one assuming that I’m assuming to have read the book.

Do you think that maybe, just maybe, that residing in a concentration camp and witnessing torture and death on a constant basis might be just a tad adverse?

From this adversity, Frankl created profound and REAL meaning. In fact, there is an entire book and field of study entitled “logotherapy” about the meaning derived from this adversity.

So please, carry on with how “REAL” meaning could never be obtained from adversity especially in light of discussing Frankl.

I supposed Beenajain means ultimate meaning. Universal opposed to personal. Frankl himself in the book wrote that he doesn’t know the awnser or thinks anyone else does.

Yes, that’s what I mean, the meaning of life - you can’t find it through an adverse circumstance because in that situation you are FORCED to find meaning in life to make your life bearable.

Enigma, can you let me know what you think of the following?
This book “men are from mars and women are from venus” is alluring but deceiving. This book will create stereotypes regarding men and women in the aeons to come. In my view, it will do UNTOLD DAMAGE by creating a wrong answer to a communication problem, when the real answer is, love. If there is not enough from both sides anymore, communication problems set in, and these problems have nothing to do with, “men are from mars and women are from venus” because we are all from a planet called EARTH. Ask yourself this question, why aren’t there communication problems when there is untold love from both sides, they should still be there if they have nothing to do with love. We are a product of genes and environment.This is a well established fact. And since, genes can come from mom or dad (male or female) and either can be dominant or recessive in either child, so, what the above book says cannot be true that “men are from mars and women are from venus” and that proper communication can help resolve relationship issues, when the basic problem is diminished love. People don’t seem to understand that love is a CONSTANT in our life. As soon as we have children, our love is divided and so love for our spouse diminishes. And it’s better this way because “change is the law of nature.” Would you rather have it the other way that one spouse start to love someone else more instead? So, life provides a balance and is fair in a sense that it introduces us all to the different facets of love and life. We should all embrace that beauty. In essence, there are shy guys, there are shy girls, there are bad guys and bad girls, some guys are this way, some girls are this way, it’s all essentially both ways and by both, girls and guys. That’s what I think.But this does not mean that we should create stereotypes like Gray does in his book and this also does not mean that we not be allowed to express our views. Expression in any form should be allowed so long as it is not imposed forcefully on anyone. So if the book circulates, that’s wonderful, but I don’t believe what it says.

Ah, so now we are talking about the “ultimate meaning to life?” :confused:

Ok, you win. Mea culpa. Man can find the “ultimate meaning to life” in normal situations as opposed to adverse ones. Happy?

Perhaps one of Frankls greatest insights can be found in this exerpt.

“Even the helpless victum of a hopeless situation, facing a fate he cannot change, may rise above himself, may grow beyond himself, and by so doing change himself.” -Frankl pg. 170.

“To become aware of what can be done about a givin situation.” -Is the way one may find personal meaning and turn personal tragedy into triumph.

However also note this:

“The deeper the experience of an absence of meaning – in other words, of absurdity --the more energetically meaning is sought.” --Vaclav Havel