30 Viktor Frankl quotes from his book Man's Search for Meaning
Viktor Frankl quotes are some of the most powerful quotes of all time. The Austrian neurologist and psychiatrist is also a well known Holocaust survivor. He is recorded to have survived the Theresienstadt, Auschwitz, Kaufering and Türkheim.
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Apart from his psychological prowess, Frankl was also the founder of the logotherapy method. He is best noted for his well-performing and best-selling book Man's Search for Meaning. It is from this book that he shares a lot of his thoughts as captured in popular Viktor E Frankl quotes. If you have seen any quotes by Viktor Frankl, you will appreciate that he was deep and very philosophical.
Inspiring Viktor Frankl Man's Search for Meaning quotes about life
These are some of the many Viktor E. Frankl quotes that will inspire anyone who reads them. If you have read the popular book, you are likely to identify with Man's Search for Meaning quotes, some of which will resonate with you deeply. Do you have a favorite Viktor Frankl quote that you can identify with? Either way, these Mans Search for Meaning quotes will make it possible for you to look at life differently.
- When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.
Only those who can adapt to situations that are unchangeable will get through the toughest life challenges.
- But today’s society is characterized by achievement orientation, and consequently, it adores people who are successful and happy and, in particular, it adores the young. It virtually ignores the value of all those who are otherwise, and in so doing blurs the decisive difference between being valuable in the sense of dignity and being valuable in the sense of usefulness.
Do not be fooled by the world standards of success just because those being appreciated are the few. Those being ignored are far more useful but have been sidelined by the systems in place. Learn to appreciate and value all people for their strengths.
- 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.
Even when everything else is taken away from you, at least you can keep a good attitude and thrive.
- When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.
Adjusting to situations around you is the secret to success.
- 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.
Even when situations force you to go back to a starting point, you have the choice to keep things sane. Make sure you are on top of things by responding positively no matter how bad things are.
- 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.
Your attitude should always be perfect and unshaken no matter what changes around you. Keeping a sane mindset is the secret to successful people.
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- Don't aim at success. The more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. 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 about it.
Your focus should not on being successful, but on becoming a better version of yourself. Let success be the result of your daily self-improvement.
- In some ways suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of a sacrifice.
The interpretation of hardship changes when you put a different meaning to it. This is what people should endeavor to do at all times.
- Those who have a 'why' to live, can bear with almost any 'how'.
If you have a reason to pursue life, then the means of doing it will always find its way to you.
- The one thing you can’t take away from me is the way I choose to respond to what you do to me. The last of one’s freedoms is to choose one’s attitude in any given circumstance.
A liberated mind is a mind that handles responses perfectly. People can take everything away from you, but not your ability to respond.
- 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.
Just because you cry does not mean that you are less courageous. Tears are an indication of how courageous you truly are.
- 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. It may remain brave, dignified and unselfish.......Here lies the chance for a man either to make use of or forgo the opportunities of attaining the moral values that a difficult situation may afford him. And this decides whether he is worthy of his sufferings or not.
How one handles the sufferings he endures in life defines who they truly are.
- What is to give light must endure burning.
What this implies is that all things with the potential to yield excellent results will definitely require someone to work extra hard.
- By declaring that man is responsible and must actualize the potential meaning of his life, 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.
We are urged to face life with the mindset of helping the entire world and quit focusing on specific individuals who may only lead you to be selfish.
- 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 fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual.
Viktor Frankl Man's Search for Meaning quotes on love and hurt
Source: UGC
The great psychologist is also known for his powerful views on love. This article captures some of Viktor Frankl quotes love that will make you think about this emotion.
- Love is the only way to grasp another human being in the innermost core of his personality. No one can become fully aware of the very essence of another human being unless he loves him. 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 believed that love is the only thing that can make a person show his real nature. You have to love another person to show your appreciation and sincere acceptance of them. Without such love, you can hardly see anything good in the person.
- 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.
Sometimes, the amount of suffering in the world can only be seen through experience. You can only appreciate the intensity of such suffering when you are in the place where the pain is being inflicted on others. However, coming out of such suffering depends on your attitude.
- If there is a 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
Just like life, suffering has a place in the world.
- For the first time in my life, I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers......, the truth - that Love is the ultimate and highest goal to which man can aspire. Then 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.
The world experiences a lot of pain through different circumstances. However, despite the pain and suffering, love is the solution to it all.
- Love goes very far beyond the physical person of the beloved. It finds its deepest meaning in his spiritual being, his inner self. Whether or not he is actually present, whether or not he is still alive at all, ceases somehow to be of importance.
The beauty of love is that it is not bound or stoppable. When it exists, it takes away all darkness and becomes everything any person truly needs.
- Suffering has the ability to consume a man wholly. No matter how little the suffering seems, it can consume the entire person and should not be taken for granted.
Everyone has the power to choose how best they want to respond to a situation.
- Ultimately, man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather 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.
You can try to seek life's meaning after you have understood your own life and taken responsibility for it all.
- At such a moment, it is not the physical pain that hurts the most (and this applies to adults as much as to punished children); it is the mental agony caused by the injustice, the unreasonableness of it all.
When in certain situations, the physical pain stops being the problem. The mental torture takes over, and that cannot be avoided. People of all ages go through it including children and the aged. That is where the real suffering lies.
- Love goes very far beyond the physical person of the beloved.
The power of love knows no limitations. It is not just about the physical person.
- As the struggle for survival has subsided, the question has emerged: survival for what? Evermore people have the means to live, but no meaning to live for.
The more people get the means to survive, the harder it becomes to find the meaning of life. Many wonder what is the reason for being alive because there is no pressure to survive.
- The central theme of existentialism: to live is to suffer, to survive is to find meaning in the suffering. If there is a purpose in life at all, there must be a purpose in suffering and a purpose in dying. But no man can tell another what this purpose is. Each must find out for himself, and must accept the responsibility that his answer prescribes.
Every phase and stage in life has a meaning that is deeper than we appreciate. It is important for every person to discover what this is and to fully embrace it.
- 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.
Sometimes, the amount of suffering in the world can only be seen through experience. You can only appreciate the intensity of such suffering when you are in the place where the pain is being inflicted on others. However, coming out of such suffering depends on your attitude.
Man's Search for Meaning quotes with page numbers
- Those who know how close the connection is between the state of mind of a man—his courage and hope, or lack of them—and the state of immunity of his body will understand that the sudden loss of hope and courage can have a deadly effect. The ultimate cause of my friend's death was that the expected liberation did not come and he was severely disappointed. This suddenly lowered his body's resistance against the latent typhus infection. The faith in the future and his will to live had become paralyzed and his body fell victim to illness—and thus the voice of his dream was right after all. — Page 84
A man is just as healthy as his state of mind, his courage, and hope. The lack of these elements makes a person sick. You are likely to suffer from a lower immunity if you are fearful and lack hope.
- This uniqueness and singleness which distinguishes each individual and gives a meaning to his existence have a bearing on creative work as much as it does on human love. 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 towards 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." — Page 87
Both men had talked about their intentions to commit suicide. ... uniqueness and singleness which distinguishes each individual and gives a meaning to his existence have a bearing on creative work as much as it does on human love. The impossibility of replacing a person is realized, it allows the responsibility.
- It is apparent that the near knowledge that a man was either a camp guard or prisoner tells us almost nothing. Human kindness can be found in all groups, even those which as a whole it would be easy to condemn. I remember how one day a foreman secretly gave me a piece of bread which I knew he must have saved from his breakfast ration. It was far more than the small piece of bread which moved me to tears at that time. — Page 93
Kindness differentiates a person from an animal. It does not matter what the situation is, or how hardened they are. As long as someone is kind, everything else does not matter.
The above Viktor Frankl quotes will inspire you. They cut across different subjects that may interest you. Even without reading the book, you can tell that he was a man who believed in the power of love for humanity. In all his sayings, he offered love as a solution to life's sufferings. His book is an encouragement to all those people who have lost hope and feel left out. Love conquers all and heals all forms of hurt, no matter how deep.
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