If we take a man as he is, we make him worse, but if we take man as he should be we make him capable of becoming what he can be.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLIf we take a man as he is, we make him worse, but if we take man as he should be we make him capable of becoming what he can be.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLIf there is meaning in life at all, then there must be meaning in suffering.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLMan’s search for meaning is the chief motivation of his life.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLA man who could not see the end of his”provisional existence” was not able to aim at an ultimate goal in life.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLMan can only find meaning for his existence in something outside himself.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLThe meaning of our existence is not invented by ourselves, but rather detected.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLOur generation is realistic, for we have come to know man as he really is. 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. FRANKLLove goes very far beyond the physical person of the beloved. It finds its deepest meaning in its 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.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLWe cannot, after all, judge a biography by its length, by the number of pages in it; we must judge by the richness of the contents…Sometimes the ‘unfinisheds’ are among the most beautiful symphonies.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLThe salvation of man is through love and in love.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLIt isn’t the past which holds us back, it’s the future; and how we undermine it, today.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLThe last freedom is choosing your attitude.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLIt is here that we encounter the central theme of existentialism: to live is to suffer, to survive is to find meaning in the suffering.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLHaving been is also a kind of being, and perhaps the surest kind.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLI do the unpleasant tasks before I do the pleasant ones.
VIKTOR E. FRANKLWhen we are no longer able to change a situation – we are challenged to change ourselves.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL