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As the struggle for survival has subsided, the question has emerged: survival for what? Ever more people have the means to live, but no meaning to live for.

Viktor E. Frankl

The attempt to develop a sense of humor and to see things in a humorous light is some kind of a trick learned while mastering the art of living.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Art Develop Humorous Light
Fundamentally, therefore, any man can, even under such circumstances, decide what shall become of him-mentally and spiritually. He may retain his human dignity even in a concentration camp.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Dignity May Men Mentality Spiritual
Live as if you were living a second time, and as though you had acted wrongly the first time.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Chance Life Second Time
The one thing you can’t take away from me is the way I choose to respond to what you do to me.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Away Choose One Thing Way
A man’s concern, even his despair, over the worthwhileness of life is an existential distress but by no means a mental disease.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Despair Disease Mean Men
A man who becomes conscious of the responsibility he bears toward 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.”
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Life Men Responsibility
Thus, human existence-at least as long as it has not been neurotically distorted-is always directed to something, or someone, other than itself, be it a meaning to fulfill or another human being to encounter lovingly.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Encounters Existential Human Long
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.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Attitude Learning Life
For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one’s surrender to a person other than oneself.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Causes Dedication Happiness
Happiness must ensue. It cannot be pursued
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Ensues Happiness Pursued
Life is not primarily a quest for pleasure, as Freud believed, or a quest for power, as Alfred Adler taught, but a quest for meaning. The greatest task for any person is to find meaning in his or her own life.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Believe Greatest Quests Task Taught
It is this spiritual freedom – which cannot be taken away – that makes life meaningful and purposeful.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Meaningful Spiritual Taken
I recommend that the Statue of Liberty be supplemented by a Statue of Responsibility on the west coast.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Liberty Responsibility West
It isn’t the past which holds us back, it’s the future; and how we undermine it, today.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Future Past Today Undermine
Man’s main concern is not to gain pleasure or to avoid pain but rather to see a meaning in his life.
VIKTOR E. FRANKL

Detect Gains Men Pain
Love 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. FRANKL

Alive Deepest Meaning Self Spiritual

As the struggle for survival has subsided, the question has emerged: survival for what? Ever more people have the means to live, but no meaning to live for.

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As the struggle for survival has subsided, the question has emerged: survival for what? Ever more people have the means to live, but no meaning to live for.

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Popular Authors

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