BOOK REVIEW
Man’s Search For Meaning
Intro. Man’s Search For Meaning is a work of non-fiction that deals with Viktor Frankel’s experience living in Nazi concentration camps, as well as his psychotherapeutic technique called logo therapy.
Aim. To illustrate the book, Man’s Search For Meaning
SEQ
About the Author
About the Book
Review of the Book
Recommendations
About the Author. Viktor Frankel grew up in Vienna. He was a medical student and a neurologist. In 1938, during the German occupation of Austria, Nazi leaders forbid Frankel, a Jew, from seeing non-Jewish patients. Two years later, Frankel became the head of the neurological department at the Jewish Rothschild Hospital. In 1942, Frankel, his wife Tilly, and Frankel’s parents were arrested and sent to Nazi concentration camps. Frankel’s wife and parents died in the camps, but Frankel survived three years in four camps, after which he wrote many books and served as a professor at a number of universities. He is best known for his book Man’s Search for Meaning, and for developing the fields of logo therapy. Frankel remarried several years after his liberation and had one daughter. He died of heart failure at the age of 92.
About The Book. Frankel’s book is set during and in the immediate aftermath of World War II. During this war, which lasted from 1939 to 1945, Hitler killed six million Jews and five million other “undesirables,” including Roman people and the mentally disabled. Victims were usually taken prisoner and sent to concentration camps (like the ones Frankel experienced), where they were either killed or made to work in starvation conditions. This systematic genocide, known as the Holocaust, was the product of Hitler’s desire to create a pure “Aryan” race that would rule the world. Frankel introduces psychological theory, Logo therapy, which focuses on childhood events, and subconscious drives. Frankel’s logo therapy is based in the philosophical idea of existentialism, which holds that freedom is the most important value in life, and that one must create one’s own meaning in a fundamentally meaningless world.
Review of the Book. The core of Frankel’s philosophy is that a man’s deepest desire is to find meaning in his life, and if he can find that meaning, he can survive anything. Frankel found meaning in his experiences in the concentration camp by deciding that he was going to use his suffering as an opportunity to make himself a better person. Instead of becoming apathetic and accepting that he was doomed, he chose to embrace his suffering. According to Frankel, while a man’s destiny in life is certainly affected by the circumstances in which he finds himself, he is ultimately free to choose his own path in life. Even in the worst situation possible, man always has the freedom to choose his attitude towards life. Frankel claims that there are three ways to find meaning in life: through work, through love, and through suffering. Frankel kept his will to meaning—or his desire to live a meaningful life—alive through his three years in the camps by focusing on the potential meanings he could create for himself.
Recommendations. No matter what has happened in the past, remember that you always have the power to create change for the better. Staying optimistic throughout Recovery is incredibly important because it can help you stay on track to your goals and attract like-minded people. To stay optimistic, one must read this book to make his life as meaningful as it suggests in Its core of theme.
Summing Up. In the end, Frankel says if a man cannot find the meaning or purpose in his life, he can develop mental problems that need to be addressed. Every human has the capacity to change his behavior and attitude in every possible situation. Everyone should strive to be in a state of biodynamics, in which there is a tension between what one has already done and what one hopes to accomplish. Ultimately, Logo therapy seeks to help its patients develop goals—whether they be getting rid of a phobia or surviving a horrible situation—and finding ways to meaningfully accomplish them.
Lesson Learned. The lessons learned from the book are given below:
Don’t judge yourself.
Take ownership of your behavior.
Become a problem-solver.
Don’t label yourself.
Use daily positive affirmations.
Talk yourself out of guilt.
Learn from the past.
Live your present
You must be logged in to post a comment.