Viktor Frankl, Seeker of Meaning

Even in his school years, he became interested in the question of the meaning of human life; having received the specialty of a psychiatrist, he began to develop methods that allow people to cope with the loss of the meaning of life, which leads to neurosis, psychosis, suicide, alcoholism and drug addiction. During the Second World War, he shared the fate of millions of European Jews, spending three and a half years in Nazi concentration camps. He not only survived, but within six years after his release, he published about 10 books in which he developed the doctrine of the pursuit of meaning as the main driving force of human life. The experience of the concentration camp showed that the greatest chances of survival were not those who were distinguished by good health, but those who had something to live for.

Since the 1960s, Frankl’s teaching, which he called “logotherapy”, has been gaining worldwide fame. His books, translated into dozens of languages, were published in millions of copies, and public lectures sometimes gathered thousands of listeners (I once witnessed this myself). I had the good fortune to get to know this amazing man, correspond with him, translate his books and speeches when he visited Moscow in 1986 and 1992. The inextinguishable inner light, the crystal clearness and precision of his thoughts and their verbal expression were combined in him with amazing attentiveness to the people around him.

Five keys to understanding

Man is multidimensional

“Man is more than a psyche; man is spirit. In addition to our biological nature, embodied in our body, and the mental organization, embodied in our psyche, a person has another dimension of existence – spiritual, or semantic. This is what distinguishes man from other beings. It is at this level, opening up to the world of meanings, that we are able to overcome those limitations and rigid causal relationships that are found at lower levels.

Man strives for meaning

“Human existence is always oriented outward, towards something or someone – towards a meaning that needs to be fulfilled, or towards another person to whom we are drawn with love.” We don’t construct meanings in our heads, we find them in the world. Finding meaning is “the perception of possibility against the backdrop of reality.”

Man is free

“Necessity and freedom are not localized on the same level; freedom rises, built on top of any necessity. Freedom is not absolute, it does not abolish determinism, but it adds a new dimension, allowing different attitudes towards what cannot be avoided. In particular, Frankl says that a person is free in relation to his drives, heredity, as well as the influences of the social and domestic environment.

The person is responsible

“One cannot recognize a person as free without recognizing him at the same time as responsible.” First of all, we are responsible for finding and realizing our unique meaning and values. Conscience is our “organ of meaning”, it is to it that we are responsible for our actions. But the religious man goes one step further; for him, conscience is a direct way of communicating with God, before whom, in the end, he will have to answer for his life.

Meaning can always be found

“Meaning is in principle available to any person, regardless of gender, age, intelligence, education, character, environment and religious beliefs.” Although meaning is unique for each person and in each situation, there are generalized values ​​- a kind of typical variants of meaning. Frankl distinguishes three of their types: creativity values ​​(creation, bringing something into the world); experience values ​​(getting something from the world, such as love or aesthetic impressions); attitude values ​​(change of attitude towards what we cannot change). These three search paths make it possible to find meaning even in the most hopeless situation, such as in a concentration camp – Frankl’s life experience and clinical practice have provided many confirmations of this.