The Value of Usefulness ("Man's Search For Meaning" pt. 5)

How do we measure one's value? The systems of our society teach that value comes with success. Success, a word seeming always illusive as one strives for a better career, a bigger house, and more income. We then de-value that which cannot lead to success, causing us to look at those who cannot "produce" (the poor, children, the elderly, etc) as having less value.

In "Man's Search For Meaning" Frankl writes: "...usefulness is usually defined in terms of functioning for the benefit of society. 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."

We need to operate in such a way that preserves the dignity of all people, recognizing that regardless of age, social-economic status, or "success" level, they are intrinsically valuable. It is in the place of mutual respect and understanding for ones inherent value that we can spur one another on to a life of meaning.

The Case for a Tragic Optimism ("Man's Search For Meaning" pt. 4)

"Live as if you were living for the second time and had acted as wrongly the first time as you are about to act now."

-Victor Frankl "Man's Search for Meaning" (p.151)

Capable of Change ("Man's Search For Meaning" pt. 2)

There is always the hope that some how we can change as human beings, that we can become better people regardless of the circumstances that seek to oppress and limit our capabilities.

The hope here is not that we may become better people for our own good or benefit, but that our change might lead to the change we hope to see in this world. In "Man's Search For Meaning" Holocaust survivor Victor Frankl writes:

"...man is ultimately self determining. Man does not simply exist but always decides what his existence will be, what he will become in the next moment. By the same token, every human being has the freedom to change at any instant...one of the main features of human existence is the capacity to rise above such conditions, to grow beyond them. Man is capable of changing the world for the better if possible, and of changing himself for the better if necessary."

Unique Meaning ("Man's Search For Meaning" pt. 2)

As human beings we are on a continual search for puropse and "the meaning of life". Victor Frankl writes that in one's pursuit of an over-arching meaning of life on a grand scale, we miss the meaning that is found in the day to day, hour to hour.

"What matters, therefore, is not the meaning of life in general but rather the specific meaning of a person's life at a given moment...Everyone has his own specific vocation or mission in life to carry out a concrete assignment which demands fulfillment. Therein he cannot be replaced, nor can his life be repeated. Thus, everyone's task is as unique as is his specific opportunity to implement it."

When the fullness of what Frankl writes hits us, we will find great tragedy and loss with those who "wander" this life. For it is not merely "their loss", but ours...the community's loss of a unique contribution in which they were designed to make.

It becomes all of our responsibility to foster within our self, but even more, one another, the pursuit of that uniqueness, that in the discovery of that meaning "whole" might greatly benefit.

Meaning and Suffering ("Man's Search For Meaning" pt. 1)

"Man's Search For Meaning" is Victor Frankl's most notable published work. In the 1958 book Dr. Frankl recounts his experience lived out in the Nazi concentration camps from September 25, 1942-April 27, 1945. While there are several vivid stories of life (if one could call it that) in the concentration camp (stories of excruciating labor, humiliation, and beatings) the focus of the book is to point beyond the suffering in such a way as to find meaning.



Frankl writes on the use of suffering: "I consider it a dangerous misconception of mental hygiene to assume that what man needs in the first place is equilibrium or, as it is called in biology, 'homeostasis,' i.e., a tensionless state. What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for a worthwhile goal, a freely chosen task. What he needs is not the discharge of tension at any cost but the call of a potential meaning waiting to be fulfilled by him.



We are taught to avoid suffering at all costs...it is the American way. Yet is is the American pursuit of comfort and ease (pursuit of the "tensionless state") that does little to develop a greater sense of purpose within our own human existence. Although not always welcomed, it is through suffering, pressure, and trial that one's meaning can truly develop and strengthen.