Quotes from Viktor E. Frankl

We are never left with nothing as long as we retain the freedom to choose how we will respond.

There was no need to be ashamed of tears, for tears bore witness that a man had the greatest of courage, the courage to suffer.

Now we can understand Schopenhauer when he said that mankind was apparently doomed to vacillate eternally between the two extremes of distress and boredom. In actual fact, boredom is now causing, and certainly bringing to psychiatrists, more problems to solve than distress.

Meaning is missing in the world as described by many a science. This, however, does not imply that the world is void of meaning but only that many a science is blind to it. Meaning is scotomized by many a science.

Logos is a Greek word which denotes meaning.

Yes, a man can get used to anything, but do not ask us how.

To put it figuratively, the role played by a logotherapist is that of an eye specialist rather than that of a painter. A painter tries to convey to us a picture of the world as he sees it; an ophthalmologist tries to enable us to see the world as it really is. The logotherapist's role consists of widening and broadening the visual field of the patient so that the whole spectrum of potential meaning becomes conscious and visible to him.

More and more I felt that she was present, that she was with me; I had the feeling that I was able to touch her, able to stretch out my hand and grasp hers. The feeling was very strong: she was there. Then, at that very moment, a bird flew down silently and perched just in front of me, on the heap of soil which I had dug up from the ditch, and looked steadily at me.

Is it not conceivable that there is still another dimension, a world beyond man's world; a world in which the question of an ultimate meaning of human suffering would find an answer?

Man's search for meaning is the chief motivation of his life.

The grasping of another person in his uniqueness means loving him[.]

This uniqueness and singleness which distinguishes each individual and gives a meaning to his existence has a bearing on creative work as much as it does on human love. When the impossibility of replacing a person is realized, it allows the responsibility which a man has for his existence and its continuance to appear in all its magnitude.