Quotes from Viktor E. Frankl

Even if things only take such a good turn in one of a thousand cases, my explanation continues, who can guarantee that in your case it will not happen one day, sooner or later? But in the first place, you have to live to see the day on which it may happen, so you have to survive in order to see that day dawn, and from now on the responsibility for survival does not leave you.

It was in the nature of this sacrifice that it should appear to be pointless in the normal world, the world of material success.

must never forget that we may also find meaning in life even when confronted with a hopeless situation, when facing a fate that cannot be changed. For what

human potential which at its best always allows for: (1) turning suffering into a human achievement and accomplishment; (2) deriving from guilt the opportunity to change oneself for the better; and (3) deriving from life's transitoriness an incentive to take responsible action.

most men in a concentration camp believed that the real opportunities of life had passed. Yet, in reality, there was an opportunity and a challenge. One could make a victory of those experiences, turning life into an inner triumph, or one could ignore the challenge and simply vegetate, as did a majority of the prisoners.

What is demanded of man is not, as some existential philosophers teach, to endure the meaninglessness of life, but rather to bear his incapacity to grasp its unconditional meaningfulness

Forces beyond your control can take away everything you possess except one thing, your freedom to choose how you will respond to the situation. You cannot control what happens to you in life, but you can always control what you will feel and do about what happens to you. There is a scene

The salvation of man is through love and in love. I

meaning is possible even in spite of suffering—provided, certainly, that the suffering is unavoidable.

In actual fact, boredom is now causing, and certainly bringing to psychiatrists, more problems to solve than distress.

love goes far beyond the physical person of the beloved. it finds its deepest meaning in his spiritual being, his inner self

Thus it can be seen that mental health is based on a certain degree of tension, the tension between what one has already achieved and what one still ought to accomplish, or the gap between what one is and what one should become. Such