"everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way."
This is the quote that starts Viktor Frankl's book, Man's Search For Meaning. I had heard of the book through the years but ultimately it was a podcast with Tim Ferriss interviewing Jacqueline Novogratz that ultimately got me to make the purchase and start reading.
Through the book, Frankl discusses his experiences as a prisoner in the Auschwitz concentration camp and how it further informed the work that he had begun which would later become logotherapy. He declares that "there are three main avenues on which one arrives at meaning in life. The first is by creating a work or by doing a deed. The second is by experiencing something or encountering someone; in other words, meaning can be found not only in work but also in love... experiencing can be as valuable as achieving is therapeutic because it compensates for our one-sided emphasis on the external world of achievement at the expense of the internal world of experience. Most important, however, is the third avenue to meaning in life: even the helpless victim of a hopeless situation, facing a fate he cannot change, may rise above himself, may grow beyond himself, and by so doing change himself. He may turn a personal tragedy into a triumph."
And how does a human being go about finding meaning? As Charlotte Bühler has stated: “All we can do is study the lives of people who seem to have found their answers to the questions of what ultimately human life is about as against those who have not. In my background, this usually meant that the sports heroes I had as a child helped to form not only my playing style but also how I wanted to live. I admired Arvydas Sabonis, Tim Duncan, Hakeem Olajuwon, and Kobe Bryant but myself as a moderately talented basketball player from small town Saskatchewan, I didn't know how to put in the work to take my basketball skills to their maximum potential. It was only in later years by studying the people who had achieved being the top in their field that I understood the preparation and work needed to become the best.
Creating a work or doing a deed
There has always been a desire for me personally to create something that will change the world. Yet I've struggled for years to find out what that one thing is. Finally after reading this book and combining it with many other experiences, I decided to let go of the outcome and trying to find that one thing which would define my legacy. Instead, I'm choosing to focus on the present. This flows into the next point, however I know that my creativity is bubbling under the surface and as I continue to live life, experience more, and meet new people, the opportunities to do deeds and create work will arise.
Experiencing something or encountering someoneWhen I was experiencing my previous relationship, it was the most challenging and frustrating time of my life in that area, up to that point. However without that person and those experiences, I wouldn't be the person that I am today. I think this sentiment is shared by many and often it leads to a feeling of gratitude. It also led to doing a shit ton of work for myself personally. That meant reading books, listening to podcasts, trying to figure out where it had all gone wrong. What I realised was that there was nothing wrong with me, but I could improve my skills in being present, communication, vulnerability. Also that I couldn't think my way out of an emotional situation. Through counselling, intensive workshops, and supportive people in my life showing me that there could be a different way to live, I was able to transition from unpacking my past and making sense of it in a 4 quadrant way (body, spirit, emotions, mind), today I am working on my future (logotherapy and the search for meaning).
Because of the work over the past number of years I've had the good fortune to meet a great number of people who have been influential in my life and brought me new experiences and helped to redefine what love is and can be.
Through witnessing people in both the highs and lows of life and choosing to be present, supportive, and loving in those moments, I feel the world becomes a better place (with healthy boundaries of course).
In unchangeable circumstances, choosing to suffer well
Set against the backdrop of a German concentration camp, it is hard to imagine more unchangeable circumstances on an individual level. It's important to point out that Frankl notes unnecessary suffering as masochistic rather than heroic.
When my mother passed away at the age of 6, that was a situation that couldn't be changed. At the time, there was no other option than to continue on and I give a lot of credit to my father for doing the best that he could given the circumstances. It's not easy to raise two growing boys, run a busy farm, and still take care of yourself. Learning from that example I now understand what it means to persevere and also some things I would choose to do differently.
In my experience, all three ways of finding meaning are experienced in life. For the people who choose to rise about their circumstances, to create something beautiful, to experience love fully, or to suffer with dignity, they always will remain a minority. And yet I see therein the very challenge to join the minority. The world is in a bad state and has been since Frankl first wrote the book, but everything will become still worse unless each of us does our best to first change the world by changing ourselves and finding meaning.
