<Man's Search for Meaning> 英文阅读笔记
2020.07. 17 - 22
Frankl, V. E. (2006). Man's Search for Meaning [Kindle iOS version].
Journal format:
- Page
- Key Quotes
- Analysis, Reflection, Questions
I: Experiences in a Concentration Camp
p. 7
But I was Number 119,104, and most of the time I was digging and laying tracks for railway lines. At one time, my job was to dig a tunnel, without help, for a water main under a road.
Numbering people is an act of deprivation of their individuality and identity. Such actions violate the ethic of care and justice, and even the basic human rights.
p.15
While we were waiting for the shower, our nakedness was brought home to us: we really had nothing now except our bare bodies—even minus hair; all we possessed, literally, was our naked existence. What else remained for us as a material link with our former lives?
Removal of material link of one’s past and lining people nakedly to shower and get shaved are cruel activities.
p.17
I had been convinced that there were certain things I just could not do: I could not sleep without this or I could not live with that or the other. The first night in Auschwitz we slept in beds which were constructed in tiers.
From here I notice the deprivation of freedom of people kept in the concentration camp. Their minds were misled for too long that the perceived reality is distorted.
p.24
The pain he caused me was not from any insults or any blows. That guard did not think it worth his while to say anything, not even a swear word, to the ragged, emaciated figure standing before him, which probably reminded him only vaguely of a human form.
The word “figure” reveals Frankl’s question for his sense of humanity. Losing physical freedom and that for making individual choices and decisions have made him felt insulted and not like a humanbeing.
p.28
Apathy, the main symptom of the second phase, was a necessary mechanism of self-defense. Reality dimmed, and all efforts and all emotions were centered on one task: preserving one’s own life and that of the other fellow.
From feeling constrained and humiliated to apathetic, Frankl has abandoned his moral sense and self-esteem. To stay alive became the only need and concern.
p.36
In spite of all the enforced physical and mental primitiveness of the life in a concentration camp, it was possible for spiritual life to deepen.
The ability to maintain a spiritual life at a concentration life is valuable and admirable. Only those with strong minds could do so.
p.38
Love goes very far beyond the physical person of the beloved. It finds its deepest meaning in his spiritual being, his inner self. Whether or not he is actually present, whether or not he is still alive at all, ceases somehow to be of importance.
Love is an influential and powerful thing that may save people from a state of being lost, bored, or meaningless. If there is love, there is still hope.
p.44
The attempt to develop a sense of humor and to see things in a humorous light is some kind of a trick learned while mastering the art of living. Yet it is possible to practice the art of living even in a concentration camp, although suffering is omnipresent.
While the physical freedom is deprived, mental or spiritual freedom could be pursued for people to feel a little bit comfort. The sense of humor could relieve the daily physical and mental suffering. Reading this part arose my ethic of care, and I can feel so much pain from Frankl’s language.
p.67
If there is a meaning in life at all, then there must be a meaning in suffering. Suffering is an ineradicable part of life, even as fate and death. Without suffering and death human life cannot be complete.
This quote reminds me of Greene’s argument that freedom is meaningless without resistance in world. It is just because of the unescapable things such as suffering in life or death that meaning of life is worthwhile.
p.75
The ultimate cause of my friend’s death was that the expected liberation did not come and he was severely disappointed. This suddenly lowered his body’s resistance against the latent typhus infection.
One’s perception on life and fate is important for the emotion and even physical status. If Frankl’s friend could realize the meaning in suffering, he might not have been so disappointed and given up.
p.84
We now come to the third stage of a prisoner’s mental reactions: the psychology of the prisoner after his liberation.
Physical liberation does not come along with mental one. Long-term prisoning made one’s mind adaptive and given up even they now have the right and conditions to pursue freedom.
II: Logotherapy in a Nutshell
p.98
However, there is something in it, inasmuch as logotherapy, in comparison with psychoanalysis, is a method less retrospective and less introspective. Logotherapy focuses rather on the future, that is to say, on the meanings to be fulfilled by the patient in his future.
Logotherapy should be helpful for those who were traumatized. Being retrospective and introspective only brought up the pain. To help the traumatized to find new meaning can be an effective therapeutic method.
p.105
What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for a worthwhile goal, a freely chosen task.
Being kept in the concentration camp made people lost their worthwhile goal. They became the cheap labor and working on meaningless tasks. The ethic of justice should respect freely chose task of individuals and support the freedom of choice and action.
p.112
We 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.
This is a powerful quote. A desperate fate may not be changed, but one can continue search for meaning regardless of the physical environment and situations.
p.118
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 in rational terms.
If people could realize the unconditional meaningfulness, they could persist through many adversities. However, as many people are not able to do so, it is demanded for us to bear that inability.
