Viktor Frankl

We came to meadows full of flowers. We saw and realized that they were there, but we had no feelings about them. The first spark of joy came when we saw a rooster with a tail of multicolored feathers. But it remained only a spark; we did not yet belonged to this world.

Edith Weisskopf-Joelson, before her death professor of psychology at the University of Georgia, contended, in her article on logotherapy, that “our current mental-hygiene philosophy stresses the idea that people ought to be happy, that unhappiness is a symptom of maladjustment. Such a value system might be responsible for the fact that the burden of unavoidable unhappiness is increased by unhappiness about being unhappy.

It is the very pursuit of happiness that thwarts happiness.

An abnormal reaction to an abnormal situation is normal behavior.

تحقيق الذات ليس هو الغاية القصوى عند الانسان, ولا حتى مقصده الأول. ذلك أن تحقيق الذات, اذا صار غاية في حد ذاته فإنه يتعارض مع خاصية تجاوز الذات أو التسامي بالذات وهي الخاصية المميزة للوجود الانساني. وبالاضافة الى ذلك, فإن تحقيق الذات ما هو الا نتيجة أو أثر -أي أنه نتيجة أو أثر لتحقيق المعنى, وينبغي أن يظل تحقيق الذات هكذا. ذلك أن الانسان لا يحقق ذاته الا بمقدار تحقيقه لمعنى في هذا العالم. وعلى العكس من ذلك, إذا شرع الفرد في تحقيق ذاته بدلا من أن يحقق معنى من المعاني, فان تحقيق الذات سوف يفقد مبرراته في الحال.

"The meaning of life differs from man to man, from day to day, from 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. To put the question in general terms would be to the question posed to a chess champion: "Tell me, Master, what is the best move in the world?" There simply is no such thing as the best or even a good move apart from a particular situation in a game and the particular personality of one's opponent. The same holds for human existence. One should not search for an abstract meaning of life. 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.
As each situation in life represents a challenge to man and presents a problem for him to solve, the question of the meaning of life may actually be reversed. Ultimately, man should not ask what the meaning of life is, but rather he must recognize that it is he who is asked. In a word, each man is questioned by life; and he can only answer to life by answering for his own life; to life he can only respond by being responsible."

You may of course ask whether we really need to refer to "saints." Wouldn't it suffice just to refer to decent people? It is true that they form a minority. More than that, they always will remain a minority. And yet I see therein the very challenge to join the minority. For the world is in a bad state, but everything will become still worse unless each of us does his best. So, let us be alert — alert in a twofold sense: Since Auschwitz we know what man is capable of. And since Hiroshima we know what is at stake.

fear brings about that which one is afraid of, and hyper-intention makes impossible what one wishes

Fear makes come true that which one is afraid of.

"You may of course ask whether we really need to refer to "saints". Wouldn't it suffice just to refer to decent people? It is true that they form a minority. More than that, they always will remain a minority. And yet I see therein the very challenge to join the minority. For the world is in a bad state, but everything will become still worse unless each of us does his best."

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.

We do not ask life what the meaning of life is. Life asks us, what is the meaning of your life. And life demands our answer.

In some ways suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of a sacrifice.

Man does not simply exist, but always decides what his existence will be, what he will become in the next moment..

In the past, nothing is irretrievably lost, but rather, on the contrary, everything is irrevocably stored and treasured. To be sure, people tend to see only the stubble fields of transitoriness but overlook and forget the full granaries of the past into which they have brought the harvest of their lives: the deeds done, the loves loved, and last but not least, the sufferings they have gone through with courage and dignity.
From this one may see that there is no reason to pity the old people. Instead, young people should envy them. It is true that the old have no opportunities, no possibilities in the future. But they have more than that: Instead of possibilities in the future, they have realities in the past -the potentialities they have actualized, the meanings they have fulfilled, the values they have realized -and nothing and nobody can ever remove these assets from the past.