Man′s Search for Himself

Product Information

Later German editions prefixed the title with Trotzdem Ja zum Leben Sagen ("Nevertheless Say Yes to Life"), taken from a line in Das Buchenwaldlied, a song written by Friedrich Löhner-Beda while an inmate at Buchenwald. [4] The originality and uniqueness which is always part of a spontaneous feeling can be understood in this light. For just as there never was exactly that situation before and never will be again, so the feeling one has at that time is new and never to be exactly repeated. It is only neurotic behavior which is rigidly repetitive.” Frankl identifies three psychological reactions experienced by all inmates to one degree or another: People are unique in their consciousness of themselves. No one entirely knows the full extent of what another person feels and thinks. Each person is alone in their minds and must find their inner-strength ultimately without anyone else to do it for them. Find sources: "Man's Search for Meaning"– news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR ( November 2011) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message)

Author Rollo Reece May was an American existential psychologist and author of the influential book Love and Will. He is often associated with humanistic psychology and existentialist philosophy, and alongside Viktor Frankl, was a major proponent of existential psychotherapy. With curiosity, people can explore all of life. They begin from themselves, and not from others, as a foundation for love, open to what is possible, affirming who they are through their choices, not only in action but in attitude. A person will find what is valuable for him or herself. These values will be intimately known rather than passively given. In a 1991 survey conducted for the Library of Congress and the Book of the Month Club, Man's Search for Meaning was named one of the 10 most influential books in the US. [7] At the time of Frankl's death in 1997, the book had sold over 10 million copies and had been translated into 24 languages. As of 2022 the book has sold 16 million copies and been printed in 52 languages. [8]This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. The mature person has “the capacity to love something for its own sake, not for the sake of being taken care of or gaining a bootlegged feeling of prestige and power. Certainly loneliness and anxiety can be constructively met. Though this cannot be done through the deus ex machina of a ‘cosmic papa,’ it can be achieved through the individual’s confronting directly the various crises of his development, moving from dependence to greater freedom and higher integration by developing and utilizing his capacities, and relating to his fellows through creative work and love.” In this book, I noticed parallelisms between Rollo May's insights with those of Erich Fromm, especially on the aspect of freedom and irrational authority. But the difference is, May's style is rather free-flowing and spontaneous as contrasted with Fromm's somewhat repetitive with rigorously referenced writing. As time passed, however, the prisoner's experience in a concentration camp became nothing but a remembered nightmare. What is more, he comes to believe that he has nothing left to fear "except his God" (p. 115). An innocent is only doing what he or she must do. However, an innocent does have a degree of will in the sense of a drive to fulfill needs.

Those who hide from their anxieties during the crucial stages of their development will only stagnate or get worse. Anxiety, for everyone, is a normal aspect of growth. People should be honest and confront their own anxieties, exposing themselves gradually to what they need that helps them mature. But the artists, and the rest of us too, remain spiritually isolated and at sea, and so we cover up our loneliness by chattering with other people about the things we do have language for — the world series, business affairs, the latest news reports. Our deeper emotional experiences are pushed further away, and we tend, thus, to become emptier and lonelier.” To live with integrity is terrifying and uncertain at times. People often retreat from what’s not known, becoming rigid and dogmatic, protecting themselves with certainty. reactions of depersonalization, moral deformity, bitterness, and disillusionment if he survives and is liberated. [6]

My Book Notes

Foreword to Trotzdem Ja zum Leben Sagen: Ein Psychologe erlebt das Konzentrationslager, Hans Weigel, Penguin, München, 2009, ISBN 978-3328102779 (reprinted from 1977) To create oneself is to transcend the fit of old masks, to move beyond those dependencies of childhood, to seek unfamiliar places that haven’t yet been explored. May discusses the phenomenon of man's inability to deal with his own condition of being alone, the anxiety that causes one to feel when being confronted with the reality of having to deal with ones own existence within ones own context. The resulting fear, anxiety, and even panic of confronting this reality of being alone, or with people who do not want to face it when they call the state as 'loneliness.' To be free, however, is to have discipline. With self-discipline, one seeks to learn about life and consistently follows one’s values, discovering freedom through inner work. May used some traditional existential terms in a slightly different fashion than others, and he invented new words for traditional existentialist concepts. Destiny, for example, could be "thrownness" combined with "fallenness" — the part of our lives that is determined for us, for the purpose of creating our lives. He also used the word "courage" to signify resisting anxiety.