140
See also: Rollo May 141 ■ Boris Cyrulnik 152–53 ■
Martin Seligman 200–01V
iennese psychiatrist Viktor
Frankl had already begun
to specialize in suicide
prevention and the treatment of
depression when, in 1942, he and
his wife, brother, and parents were
taken to a concentration camp. He
spent three years there and endured
many horrors and losses before
emerging as the only survivor of the
group. In his book Man’s Search for
Meaning (1946), written after these
experiences, Frankl explains that
humans have two psychological
strengths that allow us to bearpainful and possibly devastating
situations and to move forward;
these are the capacity for decision,
and freedom of attitude. Frankl
stresses that we are not at the
mercy of our environment or events,
because we dictate how we allow
them to shape us. Even suffering
can be seen differently, depending
on our interpretation of events.
Frankl cites the case of one of
his patients who suffered because
he missed his dead wife. Frankl
asked how it would have been if
the patient had died first, and he
replied that his wife would have
found it very difficult. Frankl pointed
out that the patient has spared her
this grief, but must now suffer the
grief himself. In giving meaning to
the suffering it becomes endurable;
“suffering ceases to be suffering at
the moment it finds a meaning.”
Meaning is something we
“discover rather than invent,”
according to Frankl, and we must
find it for ourselves. We find it
through living, and specifically
through love, creating things, and
the way we choose to see things. ■IN CONTEXT
APPROACH
LogotherapyBEFORE
600–500 BCE In India,
Gautama Buddha teaches that
suffering is caused by desire,
and can be alleviated by
releasing desire.458 BCE Ancient Greek
dramatist Aeschylus explores
the idea that “wisdom comes
alone through suffering.”AFTER
1950s French existentialist
philosophers, such as Jean-
Paul Sartre, say our lives do not
have a God-given purpose; we
must find it for ourselves.2003 Martin Seligman says
a “full life” encompasses
pleasure, engagement (flow),
and meaning.2007 US psychologist
Dan Gilbert explains that
people are unhappy because
of the way they think
about happiness.S U F F E R I N G C E A S E S
T O B E S U F F E R I N G
A T T H E M O M E N T
IT FINDS A MEANING
V I K T O R F R A N K L ( 1 9 0 5 – 1 9 9 7 )
A man who has nothing else
in this world may still
know bliss.
Viktor Frankl