Man's Search for Meaning (Part 2)

It’s in this context that Man’s Search for Meaning offers a completely different perspective. When people are under adverse condition, their life under threat, their daily activities more as for sustaining than living out any meaning of existence, they persevere. They live on. Their will to survive flourishes. Yes it is difficult to understand. Born in each man is a will to survive and to live. It’s this will that keeps human beings as a group to continue their existence on earth.

Surely there still is the strong and the weak. Some are blessed with a stronger will to live, and they live on regardless of how unfavorable their surroundings are. How this will is sustained I’m not so sure. It can be just an animal instinct. Or more likely it’s love, legacy, and hope.

Love is well known to be a driving force for life. Viktor Frankl described his longing to see his wife made him want to stay alive. It is sad that while he was struggling to survive with the flimsy hope that he would live with his wife together one day, she was already dead. But reality does not matter. So long as a man’s love for someone stays afloat, he will strive to live on. “Nothing could touch the strength of my love, my thoughts, and the image of my beloved,” he said. We’ve heard stories like a prisoner serving long prison term not losing his resolve because there was a young family he hoped one day would reunite with. Or a person trapped in debris for several days after an earthquake, without food or water, not knowing her chance of survival, did not give up simply because of the thoughts of her family. Love provides a man’s life with meaning. “Set me like a seal upon thy heart, love is as strong as death.” How beautiful!

Legacy is something one leave to this world. This is most of the time closely related to a person’s achievement. Viktor Frankl mentioned several times his desire to finish his academic writings in psychology and publish them as a book. Once he even risked his life hiding his work from SS guards. People may argue “if you can preserve your life, you can always finish your work later.” But this is actually easier said than done. When one is faced with a situation that what he sees as precious is going to be taken away, there is really an urge to protect it at the cost of his own well being or even his own life. This ”precious something” is not necessarily material thing. In our society a lot of people work extremely hard. Other people may comment that they work for money that they don’t really need (as they are already wealthy.) The truth is they work for their psychological need of leaving a legacy. This is similar to the phenomenon that many elder men take sex enhancement drugs, even at the risk of their life, not for sexual pleasure but to prove their potency. (I may be a bit off track here.) Legacy is the second component that fulfills life with meaning.

The final piece of the puzzle is hope. Hope of something better to come in the future strengthen one’s will to survive. How hope stays with a person under a difficult situation yet leaves another person under a similar situation is anybody’s guess. No one knows the answer for sure. Is it something to do with a person’s personality and character traits? Or is it due to a person’s experience during his growing up? Or is it more to do with a person’s mental strength coming from his ancestors’ genes, or religious belief, or encouragement from friends? Viktor Frankl had not explicitly mentioned hope as a key factor of his survival through the concentration camp. Nevertheless he hinted in different occasions the importance of focusing on the positive side of this ordeal. The prisoners’ thankfulness for the smallest of mercies, the image of his wife, their ability to look at life in a humorous way - all are evidence of hope at work here.

Love, legacy and hope – these are the three cornerstones of man’s meaning of existence!

Man's Search for Meaning (Part 1)

This is the second time I tried to write some of my thoughts inspired by this very good book. The first time I stopped after five minutes. Apart from the usual excuse of too busy with work, there is also a feeling that I don’t know where to start. In fact I find myself too irrelevant compared to what this book’s author had experienced.

This is a classic book, aka very old book. Its first edition came out in 1959, before I was even born. There is a reason why this book still captures the attention of many readers after many decades. It is simply good. It is also heavy. So be warned - it will destroy your good mood if you try to do some pool-side reading during a vacation.

It’s about a Jewish scholar’s unique experience of surviving Nazi death camps during the Second World War. I say unique because not many Jewish could survive death camps – they either were executed or died of hard labor and malnutrition, or sometimes just lacked the will to live on. Even for those who survived, they might not be able to describe people’s inner feelings under extremely adverse conditions in such details – fear, hope, compassion, and love, at times with deep psychological analysis.

Again I have to emphasize that I’m not qualified to comment anything on Victor Frankl’s theories or views. I’ll just share a few insights or probably personal feelings gained from this book. What’s the meaning of a man’s life? I’ve been asking this question since I entered adolescence (and now I am in my mid life). There are many ready-made answers to suit your appetite. In fact the answer changes with your age. For a teenager or young adult, a simple answer from what most religions offer, like “living for God” or “be a good son/daughter of the Lord”, will do. For adults from mid-twenties to late-thirties, it is difficult not to focus on their needs (or desires) to establish a family, to earn a stable income, and to improve their material life. So life’s meaning to them is just to make more money. Money also contributes to their having a sense of security, and self-esteem as well – belonging to a class of the society that ‘has’. People of all ages look for a kind of inner fulfillment or satisfaction that often results in them feeling ‘happy’. For the first half of a man’s life - from childhood to early mid-life, it’s a sense of CERTAINTY and SECURITY that contribute to this inner fulfillment.

Entering mid-life, however, a man’s landscape changes. There is less urge to accumulate more stuff and things (well… it depends). There is a sense of stability because you already own a house with mortgage almost paid off. Your kids are in high school and your job seems safe. If you lose your job, your investment is probably enough for your family to live a comfortable life for the next 5 years. Well, a few of their friends and peers already died, perhaps prematurely. So some people even think they have lived long enough, seen enough, and if their lives end suddenly it would be acceptable. The need for security and certainty diminishes. Here comes their mid-life crisis. You start wondering why you live and what this fuss is all about. What have you accomplished in the first 40 years? Is there any strong reason to live on? Does one carry on living just because one hasn’t died?