Quote

I would say that our patients never really despair because of any suffering in itself! Instead, their despair stems in each instance from a doubt as to whether suffering is meaningful. Man is ready and willing to shoulder any suffering as soon and as long as he can see a meaning in it.

Viktor E. Frankl

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Viktor E. Frankl
Age: 92 †
Born: 1905
Born: March 26
Died: 1997
Died: September 2
Existential Therapist
Neurologist
Professor
Psychiatrist
Psychologist
Psychotherapist
Surgeon
Writer
Vienna
Austria
Viktor E. Frankl
Viktor Emil Frankl
Really
Meaning
Stem
Never
Instead
Shoulder
Would
Ready
Shoulders
Men
Willing
Meaningful
Doubt
Instance
Suffering
Patient
Stems
Whether
Despair
Patients
Long
Soon
Existential

More quotes by Viktor E. Frankl

Image
This is the core of the human spirit ... If we can find something to live for - if we can find some meaning to put at the center of our lives - even the worst kind of suffering becomes bearable.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
As such, I also bear witness to the unexpected extent to which man is capable of defying and braving even the worst conditions conceivable.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
It is true that we can see the therapist as a technician only if we have first viewed the patient as some sort of machine.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
Since Auschwitz we know what man is capable of. And since Hiroshima we know what is at stake.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
Sunday neurosis, that kind of depression which afflicts people who become aware of the lack of content in their lives when the rush of the busy week is over and the void within themselves becomes manifest.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
For the world is in a bad state, but everything will become still worse unless each of us does his best.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
If there is 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.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
Our greatest human freedom is that, despite whatever our physical situation is in life, WE ARE ALWAYS FREE TO CHOOSE OUR THOUGHTS!
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
Woe to him who saw no more sense in his life, no aim, no purpose, and therefore no point in carrying on.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
Even when it is not fully attained, we become better by striving for a higher goal.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
Most important, however, is the third avenue to meaning in life: even the helpless victim of a hopeless situation, facing a fate he cannot change, may rise above himself, may grow beyond himself, and by so doing change himself. He may turn a personal tragedy into a triumph.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
Our attitude towards what has happened to us in life is the important thing to recognize. Once hopeless, my life is now hope-full, but it did not happen overnight. The last of human freedoms, to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, is to choose one's own way.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
Pain is only bearable if we know it will end, not if we deny it exists.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
...to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life-daily and hourly. Our answer must consist, not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
What you have experienced, no power on earth can take from you.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
The existential vacuum manifests itself mainly in a state of boredom.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
At such a moment, it is not the physical pain which hurts the most (and this applies to adults as much as to punished children) it is the mental agony caused by the injustice, the unreasonableness of it all.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
Man is not fully conditioned and determined but rather determines himself whether he gives in to conditions or stands up to them.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
When a man cannot find meaning, he numbs himself with pleasure.
Viktor E. Frankl
Image
The more one forgets one’s own self, the more human the person becomes.
Viktor E. Frankl