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Logotherapy In Man's Search For Meaning

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A good way one can respond to conflict is to find meaning. In Viktor Emil Frankl’s book, Man’s Search for Meaning, he shares his experiences in Aushwitz and he proposes a theory called logotherapy. Logotherapy is the search for meaning broken into three parts: accomplishing something, experiencing something or encountering someone, or turning a personal tragedy into triumph.

The first part of logotherapy is accoplishing something. Some people in the Holocaust accomplished something--escaping concentration camps. Michael Kutz was 10 in Belarus, June 1941, when Nazis arrived to force 4,500 Jews to work. Captives who refused to work were forced to be buried alive. Kutz was buried alive with other Jews, trying his best to breathe. Kutz crawled out of the pit and didn’t see any Nazi guards. He ran until he found nuns who gave him food and clothes. Kutz then met up with some Russian Resistance fighters, who harbored him. He spent the next three years with the resistance fighters living in the forest and fighting invading forces. Many years later, Kutz wrote an autobiography called If, by …show more content…

Anne Frank did this and in return became a legend. “From a secret annex, Anne Frank wrote in her diary conveying the hopes and fears of an everyday teenager. But the times were anything but ordinary.” Anne was living in the Holocaust during WWII and was sent to Auschwitz, dying before the liberation of the camp. Anne’s dad recovered the journal with the purpose of giving the public “a perspective of a young girl amidst the unimaginable horrors of the Holocaust.” Although Anne Frank died in Auschwitz, her presence was meaningful because of the second part of logotherapy: experiencing or encountering someone. Anne’s personal experience was tragic and disastrous. However, because Anne shared this experience in her journal, the audience got to somewhat experience and understand living in the

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