The Personal Optimism of Viktor Frankl Essay examples

This book is didactic because Frankl is indeed trying to teach us what human’s meaning in life is. He does this by portraying that even in the most extreme and miserable cases there is potential for one’s life. The whole section of part two is an example of why it is didactic because he repeatedly supports teaching us how to find the meaning in our life. Granted that none of us have gone through what he did, we can compare some of our sufferings by using logotherapy and find the purpose in the suffering. However, his main goal is not to teach us about the concentration camps, for one of the first pages of his book states, “This book does not claim to be an account of facts and events but of personal experiences, experiences in which millions of prisoners have suffered time and again” (Frankl 3). It is also rhetorical because he plays with our feelings in order to get his point across. The point he is trying to make is you can find meaning in life in three different ways. An example is the multiple times he thinks about his wife while in the concentration camps. In order to move a reader to feel a certain feeling or make a decision is to tug at their heart. And what better way to do so by mentioning family and how much he loves, misses, and thinks of them. I personally think the book was more rhetorical because to me it was an inspirational book. He wrote about all his hardships and sufferings that he had to endure in the concentration camps. Even when he was out of the camp, he was still suffering because he found out that his wife, who was pregnant with their child had died in the camps. He had to live with that for the rest of his life and he had to live with the nightmares and experiences that he had once

The memoir,”Night”, shows the perspective of Elie Wiesel, a young boy that was sent to a concentration camp alongside hundreds of other Jews, that lost their valuables , faith and family.The terror within the concentration camp slowly deteriorate the Jews ,physically and mentally.The jews had a choice to be selfish or selfless,given the jews’ situation it is best to do what was in their best interest. Throughout Elie Wiesel’s memoir, “Night”; many individuals had a hard time navigating the brutality within the concentration camps.Through these times of brutality, many people in the camp had to choose to either be selfish or altruistic. Given the jew’s situation, it is better to act selfish than to be altruistic.

'He who has a why to live for can bear any how.' The words of Nietzsche begin to explain Frankl's tone throughout his book. Dr. Frankl uses his experiences in different Nazi concentration camps to explain his discovery of logotherapy. This discovery takes us back to World War II and the extreme suffering that took place in the Nazi concentration camps and outlines a detailed analysis of the prisoners psyche. An experience we gain from the first-hand memoirs of Dr. Frankl.

The human condition is a very malleable idea that is constantly changing due to the current state of mankind. In the memoir Night by Elie Wiesel, the concept of the human condition is displayed in the worst sense of the concept, during the Holocaust of WWII. During this time, multiple groups of people, most notably European Jews, were persecuted against and sent to horrible hard labor and killing centers such as Auschwitz. In this memoir, Wiesel uses complex figurative language such as similes and metaphors to display the theme that a person’s state as a human, both at a physical and emotional level, can be altered to extreme lengths, and even taken away from them under the most extreme conditions.

The concentration camps from World War II are part of a painful and tragic incident that we have learned about in school for many years. And while we are taught the facts, we may not fully understand the emotional impact it had upon the humans involved. Upon reading Night by Elie Wiesel, readers are given vivid descriptions of the gruesome and tragic behaviors that the Jews were forced to endure inside he treacherous concentration camps. Among all of the cruelties that the Jews were exposed to, a very significant form of the callous behaviors was the demoralization of the prisoners. Each inmate was given a tattoo of a number, and that tattoo became their new identity within the camp. Every prisoner was presented with tattered uniforms that became

Shock, apathy, and disillusionment were three psychological stages that the prisoners of the Nazi concentration camps experienced. Ironically, it took an event of such tragedy and destruction to enable us to learn more about how the human mind responds to certain situations. Frankl’s methods for remaining positive can be used by every human being to give them a meaning in their lives regardless of what predicament or mental state they are in – it is in many ways like a phoenix risen from the

Everyone experiences emotional and physiological obstacles in their life. However, these obstacles are incomparable to the magnitude of the obstacles the prisoners of the Holocaust faced every day. In his memoir, Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel, illustrates the horrors of the concentration camps and their mental tool. Over the course of Night, Wiesel demonstrates, that exposure to an uncaring, hostile world leads to destruction of faith and identity.

Through Frankl's view of suicide you can discover his view of human person. Suicide is wrong in all cases, and should not be even considered an option. He believes that all people can find some meaning in life which would prevent them from giving up all hope and ending their lives. Every human life has meaning, and therefore every human life has value. While in a concentration camp serving as a doctor to those who were ill with typhus or other diseases, he encountered two individuals who had given up hope on life. He asked them both to think of something worth living for. One answered that he had a son waiting for him at home, and the other said he was writing a book and wanted to finish it. Frankl helped them find meaning in their lives to hold on to some hope. Just as they did, anyone can find a meaning to live for, whether it be another person or a goal or achievement.

Many books were published about Holocaust, but Frankl’s work is “One of the outstanding contribution to psychological thought . . .” (Carl Rogers. 1959). Frankl, a psychiatrist and neurologist, spent 3 years in Nazis concentration camps where he underwent

In Man’s Search for Meaning, Viktor E. Frankl tells the honest story of his own experiences as an inmate in a concentration camp during World War II. In his book, Frankl answers the question “How was everyday life in a concentration camp reflected in the mind of the average prisoner?” (Frankl, 2006, p. 3) He describes the physical, emotional, and psychological torment that he endured as well as the effect that the camp had on those around him. He breaks down the psychological experience as a prisoner into three stages: the initial shock upon admission into the camp, apathy, and the mental reactions of the prisoner after liberation. He highlights certain emotions experienced throughout the time in the camp such as delusions of reprieve, hope, curiosity, surprise, and even humor.

Prior to World War II, Viktor Frankl was a somewhat successful therapist. Once the war began however, he was sent off to an Auschwitz concentration camp. Everyone in concentration camps had one wish, to stay alive (Frankl 15). Whether they tried to get on the good side of the warden, or attempt an escape, everyone had a different way to survive. Many prisoners died while at camps, but some of them who were hopeful and courageous made it out. Inspired by these prisoners, Frankl created logotherapy to help other find meaning in their own lives.

The Holocaust is regarded as one of the worst events in human history. In fact, the vast majority of those who were sent to a concentration camp perished there. When prisoners view the despair all around them, they find it hard to see meaning behind all the suffering. Life is no longer worth living, so many prisoners see suicide as the only option to escape the pain. As a psychiatrist who was sent to Auschwitz, a concentration camp notorious for its crematoriums, Viktor Frankl has a special perspective on the loss of the will to live that those imprisoned exhibit. In his own words, “Life in a concentration camp tore open the human soul and exposed its depths”(Frankl 94). Frankl discovers in himself not only the shock and apathy he displays, but also the strange hope that comes with imagining his freedom. The brutality of the Holocaust changes Frankl and brings out his true self while teaching him that he and others can survive the worst of terrors by setting a purpose in life, which only they can individually determine.

Man’s Search for Meaning, is a biography and the personal memoir of Victor Frankl’s experience in a Nazi Concentration Camp. The book was initially published in 1946 in German and was then published in 1959 in English, under the title From Death-Camp to Existentialism. Prior to World War II, Victor Frankl was a psychiatrist working in Vienna and then later was responsible for running the neurology department at a Jewish Hospital in Rothschild. In 1942 he and his family were arrested and deported. They were separated and sent to concentration

Psychologist Victor Frankl’s novel: Man's Search for Meaning delivers a powerful and humbling perspective on life that inspires introspection in the minds of all those that read it. The book achieves this by taking us on a journey with Frankl as he describes his personal experiences of the Holocaust. During his time spent in four different concentration camps Frankl gradually learns lessons in spiritual survival. Devoid of all pleasures and possessing nothing but his “naked existence” Frankl is forced to look inward and in the process discovers what he believes to be the primary motivating factor of all men (p. 15).

In September of 1942, Viktor Frankl was arrested in Vienna and taken to one of the many Nazi death camps. Frankl was working on a manuscript which was confiscated from him in a move to Auschwitz. In this manuscript entitled, The Doctor and the Soul, Frankl had began his work on a theory he would later call logotherapy. The term logotherapy is derived from the Greek word logos, which means meaning. According to logotherapy, the striving to find a meaning in one’s life is the primary motivational force in man (Frankl 121). Frankl’s theory and therapy generated and grew through his experiences in the concentration camps.