The Viktor Frankl

'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.

Many women struggle to overcome obstacles in their lives. Sometimes they find it difficult to leave abusive relationships and end up never leaving. But some women are brave or work up the courage to take a stand and leave the situation. In the short story, “Women Hollering Creek”, Sandra Cisneros explains the theme of the story by telling about a woman who’s husband abuses her.

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

A victim’s mind does not enter into an abusive relationship the same as it, hopefully escapes. Most people are familiar with the honeymoon stage of a new relationship, the excitement, infatuation and methodical self-disclosure that most, if not all people experience and engage in. The gradualism of an abusive relationship is one critical piece of a frightening puzzle.

Everybody changes even if it's just puberty or just in the way you act. Change is shown everywhere in the novel “Night” by Elie Wiesel. It’s not just shown physically but it’s also shown mentally. He also had to make many difficult decisions through his journey through the Holocaust. Night is about Pain and Suffering that was caused by the holocaust, and most of that pain was put on the jews.

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

The bizarre fact regarding people, is they can be given everything necessary to live: food, water, shelter yet the way a person interacts with the world is majorly influenced by numerous other factors. Intimate relationships, such as the consistent involvement of family, is one factor that has an immense impact on how humans respond to different situations in life. Melinda Sordino, a high school student at Merryweather high, had been raped, at a party a couple weeks before freshman year. She deeply felt that nobody cared leading her to have socially distant herself from everyone and no longer putting any mindfulness into her outward appearance. Just in the matter of a few weeks, an entirely new Melinda had been fashioned without even the slightest acknowledgment or concern from her parents causing a chain of followed reactions.

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.

On average,in the United States, twenty people per minute are physically abused by their partner. Which if you make the math, that is more than ten million women and men. In the short story, “ It will look like a Sunset” by Kelly Sundberg, she effectively asserts her targeted audience which consists on couples and mainly young women in their late twenties who are in a relationship. Sundberg supports her assertions by appealing to ethical, emotional, and logical examples as well as using rhetorical strategies. The author's main purpose is to urge the readers to accept life is complicated and anyone who faces a similar situation should seek help because you may not be in the right state of mind to make the right decision.

I chose this topic because I feel it meets a true community need; too many young people, girls in particular, are falling prey to abusive relationships. The effects are far-reaching, and the loss of self-esteen that so often occurs leaves invisible scars. I also feel that emotional abuse among young girls in dating realtionships is far too often ignored, and when it is recognized, many people do not know how to help the young girls deal with it in an effective manner.

Looking back at her tragic series of sexual assaults, Samentha Moore reminisces on her habitual inexorable feelings of “self-conscious and blaming” (source 5). Moore experienced her first two traumatic assaults before college; she was left vacant, aloof and disconsolate after the police disdainfully responded to her assaults. Around the time, she experienced her third assault in college, Moore was discourage to report it ands was left miserable and unable to desert her pain, loneliness and self- punishment. Her agony later developed into an eating disorder; Moore thought maybe if she “made myself (herself) less attractive it (the rape) wouldn’t happen again” (source 5).

Lynn Nottage’s “Poof!” begins by stating that nearly half of all women on death row in the United States are convicted of killing abusive husbands (1120). With the use of this fact, Nottage supports the central theme of her play. Nottage’s central theme is the social difficulties that are experienced by women of lower social economic status. Nottage shows how women who are trapped in a corner in their abusive households can finally reach a breaking point. Women who reach this breaking point often do resort to murder in order to escape the hell they live at home.

While not a somatic assault, emotional abuse can cause lasting effects on a woman’s health, so much so that researcher, B. Van Houdenhove and others working on the project have found “that emotional abuse and neglect may be contributing factors to the development and/or severity of illnesses such as chronic fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia” (Karakurt and Silver). Finally, emotional abuse is a rampant issue, Karakurt and Silver report that “Psychological aggression by an intimate partner was reported by 48.4% of women,” which was found in the National Intimate Partner & Sexual Violence Survey (“Emotional Abuse in Intimate Relationships: The Role of Gender and Age”). Nearly half of the population of women report being victims to psychological abuse, making it a widespread epidemic faced by not only women in dystopian novels but also real life. Psychological abuse can take many verbal and non-verbal forms, which can put great strain on a woman’s health, and affects nearly half the population of the United States.

What mechanisms do people use, and what mechanisms could the prisoners of war have used, to resist a change in their self-concepts?

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).