[Beta]

Man's Search for Meaning

Viktor E. Frankl

Notes
ix He who has a why to live for can endure almost any how. Read some Nietzsche.
xi ¶1 In a way, life is about making choices that improve the choices you make tomorrow.
19 ¶2 Look fit for work. Shave, stand and walk smartly.
(pg. 19) basilwhite
44 ¶1 Write something about today that you'll be able to laugh at when the conditions of the story you write no longer apply (i.e., a "look back at this and laugh" story about today."
(pg. 44) basilwhite
46 ¶1&2 Count your blessings.
(pg. 46) basilwhite
66 ¶1 No one can take away your good attitude.
(pg. 66) basilwhite
66 ¶3 Be worthy of your suffering.
(pg. 66) basilwhite
68 ¶1 Achieve something through your own suffering today.
(pg. 68) basilwhite
68 ¶2 It's never to early to face death with courage and dignity.
(pg. 68) basilwhite
71 last¶ Nostalgia deprives us of opportunities to make something positive of the present.
(pg. 71) basilwhite
72 ¶2 Every experience has a victory you can make out of it.
(pg. 72) basilwhite
73 ¶3 In the future, how do you want to say you used today's suffering as a means to get to that future?
(pg. 73) basilwhite
78¶3 Making your suffering count for something is your job; tears prove that you have the courage to suffer.
(pg. 78) basilwhite
79 Life has expectations of you that you value.
(pg. 79) basilwhite
82 ¶3 What you have experienced, no power on earth can take away from you.
(pg. 82) basilwhite
109 ¶2 The meaning of life is responsibility in the formal sense: The ability to respond. Choices.
(pg. 109) basilwhite
109 ¶3 Live as if you were already living for the second time and as if you had acted the first time as wrongly as you are about to act now.
(pg. 109) basilwhite
110 Change your behavior, change your experiences or change your attitude.
(pg. 110) basilwhite
121 ¶3 Diaries and journals make your past exploitable.
(pg. 121) basilwhite
123 ¶1 For things you want that you can't directly control, work toward the things you can control for which the thing you can't control is an emergent property, e.g., I can't control whether I catch a fish, but I can work toward waking up early and putting the bait in the water every day, and catching fish is a property that emerges from those actions which I control.
(pg. 123) basilwhite
124 ¶2&3 You also can't make bad things happen outside of your control, so trying to make your unwanted, uncontrolled behavior occur takes the wind out of the sails of anxiety. A bad thing isn't your fault if you can't make it happen.
(pg. 124) basilwhite
127 Another way of defining paradoxical intention is that it's impossible to fail on purpose, because failing on purpose isn't failure. Failing on purpose is a form of success. Failure to fail is also a form of success. So if you can't succeed, fail on purpose. You can't lose! Failing on purpose is the secret to avoiding failure.
(pg. 127) basilwhite
128 ¶2 Etiology = what causes something, used here in the context of what causes a disease.
(pg. 128) basilwhite
128 ¶3 Problems don't drive you crazy. FEAR of problems drives you crazy. Fixing the problem fixes the problem. Fixing the fear makes you sane.
(pg. 128) basilwhite
128 note 15 Fear is not crazy. Fear, in fact, means you're not crazy.
(pg. 128) basilwhite
129 ¶2&3 Feeding a selfless goal starves your fear of attention.
(pg. 129) basilwhite
138 ¶1 How can I make pain, guilt and death work for me?
(pg. 138) basilwhite
141 ¶2 Volunteering spites the devil.
(pg. 141) basilwhite
143 ¶3 Constantly ask "What is the meaning of this?" and "So what?
(pg. 143) basilwhite
145 Experience isn't as valuable as achievement but the ROI is greater. For example, thanks to this book I have significant insight on the lessons learned from concentration camps without entering one.
(pg. 145) basilwhite
146 ¶1 Do something, feel something, rise above.
(pg. 146) basilwhite
148 Suffer as well as possible.
(pg. 148) basilwhite

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