Mans Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl :: Papers

Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl "On the average, only those prisoners could keep alive who, after years of trekking from camp to camp, had lost all scruples in their fight for existence; they were prepared to use every means, honest and otherwise, even brutal force, theft, and betrayal of their friends, in order to save themselves. We who have come back, by the aid of many lucky chances or miracles - whatever one may choose to call them - we know: the best of us did not return." (p. 7) The Three Phases of the Inmate's Mental Reactions to Camp Life: a) the period following his admission Symptom = shock "Delusion of reprieve": "The condemned man, immediately before his execution, gets the illusion that he might be reprieved at the very last moment. We, too, clung to the shreds of hope and believed to the last moment that it would not be so bad." (p. 14) 1) a grim sense of humor 2) cold curiosity 3) thoughts of suicide "An abnormal reaction to an abnormal situation is normal behavior." (p. 30) b) The period when he is well entrenched in camp routine a) Relative apathy, a kind of emotional death "Disgust, horror and pity" were "emotions" one could "not really feel anymore. The sufferers, the dying and the dead, became such commonplace sights to him after a few weeks of camp life that they could not move him anymore." (p. 33) "...the prisoner soon surrounded himself with a very necessary protective shell." (p. 35). b) Extreme hunger from undernourishment & preoccupation with food c) Absence of sexual urge d) "Cultural hibernation," with the two exceptions: politics and religion "In spite of all the enforced physical and mental primitiveness of life in a concentration camp, it was possible for spiritual life to deepen. Sensitive people who were used to a rich intellectual life may have suffered much pain (they were often of a delicate constitution), but the damage to their inner selves was less. They were able to retreat from their terrible surroundings to a life of inner riches and spiritual freedom." (p. 56). On love while thinking on his wife while marching: "...for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth - that love is the ultimate and the