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Freedom and Man’s Search for Meaning
No one else can control your attitude.
I’m in a book club that recently wrapped up discussion on Man’s Search for Meaning, Viktor Frankl’s autobiographical account of his experiences in Nazi concentration camps. Upon reflection, my mind went back to the Bible, which, when stripped of religious dogma, contains much wisdom.
For instance, Frankl makes me think of Paul’s words from 1 Corinthians 13:13, “And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.”
- Faith in one’s calling or “life’s work” as motivation to live another day.
- Hope that suffering and hardship will end; hope as inspiration for courage and persistence.
- Love for others, and the feeling of being loved, as a source of spiritual sustenance.
Faith, hope, and love must always come from within. As Frankl notes:
Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms — to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.
In the mid-00’s I regularly read Matthew Bryan’s blog “Freedom is Free.” (It can be found on the Wayback Machine: freefreedomtoldhere.blogspot.com) Its tagline was “Who owns you?” While the blog was about individual…
