Wednesday, March 20, 2002

Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl On Choosing One's Attitude "Everything can be taken from a man but ...the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way." p.104 "There is also purpose in life which is almost barren of both creation and enjoyment and which admits of but one possibility of high moral behavior: namely, in man's attitude to his existence, an existence restricted by external forces."  p.106 On Committing to Values and Goals "Logotherapy...considers man as a being whose main concern consists in fulfilling a meaning and in actualizing values, rather than in the mere gratification and satisfaction of drives and instincts." p.164 "What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for some goal worthy of him. What he needs is not the discharge of tension at any cost, but the call of a potential meaning waiting to be fulfilled by him." p.166 On Discovering the Meaning of Life "The meaning of our existence is not invented by ourselves, but rather detected." p.157 "What matters, therefore, is not the meaning of life in general, but rather the specific meaning of a person's life at a given moment." p.171 "We can discover this meaning in life in three different ways: (1) by doing a deed; (2) by experiencing a value; and (3) by suffering." p.176 On Fulfilling One's Task "A man who becomes conscious of the responsibility he bears toward a human being who affectionately waits for him, or to an unfinished work, will never be able to throw away his life. He knows the "why" for his existence, and will be able to bear almost any "how." p.127 "It did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life - daily and hourly. Our answer must consist, not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual." p.122 Above quotations reprinted from: Frankl, Viktor E., Man's Search for Meaning, Washington Square Press, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1963. 10:05:20 PM

Carl Jung tells of the day when he suddenly realized "what it means to live with a myth, and what it means to live without one." Asking himself what myth he was living by, he found that he did not know. And so, he writes, "I took it upon myself to get to know 'my' myth, and I regarded this as the task of tasks." 9:08:46 PM

When Pete Sampras won his first U.S. Open title he mentioned in the interview that "no one will ever be able to take this away from me". I always thought it a strange thing for an 18 year old to say. Were people out to take things away from him? Was he being overly paranoid? Well now that I've got this web site up and running with Radio Userland I feel kinda the same way. No matter what no one will ever be able to take away from me my struggles to come to grips with this technology/use of technology. I will attempt to show why it is the greatest thing since the staple remover and why a six man company should really have a larger market cap than Yahoo. P.S. Though he was a brat I still prefer the physical gracefulness of John McEnroe. Also he's the only tennis player whose words I still remember: "I don't get out of bed for less than $50,000". 9:06:40 PM

Is this considered Numerology? The other day I saw the "Investment Biker" interviewed on TV. That old guy that rides around the world on his Harley Davidson looking for investments. He said there were two countries to invest in right now: one being East Timor. East Timor just happens to be gaining Independence on May 20th - my birthday. 9:04:10 PM

© Copyright 2002 Ian Bruk.