Man's Search for Meaning | Viktor Frankl

05/24/21 • 10 min

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Man’s Search for Meaning was published by Viktor Frankl in 1946. Frankl is the founder of logotherapy. The most important force in a man’s life is his desire to find meaning. While Freud speaks of a “will to pleasure” and Adler speaks of a “will to power,” Frankl focuses on a “will to meaning”, as the primary motivational force in man.

The book sold over 10 million copies at the time of Frankl’s death in 1997, and continues to this day to inspire many to find significance in the very act of living. The success of the book may be a symptom of the "mass neurosis of modern times" since the title promised to deal with the question of life's meaningfulness.

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━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ⌛ Timestamps (0:00) Introduction (1:39) Part I. “Experiences in a Concentration Camp” (6:03) Part II “Logotherapy in a Nutshell"

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━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ⌛ Timestamps (0:00) Introduction (1:39) Part I. “Experiences in a Concentration Camp” (6:03) Part II “Logotherapy in a Nutshell"

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No Exit | Jean Paul Sartre

No Exit (Huis Clos) is one of Jean Paul Sartre’s most interesting existentialist short stories. The book is the source of one of Sartre’s most celebrated phrases: “Hell is other people”.

Sartre brilliantly emphasises that hell is not so much a specific place, but a state of mind. It is connected with his idea of the Look, which explores the experience of being seen, as we are always under the eyes of others.

The conflict of being a subject (an agent of one’s life) and being an object that other people are observing, alienates us and locks us in a particular kind of being, which in turn deprives us of our freedom, because we are unable to escape the “devouring” gaze of the other.

Sartre illustrates the difficult coexistence of people, as the entire social realm is based on adversarial aspects.

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Man and His Symbols | Carl Jung

Man and His Symbols is the last work undertaken by Carl Jung before his death in 1961. The principle aim of “Man and His Symbols” is an introduction to Jung’s work and ideas. It is an examination of man’s relation to his own unconscious, emphasising the importance of dreams in the life of the individual.

The book was first published in 1964 and is divided into five parts, four of which were written by Jung’s closest associates in the world of analytical psychology.

One of the most important part of the whole book is his idea of individuation, the process by which consciousness and the unconscious have learned to live at peace and to complement one another. This addresses the essence of Jung’s philosophy of life: Man becomes whole when (and only when) the process of individuation is complete.

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━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ⌛ Timestamps (0:00) Introduction (1:05) Part I. Approaching the Unconscious - Carl Jung (3:28) Part II. Ancient Myths and Modern Man - Joseph Henderson (4:52) Part III. The Process of Individuation - M.L. von Franz (6:55) Part IV. Symbolism in the Visual Arts - Aniela Jaffé (8:17) Part V. Symbols in an Individual Analysis - Jolande Jacobi