568 Quotes by Viktor E. Frankl

Suffering is intended to guard man from apathy, from psychic rigor mortis.

If we were immortal, we could legitimately postpone every action forever. [...] But in the face of death as absolute finis to our future and boundary to our possibilities, we are under the imperative of utilizing our lifetimes to the utmost, not letting the singular opportunities - whose "finite" sum constitutes the whole of life - pass by unused.

[U]ntil his last breath no one can wrest from a man his freedom to take one or another attitude toward his destiny.

[T]he full gravity of the responsibility that every man bears throughout every moment of his life: the responsibility for what he will make of the next hour, for how he will shape the next day.

For in every case man retains the freedom and the possibility of deciding for or against the influence of his surroundings.

If all men were perfect, then every individual would be replaceable by anyone else. From the very imperfection of men follows the indispensability and inexchangeability of each individual; for each is imperfect in his own fashion.

To escape into the mass is to disburden oneself of individual responsibility. As soon as someone acts as if her were a mere part of the whole, and as if only this whole counts, he can enjoy the sensation of throwing off some of the burden of his responsibility. This tendency to flee from responsibility is the motif of all collectivism. True community is in essence the community of of responsible persons; mere mass is the sum of depersonalized entities.

Freedom is not something we "have" and therefore can lose; freedom is what we "are.

[T]he symptom is never merely a consequence of some somatic factor and the expression of some psychic factor, but is also a mode of existence - and this last element is the crucial one.