Given the choice of escape from Nazi Austria or the almost certain imprisonment in a concentration camp if he stayed to help his parents, Viktor Frankl chose to stay. Out of that experience came his bestselling 1946 book, Man’s Search for Meaning, “which he wrote in nine days about his experiences in the camps.” Among his insights:
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.
This uniqueness and singleness which distinguishes each individual and gives a meaning to his existence has a bearing on creative work as much as it does on human love. When the impossibility of replacing a person is realized, it allows the responsibility which a man has for his existence and its continuance to appear in all its magnitude. 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.”
Being human always points, and is directed, to something or someone, other than oneself — be it a meaning to fulfill or another human being to encounter. The more one forgets himself — by giving himself to a cause to serve or another person to love — the more human he is.
There’s More to Life Than Being Happy – Emily Esfahani Smith – The Atlantic.