Viktor E. Frankl

Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.

Since Auschwitz, we know what man is capable of. And since Hiroshima, we know what is at stake.

A human being is a deciding being.

Happiness must happen, and the same holds for success: you have to let it happen by not caring about it.

Everyone has his own specific vocation or mission in life; everyone must carry out a concrete assignment that demands fulfillment. Therein he cannot be replaced, nor can his life be repeated, thus, everyone's task is unique as his specific opportunity to implement it.

Challenging the meaning of life is the truest expression of the state of being human.

A painter tries to convey to us a picture of the world as he sees it; an ophthalmologist tries to enable us to see the world as it really is. The logotherapist's role consists of widening and broadening the visual field of the patient so that the whole spectrum of potential meaning becomes conscious and visible to him.

A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life, I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth — that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire.

The more one forgets himself — by giving himself to a cause to serve or another person to love — the more human he is.

Life can be pulled by goals just as surely as it can be pushed by drives.

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'.

I recommend that the Statue of Liberty be supplemented by a Statue of Responsibility on the west coast.