HOPE SPRINGS
ETERNAL
In Alexander Pope’s
“Essay on Man” written in 1732, the English poet penned this timeless line of
prose: “Hope springs eternal in the human breast.” His insight calls to
mind three Jewish psychiatrists who lived in and around Vienna in the period
leading up to World War II.
The first of these
three psychiatrists, Sigmund Freud, spent years studying people, striving to
understand what makes us tick. He reached the conclusion that the
fundamental drive in human beings is the search for PLEASURE. According
to Freud, it’s our basic need for pleasure that explains why we do what we do.
The second, Alfred
Adler, also spent years studying human behavior. His studies led him to
disagree with Sigmund Freud. Adler was convinced that the bottom line in
understanding human behavior is POWER. In his view, all of us grow up
feeling somewhat inferior and powerless. Thus, life becomes a drive to
gain control, to feel more important and powerful.
Viktor Frankl
sought to follow in the footsteps of his mentors, Freud and Adler. But
before his career gained traction, World War II began. The Nazi invasion
brought danger and death to millions of Jews. Freud and Adler were world
renowned scholars, so they managed to escape. Frankl wasn’t so
fortunate. He was arrested and detained in a Nazi concentration camp four
long years.
After the war
ended, Frankl was released and resumed his career. Carefully evaluating
his experiences as a prisoner, he noted something strange and unexpected – that
the people who survived were not always the ones that others would expect.
Many who were physically strong wasted away and died while others who
were physically weak grew stronger and survived. Why? What was it
that enabled them to hang on through the living hell of a Nazi concentration
camp?
Frankl reflected on
the theories of his mentors. Freud’s pleasure principle could not explain
it. For four desperate and terrible
years, the men in his camp knew only pain, suffering and degradation.
Pleasure was not even a word in their vocabulary. It certainly
wasn’t pleasure that kept them going.
What then of
Adler’s theory about power being the basic human need? That wouldn’t
explain it either. Frankl and his fellow
Jews were completely powerless during their years in the concentration camp.
Each day they stared down the barrels of loaded guns, they were treated
like animals, they felt enemy boots on their faces and watched helplessly while
fellow Jews were executed via gas chamber genocide. They neither had
power, nor any prospects of power.
So Viktor Frankl
came up with his own theory. He concluded that the primary difference
between those who survived and those who perished was HOPE. Those who
survived never gave up the belief that their lives had value and meaning.
Despite horrendous circumstances, they believed that their suffering would
eventually end, and they would once more live meaningful, purposeful lives.
What is this basic human drive? According to Frankl, it is the need
to live with a sense of purpose. Not pleasure. Not power.
MEANING which results in HOPE.
Consider your
present life situation. What’s really going on with you? More
importantly, what are you HOPING and TRUSTING GOD for in the short- and
long-term? Whatever that is, it constitutes your LIFE-VISION, which must and shall be inscribed
in the indelible ink of HOPE.
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