Dr. Viktor Frankl Reveals The KEY To Surviving Despair

Added: 2026-05-15

[00:00:00]They can turn their tragedies into a personal triumph, but they must know for what what should I do with it. But if people like so many segments of present day society and population cannot find any meaning whatsoever in their lives, cannot see anything meaningful, they more often than not have uh uh to uh to something to live by uh but say at least enough to live by.

[00:00:32]They cannot see anything to live for. By far one of the greatest psychiatrists and inspirational people of all time is a great Victor Frankl who wrote Man Search for Meaning. Here he is talking about finding meaning even in the most difficult of circumstances. But of course, I want to hear what you have to say about this video. So don't forget to leave your comments below, subscribe to this channel, and we'll talk to you on the other end of the video.

[00:00:53]>> So your basic philosophy is that life has meaning under all conditions. But how easy is it when there's a sense of hopelessness, a sense of despair to recognize this meaning?

[00:01:07]Let me present you, confront you with a somewhat uh strange definition of despair.

[00:01:16]as I'm used to uh proclaiming is that despair uh can be explained in terms of a mathematical equation D capital B equals S minus M. What does it mean? Despair is suffering without meaning. As long as an individual cannot find cannot see any meaning in his or her despair, he or she will certainly be prone to in its suffering. I wanted to say no meaning in the suffering. He or she will her will certainly be prone to despair and under certain conditions to suicide. But at the moment they can see a meaning in their suffering. They can mold it into an achievement into a they can mold their predicament into an accomplishment on the human level. They can turn their tragedies into a personal triumph, but they must know for what what should I do with it. But if people like so many segments of present day society and population cannot find any meaning whatsoever in their lives, cannot see anything meaningful. They more often than not have uh uh to uh to something to live by.

[00:02:57]Uh I say at least enough to live by.

[00:03:00]They cannot see anything to live for.

[00:03:02]>> Well, there he was. The great Victor Frankle, a man who I've written several books about and I practice his psychology. Let me review for you what exactly he was saying about suffering and how to overcome it. First of all, he uses a great formula. D despair equals S suffering minus M meaning. What does it mean? If a person suffers and he doesn't have any meaning in his suffering, he's posed to go into a state of terrible despair and the worst of circumstances, even suicide. But when you subtract meaning from suffering, when you give suffering some meaning, if you know why it happened to you or what to do with that, then you can transform your depression, you can definitely transform your despair and go on to a state of what he calls triumph. This is so incredibly important, ladies and gentlemen. Most of psychology deals with the self. Especially in America in the last few years, we talk about self-gratification, self-esteem, and self-awareness. But Victor Frankle said one thing which is extremely important. It's not about what I need. It's about what I'm needed for.

[00:04:11]And I'm asking everybody to think about this. There's so much suffering in the world today. People have lost loved ones. People's family members are depressed. Maybe perhaps you're depressed or terribly anxious. People have trauma on in our society. People have experienced a loss of jobs, um, loss of money, terrible things in this world, and they may have even experienced terrible personal violence.

[00:04:34]But I have to tell you one thing, whatever you've gone through, listen carefully what Victor Frankle said, you have to find some meaning in your suffering. If you can find some meaning in your suffering, you're most apt to overcome your suffering. And that's exactly what Victor Frankle taught in his book, Man's Search for Meaning, because that's what he experienced in Ashvitz. They were terribly abused people that the Nazis wanted to murder.

[00:04:58]They took away their money. They took away their freedom. They took away their food. They killed their loved ones.

[00:05:03]There were times where people were were ready to commit suicide. And Victor Frankle found some meaning in their lives. For example, he found one person about to throw himself on the electrified fence to kill himself in Avitz. He said, "Is there somebody in the future that's waiting to be loved by you and they're worth living for at this moment, not giving up hope?" another person that wanted to commit suicide. He said, "Let's find something for you to do to help some other inmate in Aitz. He said, "I can share some of my morsels of bread with him." That man that night shared a morsel of bread and found some meaning in giving to others even though the situation was desperate. The situation seemed almost impossible. So, what I want you to do is think about I know it's a difficult thing, but I talk about this in my psychology. I talk about this in my books. Try to find some meaning in your suffering. It's not a simple thing to understand, but if you meditated on it just for a few moments, I believe you'll find something I can do with my suffering. Perhaps I'm suffering because I need to become more sensitive.

[00:06:03]Perhaps I have suffered because it's prevented me from doing something worse or something worse happened to me. I guarantee you if you think deeply about this, you will find a little bit of meaning. You could squeeze out, as Victor Frankle says, some meaning in your suffering. And in fact, you could take your suffering and say, "I want to dedicate my life because of my suffering to something greater than myself." Think about things that you can do that are beyond yourself. Uh helping other people, uh loving somebody else in your life, fixing injustice, fixing something in the world that needs to be fixed. I guarantee if you focus more on that, if you find some more meaning, you're definitely prone to experience less depression. Remember, how do you overcome despair? Suffering minus meaning. Finding more meaning is the way to go. But of course, I want to hear what you have to say about this incredible Victor Frankle video.