Frankl 154 starts his concept of the will to meaning from his criticism to the concepts of the pleasure principle by Freud and the will to power by Adler. He
considers that those concepts simplify the existence and the behaviour of human being. Moreover, pleasure and power are not the main purpose of life but they are
rewards from the actions of self-fulfilment that are based and directed on the will to meaning.
According to Frankl, meaning is unique and personal because of fact that people have their own way to find the meaning of life. Besides, it is also
changeable along with the times and conditions in people’s life. It can be found by them in his works, art works and the worldview, even in the truth and love that
they struggle and undergo personally. It shows that a person cannot give or entrust another person to create a meaning of life for him. In other words, only the person
himself can feel and experience whether his life is meaningful or not and what the meaning of life for him is.
a. Base of logotherapy
Frankl 154-173 in Man’s Search for meaning and Introduction to
Logotherapy explains that the will to meaning is the main activator of one’s
personality. Furthermore, the freedom of will, the will to meaning, and the meaning of life become the base of logotherapy.
1 The freedom of will
Logotherapy explains that every person has a freedom and has to be responsible for his or her freedom. Freedom for people is the freedom to take a
stand on every condition they face, either the condition of the environment or their
self-condition but not the freedom from biological, psychological, and sociological aspects.
Taking a stand on the conditions, people can go out of biological and psychological dimension and then enter their spiritual dimension, where people
can be as a noble creature different from other creatures. It is appropriate to an honourable term for a human as a self determining being. It means that, on the
limitations, people have the ability and freedom to change their life condition in order to gain the more qualified life. The most important thing is that the freedom
must be followed by the responsibility so that it does not become despotism. 2
The will to meaning Logotherapy explains that people always want to be valuable and useful
persons for themselves, their family, friends, work environment, society, and being worthy for God. People also want to love and be loved by others because
they will feel worthy and glorious by feeling of love and being loved. For example, parents always want to love and be loved by their children, and also
want to be able to do their functions in the family as good as possible. On the other hand, children also want to be loved and to be pride of their parents.
The will to meaning is really the main motivator to people. It can direct them to do some activities like doing their job and abilities. As the basic motivator
for human being, the will to meaning directs people to be worthy and meaningful individual that they can find in their activities. If people can gain the will to
meaning, they will feel useful, worthy, and meaningful for themselves and people around. On the other hand, they will feel meaningless if they cannot gain the will.
3 The meaning of life
The meaning of life is deemed as something important, worthy and giving a particular value to someone, in which it properly becomes the purpose in life.
People will find their life worthy if they can fulfil the meaning of life. Then, the meaning of life is apparently in the life itself and able to be found in every
condition either enjoyable or suffering condition, even death. Meaning in suffering or blessing in disguise shows that people can still find the meaning of
life although they are in suffer. If the will can be fulfilled, the people’s life will be useful, worthy, and meaningful. On the contrary, if the will cannot be fulfilled, the
people’s life will be meaningless.
b. Processes of Finding the Meaning of Life
Frankl 69-79 in The Will to Meaning Foundation and Applications of Logotherapy
explains that there are valuing processes that will enable someone to find a meaningful life. They are creative values, experiential values, and
attitudinal values. 1
Creative values Creative values consist of doing work, creating and doing the duty as good
as possible with the responsibility. For example, people can find their meaning of life and experience their life meaningfully by doing work. They feel more worthy
when they have a work than when they have no work. Thus, the meaning of life is not determined by the work but it
depends on one’s personality, which has positive attitude to love his work and also to do work wholeheartedly. That is why
