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Victor Frankl [1959] suggests that the search for meaning is the primary motivation in life and not a "secondary rationalization" of instinctual drives. People, he suggests, need "something" for the sake of which to live. 'Teleology' is the term for this belief that events are pulled by a purpose toward a definite end. The first and original meaning for telos was formulated by Aristotle: 'that for the sake of which'. He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how. - Nietzsche Victor Frankl [1959] suggests that the search for meaning is the primary motivation in life and not a secondary rationalization of instinctual drives. People, he suggests, need something for the sake of which to live. "Teleology" is the term for this belief that events are pulled by a purpose toward a definite end. Aristotle formulated the first and original meaning for telos: "that for the sake of which". Telos means aim, end, or fulfillment. Hillman [1994] states that telos is opposite to cause as we generally think of causes today. Causality asks, "Who started it?" It imagines events pushed from behind by the past. Teleology asks, "What's the point? What's the purpose?" It conceives events aimed toward a goal. Teleology gives a logic to life. Telos or purpose does not usually appear as a clearly framed goal, but more likely as a troubling, unclear urge coupled with a sense of unquestionable importance. Telos gives a limited, specific reason for the sake of which we perform our actions. It causes a person to imagine every action to be purposeful, but it does not state an overriding purpose to action in general; that would be teleology or finalism. The idea of telos gives value to what happens by regarding each occurrence as having purpose. Telos gives events value. Frankl also uses the term existential, which he suggests may be
used in three ways: to refer to A person's concern, even despair, over the worthwhileness of life
is an existential distress but by no means a mental disease. Frankl,
Hillman and others consider humans to be beings whose main concern
consists in fulfilling a meaning. Thus, to offer help to the person
in despair, in the kind of boredom which is existential and influences
a lack of meaning in all behaviors, the helper must find a way to
inspire a will to meaning. Such a search may arouse inner tension
rather than inner equilibrium. However, such tension is an indispensable
prerequisite of mental health. Frankl articulates it well, no instinct tells the person without telos what s/he has to do, and no tradition tells him or her what s/he ought to do; sometimes s/he does not even know what s/he wishers to do. Instead s/he either wishes to do what other people do [conformism] or he does what other people wish him to do [totalitarianism]. We would add that another alternative, which is to act randomly, seeking immediate gratification and to put a stamp of personal power on actions, but without any clear, organized telos to guide those actions [anarchy]. Random acts can never be productive although the may occasionally be beneficial. Productivity by its essence is building upon - a sequential order. Randomness, is the opposite of planned or purposeful, and haphazard acts are more likely to be destructive than helpful. We are advised by Frankl that we should not help people to search for an abstract meaning of life. Everyone, he says, has his own specific vocation or mission in life to carry out a concrete assignment that demands fulfillment. The person cannot be replaced, nor can his life be repeated. Thus, everyone's task is as unique as his specific opportunity to implement it. Ultimately, the person should not ask what the meaning of his/her life is, but rather s/he must recognize that it is s/he who is asked. Each person is questioned by life; and can only answer to life by answering for his own life; to life s/he can only respond by being responsible. Responsibility is a term common in everyday life and refers to aspects of experience with which we are all acquainted. It suggests obligation. Structures of responsibility appear to be built into human experience; providing the framework within which orderly interaction between persons and groups takes place [Niebuhr, 1968]. Yet obligation, duty and responsibility are very likely to be issue of concern when we talk about people with problems in living. The framework for orderly interaction is somehow skewed. Responsibility, Niebuhr tells us is not a thing. It is a relationship between self and others, or a relationship the person has to certain situations. Yet these responsibilities seem somehow irrelevant when there is no personal context; no meaning; no telos. Frankl suggests that we can discover our own personal telos, or meaning in life in three different ways: 1) by creating a work or doing a deed: a way of achievement or accomplishment that should be quite obvious. 2) by experiencing something or encountering someone: By experiencing something - such as goodness, truth and beauty - by experiencing nature or culture or last, but not least, by experiencing another human being in his uniqueness -by loving him/her, we find meaning in life. 3) by the attitude we take toward unavoidable suffering: Frankl, in his experience in the Nazi concentration camp learned first hand about the attitude toward unavoidable suffering. What matters, he says, is to bear witness to the uniquely human potential at its best, to turn one's predicament into a human achievement. When we are no longer able to change a situation - we are challenged to change ourselves. Suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning such as the meaning of sacrifice, a responsibility. We emphasize again the tension of doing something. The requirement to act, rather than just feel good. By emphasizing how a child feels, at the expense of what a child does - mastery, persistence, overcoming frustration and boredom and meeting challenge - parents and teachers are making children more vulnerable to depression [Seligman, 1995]. He goes on to suggest that we can feel better about ourselves either by succeeding more in the world or downsizing our hopes. Self esteem is a feeling state: mortification, contentment, satisfaction and the like define it. But good feeling is rooted in the world in the success with orderly interaction between persons and groups. Nathaniel Branden defined self esteem as: · confidence in our ability to think and to cope with the
basic challenges of life [doing well]. Yet Seligman goes on to indicate that there is no effective technology for teaching feeling good which does not first teach doing well. Feelings of self esteem is a by product of doing well. Low self esteem is a consequence or an effect of doing poorly, not the cause. The cause is in the doing, and the doing is tied in an unquestionable way to meaning. And meaning is tied to purpose or telos for the individual life. The structure of purpose is tied directly to organized and non-random actions. But the creation of telos, meaning, purpose or goals you might say, are only thoughts, How can they impact on our actions? Thoughts are things, they are ideas projected into form, partaking of the nature of the thinker; they occupy space in mental fields. James Allen [ 1864-1912] probably stated it best when he said: A man is literally what he thinks, his character being the complete sum of all his thoughts. And these thoughts predispose a person to act. Or as Charles Fillimore [1930] writes - As he thinketh within himself, so is he is a statement of the [spiritual or natural] law that has no exception. Or finally, Baar suggests that .."Unknown events going on behind the scenes are in control of whatever happens on our subject stage. [Baar - 1988] The fact that people become unconscious of a repetitive or predictable stimulus does not mean that the stimulus has disappeared; on the contrary, it continues to be processed in the appropriate input system". Every conscious event is shaped by a number of enduring unconscious systems, which Baar calls mental contexts. He then suggests that we treat context as relatively enduring systems that shapes conscious experience, access and control, without itself becoming conscious. Contexts are coalitions of unconscious specialized processors that are "already committed" to a certain way of processing their information. Contexts are unconscious systems that evoke and shape conscious experience. Contexts can be thought of as information that the nervous system has [already] adapted to; it is the ground against which new events are defined. If we seek to help people with problems in living, it seems imperative that we discover some method in which to help inspire the will to meaning and a telos to which they can be responsible. It is not self evident under all circumstances what we should or ought do. This is clearly part of the human experience as well. Without a context, behavior becomes random. The process of recognition of obligation involves a decision making which identifies to what we are responsible. Choices also involve reflection about what I am responsible for. To choose to be responsible for one thing often excludes the possibility of being responsible for another. These observations point to the necessity to accept limitation, finitude and contingency in life. To summarize, why is a conscious and comprehensive goals structure, rooted in a personal telos so important? The development of telos provides the person with a context within which s/he can develop a summon bonum [life's greatest good]; a personal philosophy of life. From such a context, the person will select a coherent criteria for truth or fitness and place value. This coherence of standards will help them avoid material fallacies of reasoning since it provides a valued context in which they can decide to whom and for what they are responsible and the act of accepting responsibility is a process of becoming. Personal worthlessness cannot exist when one has purpose, responsibility and obligations. Finally, it provides the basis for an ethic, or a theory of right conduct, and from this emerges a moral perspective which is the practice of right conduct. Having an ethic and a practice of right conduct leads to a tension to achieve - which leads to a striving for mastery - a personal improvement program which leads to self esteem. One cannot practice right conduct without a coherent meaning for life. For the sake of what would the person act? Failure of coherence within the person leads to random, mostly destructive acts. Failure to achieve mastery inevitably leads to poor self image and incoherent behavior. References: Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, Simon & Schuster, Inc., First Printing English Translation 1959 - Third edition 1984 H. Richard Niebuhr, The Meaning of Responsibility, in On Being Responsible, Gustafson & Laney, Eds., Harper Forum books, 1968. James Hillman, The Soul's Code, Charles Fillmore The Twelve Powers of Man, Unity Classic Library, First Printing, 1930; twenty fourth printing 1995. Martin E. P. Seligman, etal., The Optimistic Child, Houghten Mifflin Company, 1995. James Allen, As A Man Thinkith, Barnes & Noble 1992. |
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