The first turn-around that I took from Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning concerned how to think about the meaning of my life. His concentration camp experience was of a life reduced to surviving cruelty, hard labour, and deprivation. Finding a meaning to such a life situation was a challenge and important for survival. What Frankl realized from his experience was that a meaning for one’s life is not abstract or attained by going inside oneself. Rather, it involves attending to what life is asking of the individual.

It did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life – daily and hourly. (Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning)

And the answer is concrete and relevant to the now of our particular situation, the unique reality of who and how we are, where we are, and what is happening to us. Life offers us meaning through what we can do, here and now. The meaning our life is not an abstract or woolly or high-flown ideal.

The meaning of my life is particular to me in my ‘now’.

Everyone has their own specific vocation or mission in life to carry out a concrete assignment which demands fulfillment. Therein they cannot be replaced, nor can their life be repeated. Thus everyone’s task is as unique as their specific opportunity to implement it. (Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning)

Frankl urges that we each take responsibility to answer for our own life by finding a meaning.

I tried it out, at a time when I was feeling ill and rather pathetic. I asked these questions and allowed the answers to be on the very local scale of the precise situation I found myself in:

What now is the meaning of my life?

What is the real and concrete thing that only I can do in this situation?

The answers that came to me really helped to get me out of my slump, to think differently, and to move and take action:

only I can paint with fluorescent pink in the way I do

it’s a special colour in my palette and only one brand gives the colour I want, and I’ve developed particular ways to use it. I can stop fretting over big questions about finding success as an artist, and just go to my paints and use some of the fluorescent pink. I did that, and it started a painting session. It kind of stands in for only I can paint the pictures I paint. reminds me of my uniqueness as a painter

only I can write the poem that I am writing

again, instead of worrying about what the other people on my course will think about my work, I need to just get on with it and value my writing process

only I can be the grandma that I am

this one led me to list the particular things that only I have to offer in this role, to recognize those I’ve done and remind me of what we could do together – ‘adventures’ like going through the car wash; activities like painting and telling stories together; my skills like ‘scaffolding’ our shared activities so she plays and learns at an optimum level.

What I loved about this way of thinking is how, by being so personal and unique, it removes the possibility of failing and reinforces confidence. It’s as if the goal is already achieved in the stating of it.

I’d love to hear what happens when you try it - do share in the Comments box.