Discovery meaning in your recovery

Victor Frankl, the esteemed psychiatrist who survived the Holocaust and founded logotherapy, found that ‘those who have a 'why' to live, can bear with almost any 'how'.

We often talk about using your values to motivate yourself towards helpful change. What, specifically, are your values? 

When you’re reflecting on your values, consider why you keep trying in the face of obstacles like distress, unexpected challenges, and setbacks. Why keep trying when you feel helpless and hopeless?

Dr. Frankl found that humans discover meaning in life in three ways:

1) Creating a work or deed

2) Experiencing something or encountering someone

And, importantly,

3) By the attitude towards which we take towards unavoidable suffering

It isn’t your fault that you have the biological vulnerabilities or the cognitive and behavioral mechanisms that maintain your illness. Your suffering is unavoidable. It is your responsibility. The way you respond can further reinforce your suffering with shame, self-criticism, and hopelessness. Or, it can give you a sense of meaning. It can make you feel courageous, curious, and compassionate.  

An attitude, by definition, is a settled way of thinking or feeling about someone or something, typically one that is reflected in a person's behavior. Attitudes don’t start as one time decisions. They starts as a series of moment by moment decisions that eventually becomes your “settled” way of thinking or feeling. You can start by changing your attitude in your behavior, and your thoughts and feelings will follow. You can also work on changing your thinking, and your feelings and behavior will follow. It’s best if you try changing your thinking and behavior at the same time.