Viktor E Frankl’s story changed my life when I first heard it 20 some-odd years ago. He was a psychotherapist in the concentration camp and he discovered that even under the physical torture bestowed upon him by his callous captors, the one thing they could not take from him was his spirit. He went on to be freed and wrote a powerful book about his experiences and taught thousands what he had learned.
We are always in control of our responses to our situations. Today I ran across this quote from the Philosopher’s Notes. If you aren’t familiar with it, you may want to be! Brian reads and shares inspiration daily on matters pertinent to the spirit and personal growth.
Here is the quote that really struck me today:
Don’t aim at success — the more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one’s surrender to a person other than oneself. Happiness must happen, and the same holds for success: you have to let it happen by not caring about it. I want you to listen to what your conscience commands you to do and go on to carry it out to the best of your knowledge. Then you will live to see that in the long-run — in the long-run, I say! — success will follow you precisely because you had forgotten to think about it.” ~ Viktor Frankl from Man’s Search for Meaning
Here’s a link to Brian’s recap on the book in its entirety:
http://tv.philosophersnotes.com/65/mans-search-for-meaning-episode-8
May Success follow you!