Food for thought

There is a book that I began a few years ago, "Man's Search for Meaning" by Viktor Frankl (an Austrian neurologist and Holocaust survivor.) It is a good book - I put it down halfway through because it is such a dark part of our history. It is one of those books you're glad you read later - but tough to read of the harsh cruelty the Jews faced.

I saw a quote in the newpaper this week from "Man's Search for Meaning":

"Between stimulus and response there is a
space. In that space is our power to choose our
response. In our response lies our growth and our
freedom."

I thought it was a powerful thought - especially considering who spoke it. Here are a few more favorite quotes from that same book:

“We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men
who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of
bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that
everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms
-- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's
own way.”

“Those who have a 'why' to live, can bear with almost any
'how.'

The one thing you can’t take away from me is the way I
choose to respond to what you do to me. The last of one’s freedoms is to choose
ones attitude in any given circumstance.”

"What is to give light must endure
burning.”

Victor Frankl