Quotes About Purpose

For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one's dedication to a cause greater than oneself.

Vivir significa asumir la responsabilidad de encontrar la respuesta correcta a las cuestiones que la existencia nos plantea, cumplir con las obligaciones que la vida nos asigna a cada uno en cada instante particular.

only to the extent to which a man commits himself to the fulfilment of his life's meaning [i.e., his vocation], to this extent he also actualizes himself. In other words, self-actualization cannot be attained if it is made an end in itself, but only as a side effect of the self-transcendence [that is guided by a vocation].

When a person cannot find a deep sense of meaning, they distract themselves with pleasure

la vida no se trata de dar sentido, sino de encontrar sentido. La vida no es ningún test de Rorschach, sino un cuadro enigmático. El sentido de la vida no puede idearse, hay que descubrirlo.

Life is not primarily a quest for pleasure, as Freud believed, or a quest for power, as Alfred Adler taught, but a quest for meaning. The greatest task for any person is to find meaning in his or her own life.

Viktor Frankl

The ultimate meaning necessarily exceeds and surpasses the finite intellectual capacities of man.

la felicidad debe surgir como consecuencia, pero en modo alguno debe ser buscada en sí misma.

El hombre tiene capacidad, fuerza, vocación para superarse a sí mismo, olvidarse de sí, perderse de vista, cuando se entrega a una tarea o a un semejante. Esto es lo que yo entiendo por autotrascendencia.

El ateo preferiría que se fuera honesto por uno mismo, por el bien de otro o por la bondad intrínseca de la cosa, y no para ir al cielo.

Suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of scarifice

If you're not busy living, you're dying.

People need hardship. They need something to struggle against. Someone to hate and feel superior to. Without those things they lose their identity and sense of purpose.

them to do when they

sic itur ad astra

Sacchetti ends his story with a popular saying: "What woman wants the Lord wants, and what the Lord wants comes to pass."24

It might be possible that the world itself is without meaning.

I feel that by writing I am doing what is far more necessary than anything else.

before parting that night we agreed that the objects of life were to produce good people and good books.

So the being grows rings; identity becomes robust. What was fiery and furtive like a fling of grain cast into the air and blown hither and thither by wild gusts of life from every quarter is now methodical and orderly and flung with a purpose--so it seems.

But for us the tragedy was but just beginning; as in the case of other wounds the pain was drugged at the moment, and made itself felt afterwards when we began to move. There was pain in all our circumstances, or a dull discomfort, a kind of restlessness and aimlessness which was even worse. Misery of this kind tends to concentrate itself upon an object, if it can find one, and there was a figure, unfortunately, who would serve our purpose very well.

The world wavered and quivered and threatened to burst into flames. It is I who am blocking the way, he thought. Was he not being looked at and pointed at; was he not weighted there, rooted to the pavement, for a purpose? But for what purpose?

We insist, it seems, on living. Then again, indifference descends.