Finding Purpose Through Pain: My Reflections on Man’s Search for Meaning

What if happiness isn’t the goal . . . but meaning is?

Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning changed how I see love, peace, and purpose forever.

Every now and then, a book finds you at exactly the right moment.

For me, Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl was one of those books.

I’ve read plenty of inspiring things over the years, but this one was different. It didn’t just speak to me; it articulated me. The way I think about love, peace, contentment, inner joy, and happiness… It's like Frankl reached into the quiet corners of my heart and put words to what I’ve always felt. I’ve never felt so understood by an author I’ll never meet.

And I have to say thank you to my mentor and leader, Ben Kinney, for teaching these principles and encouraging me to read it. I’m so grateful he did.

What Frankl Taught the World (and Me)

For anyone who hasn’t read it yet, Viktor Frankl was an Austrian psychiatrist, neurologist, and Holocaust survivor who founded logotherapy, the belief that our primary drive in life isn’t pleasure or power, but meaning.

He wrote this book after surviving four Nazi concentration camps where he lost his parents, brother, and pregnant wife. Amid the most horrific conditions imaginable, he discovered that even when everything is stripped away, one freedom always remains: the freedom to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances.

That truth hit me hard. Deep down, I’ve always believed peace isn’t about escaping pain or chasing perfection. It’s about choosing to feel, believe, and see joy right where you are. Frankl gave that belief language.

“Those who have a ‘why’ to live can bear with almost any ‘how.’”
~ Viktor Frankl

Lessons That Stayed With Me

1. Love Is the Ultimate Meaning

Frankl noticed that the prisoners who survived often maintained an inner sense of purpose and a positive attitude. That was an internal decision no external force could take away.

He wrote that love is the highest goal to which we can aspire. Even in suffering, when everything is gone, love remains,  as memory, as hope, as energy.

That idea settled deep in me. I’ve always believed love is the thread that connects our lives, but Frankl showed me it’s also what anchors us when life unravels. Love really is always the answer.

2. Suffering Isn’t the Enemy

His words completely reframed how I view struggle. Instead of running from it, he invites us to ask: What meaning can I find here?

Pain without purpose feels unbearable. But pain with purpose,  that’s growth, courage, and refinement. That’s where inner peace begins to form.

As a survivor of childhood sexual, emotional, and verbal abuse, a failed marriage, raising a disabled child, watching the love of my life fight cancer, a failed business partnership, and losing my mother… I’ve faced my share of pain. People often ask how I can still feel joy without bitterness. My answer has always been that I chose not to let it define me. I chose happiness and positivity.

But Frankl helped me understand why that choice brought peace. Because pain with purpose becomes healing. When I stopped asking “Why me?” and started seeing meaning in what happened for me, not to me, I found strength, grace, and a deeper kind of peace.

“In some way, suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning.”
 ~ Viktor Frankl

3. Freedom Is an Inside Job

We talk about freedom all the time, time freedom, financial freedom, freedom from expectations but Frankl reminded me that real freedom begins inside.

No circumstance can take away your ability to choose your response. That truth is both humbling and empowering.

It ties back to the ultimate meaning: choice. You get to choose how you will show up every single day.

The Nazis took everything they could from the prisoners except their ability to choose how they thought and felt. They could still remember love, hold faith, and choose courage. That’s what true freedom looks like.

And knowing that gives me faith too.

How I’m Carrying It Forward

This book changed the way I move through each day. I’ve started noticing meaning in the little things, a quiet cup of coffee, a hard conversation, a hug that lingers.

It’s changed what happiness means to me. It’s not about perfect days anymore. It’s about being present for the real ones.

Frankl’s message reminds me to live with intention, to find joy in purpose, gratitude in love, and peace in how I choose to show up, no matter what the day brings.

“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.”
 ~ Viktor Frankl

A Final Thank You

If I could thank Viktor Frankl, I’d tell him this:

Your words gave shape to something I’ve always felt but could never quite say correctly, that meaning, not comfort, is what makes life beautiful.

If you haven’t read Man’s Search for Meaning, I hope you do. It’s not just a book; it’s a quiet awakening.

What meaning are you finding in your own story today?

Love the life you’re building.
xo, Crystal

How did this book influence Crystal Rierson-Villeneuve’s perspective?
It helped her see that pain with purpose becomes healing. By embracing meaning over comfort, she found new clarity, gratitude, and freedom in how she lives each day.