DEPARTMENT OF PSYCHOLOGY

COURSE MATERIAL (Video Transcript)

First Term, AY 2020-2021

Course Code UTS

Course Description Understanding the Self
Prerequisite None
Credits 3 units; 54 hours (Lecture)
Mode of Delivery Online
Week Number 2 lesson 1
Lesson/Topic The Millennial Turn
Micro-Learning At the end of the lesson, the students will be able to:
Outcomes • identify the different perspective of a man in his society;
• initiates discussion concerning the view of a man; and
• create their own perspective of what is a man.
Assessment Measures Do it yourself worksheet
Video Transcript Hi, everyone! Good day. I am Cedrix Von Alesna from the
Department of Communication and Humanities. Welcome to our
third video lecture entitled The Millennial Turn.

The Millennial Turn will cover ideas by Albert Camus, Viktor

Frankl, and Erich Fromm.

Camus sees our life not as something beautiful but instead believes
that our life is absurd. He thinks that our life is meaningless and
pointless. We wake up every day, do every routine, and for what
goal? Because of this Camus suggests two solution to the problem
of absurdity. First, is suicide, killing one’s self means the absurdity
of life also ends. Second, is belief in a religion, at the end of this
current life, the is a beautiful afterlife for us. The two solutions are
not actual solutions, rather they are an escape to the absurdity of
life. The real solution that Camus suggest is the road Sisyphus
took. Sisyphus is a person that Camus calls as an absurd hero. A
man cursed to roll a boulder to the top of a mountain and yet is
happy with his circumstance. This is the goal we have to attain in
life. Yes, life is absurd but it can still be a meaningful life. We have
to accept that life is absurd and we can enjoy it, like Sisyphus who
rolls the boulder, a routine he needs to repeat everyday and is able
to see value and be happy. Life is absurd but we can be happy in
the absurdity of our life, all we need to do is accept it, and value
what we have now.

Frankl on the other hand does not see life as absurd rather for him
life is full of suffering. Are we suffering in everyday activity? Are
our routines tiring? Our life is a life where are just journeying
through and is full of pain and suffering. But to escaping this

Ethics | Overview of Philosophy 1

 feeling of pain is through finding meaning in our life. Frankl
believed that needless of our circumstances we are capable of
finding meaning in life and our motivation to live arises from our
will to find meaning in life. Our journeys are different and we have
the freedom to search for meaning in what we do, and what we
Video Transcript experience in life. But we discover this meaning in life through
(contd.) three different methods, first is through doing a deed in life. Seeing
people help the one’s in need or seeing a child share food to others,
reminds us that the world is not that bad after all. Second is
through experiencing something or encountering someone. Seeing
a beautiful sunset, comforts us that in the midst of our bad day, the
world can offer us something beautiful. Third is through our own
attitude in the search for meaning. If the world takes away
everything that we have, what is left is ourselves and our freedom
to pursue things and this is the last way to search for meaning. I
myself is a tool to find meaning in life. If I am left alone, I still can
survive with my meaning in life.

Camus and Frankl focused on the idea of life. But for Fromm a
conversation his started was on love. Fromm starts the
conversation by asking the question, is love an art? Because if it is,
then it requires knowledge and effort. Fromm is not saying the we
do not but effort in love, but he sees that we human have a peculiar
attitude towards relationship. The first problem he has observed
is, the attitude of being loved, rather than that of loving, of one’s
capacity to love. We human are fixated on the attitude on “are we
loveable”, am I cute enough or likeable enough for others. But
because of this mind set we forget what is more essential and that
is are we capable of loving them. Can I love you? The second
problem Fromm observe is the attitude of, people think that to love
is simple, what is difficult to find is the right object to love, the
right person to love. We do not need to learn anything because to
love is easy. But the problem here is, even if we find the right
person to love, our ideal partner in life, our forever, are you really
capable of loving them. You may have the perfect half, but your
heart is incapable of loving because you have forgotten to develop
your ability to love. The third error that we commit with love, is
the confusion between the initial feeling of “falling” in love, and
the permanent state of being in love. We enjoy the kilig moments of
falling in love but when we reach the serious parts of being in love,
we start to hate the responsibilities, the conflict we have to fix, or
the issues we need to resolve. We love the sweet part but we dread
the bitter parts of it. Because of this misconception, we sometimes
fail to understand that love is an art we can master, that it needs
knowledge and effort. Just like art, to make a masterpiece, we need
to understand it properly and put in the necessary effort. Nothing
is earned without putting in the needed prerequisites. Nothing

Understanding the Self | Paradigm of the Old 2

can be treasured with out working hard and putting your mind
into it.

With all of these, the next topics we are going to discuss would be
about the perspective of the East and the West. And that is where
our next lesson is heading. For now, we have talk about Camus
absurdity of life, Frankl’s Life is Suffering and Fromm’s Art of
Love. I hope you learn something from this lecture-discussion
video. For enrichment, feel free to study Handouts via LMS or
communicate with your instructors for questions. Likewise, please
be reminded of the due date of your activity worksheet available
and accessible via LMS or other platforms provided by your
instructors. Enjoy learning and keep safe everyone!
-end of video transcript-

Department of Psychology

Understanding the Self | Paradigm of the Old 3