Being human always points to something other than oneself

 

Being human always points, and is directed, to something, or someone, other than oneself—be it meaning to fulfill or another human being to encounter. The more one forgets himself—by giving himself to a cause to serve or another person to love—the more human he is and the more he actualizes himself. 

Vicktor Frankl Man's Search for Meaning

looked this up after rereading this section of Saving Time by Jenny Odell

This poem illustrates Frankl's notion that to be human is to be directed to something other than oneself... It also explains why, in those moments of true encounter that unsettle the boundary between myself and something or someone else -- when time seems to stop, then expand -- I sometimes notice a strange side effect. Like an oceanic upwelling, long-buried memories come to the surface: images and states of mind I remember from childhood, from college, from my early adult life.  These memories are often of similar moments of encounter, as though under the grid of calendar years and career milestones there were another dimension, one where all these encounters spilled into one another.