The Statue of Responsibility

At the beginning of May 2016 I was invited to attend a fund raiser for a Statue that will be erected on the West Coast in response to a request by the late Viktor Frankl. He had stated in his book, “Man’s Search for Meaning”, that a comparable statue on the West Coast should be created to mirror the Statue of Liberty on the East Coast. Viktor called it the Statue of Responsibility. Viktor was a Holocaust survivor and the father of Logotherapy, a form of therapy in Psychology. So a fantastic sculptor was granted the project to create a statue and this sculptor’s name is Gary Lee Price. Gary had created a beautiful statue called the “Ascent” that I became acquainted with at The Schuster Center where I was a student and now a member of the visiting faculty. The “Ascent” is crafted with two Native American Indians climbing up a mountain. The first is reaching down to help the second. It spoke a great deal to me in that we should all be in service to each other to get to a higher place, whether it be in stature or to become a better human being in personal growth and development. The Statue of Responsibility was created for just that reason. Viktor had a statue that showed a rising hand. When Gary was asked to create The Statue of Responsibility, he went to Vienna to see Viktor’s widow Ellie. He saw Viktor’s statue and was moved by that. He saw through the eyes of his creative talent to join an additional hand in aide. That is what will be built on the West Coast in one of 5 cities either in Washington, Oregon, or California. Taking this Statue of Responsibility one step further, I was so moved by what was taking place that I made a donation to become part of this movement. It mirrored so nicely with my philosophy of how Health Care should be. Health you see is a function of responsibility. It is something only the person can give to themselves. A doctor can cure someone’s disease but they can’t make them healthy. Therefore on my counter at the front desk is the marble model of the Statue of Responsibility that will soon be part of the West Coast somewhere. I am proud to display this statue as my office is dedicated to all those who have made a fundamental choice to be healthy.