Katy Cabot Journal Entries of Sessions with C.G. Jung
May 9th, 1932
Back again in Zurich & seeing Jung more often, so as to get at the “lump” that is causing my panics.
I told him today about X, & he said that X was a great fantasy artist & could sometimes tell the most astonishing lies!
Also that X “hat sich eingebildet” [X had imagined] that he could ski & wanted to be le “Tartarin des Alpes” le protector got himself into that role.
He roared with laughter over X. I’m in a particularly depressed mood now over Dan [Dr. George Draper] & told him again how I couldn’t seem to get over it.
He said Dan’s letter was thoroughly superficial, like himself – that he was a featherweight, and that is why, though brilliant, he couldn’t become famous because he couldn’t stick to a thing long enough – had to go on always to something new and exciting.
He is like a cork just floating; if he had had a little lead in him, he could sink into something & remain anchored. Jung said he heard . . .
[The page ends there. On the following page, in different ink, is written:] ” … his cage.
No man could help Dan, only a woman.” ~Katy Cabot, Jung My Mother and I, Page 60
… truths about myself which I fancy I needed to hear.
The main point seems to be that I haven’t a fundamental philosophy of my own which I hold to sincerely amid the storms & stress of life.
It strikes me as being very true the more I think about it.
I’ve always been trying to please everybody, be on everybody’s side & cut my cloth, as it were, so that it will always be accepted & acceptable to the herd.
Then he [Jung] pointed out that I make too much fuss about my affairs and experiences – as though mine were the only & original ones & no other man even had the like.
He counseled me just to get a Weltanschauung – something I believed in – & then quietly go about working inconspicuously.
Then, when I had something to say with ample proof & data, to say it.
He talked about what he called ‘living double.’
If a man has a philosophy of life which differs from that of the group he works and plays with,
he must do what is expected of him in the expected way insofar as his routine group responsibilities are concerned.
But he can go on thinking; working & living his own ideas quietly & unostentatiously.
It is all getting very much clearer to me & I think the implication is that I must return to my clinic & not try to force my new ideas into that great medical machine – but do my job there & quietly, inconspicuously work out my thoughts.
So much for the work side of life. Whether or not I can carry out the same technique in the ‘family circle’ is not so clear to me.
In respect of that situation, Jung kept emphasizing that many men were in trouble of that sort – that my case was not unique.
“If you get a Divorce,” he said, “the skyscrapers won’t fall down on your head.”
I can see much more clearly now that I’ve taken everything in life far too hard, put myself in the wrong unnecessarily most of the time & supposed that my life experiences were unique.
Much more terrible than anyone else’s. Absurd of course.
Now having perceived it, can I overcome the habit of years & cease reacting to life that way? When I think of you … [Katy destroyed the rest of the letter.] ~Katy Cabot, Jung My Mother and I, Page 61
October 13th, 1933
Mrs. C. Cabot
Villa Aloha
San Remo
Italy
Dear Mrs. Cabot,
I shall be very busy in the beginning of November.
In the second half of November it would be better because up to then one or the other of my cases will leave.
There is moreover a new complication in my life and that is that I have to deliver a course of lectures at the technical university, which of course takes up a good deal of my time.
I have seen the “Flying Draper” too.
He was as flimsy and unsubstantial as ever.
Of course perfectly delightful as far as it goes.
Hoping you had a splendid summer and a correspondingly beautiful autumn, I remain,
Yours sincerely, C.G. Jung ~Carl Jung, Jung My Mother and I, Page 64-65
November 20, 1933
Have seen Dr. Jung again today for the first time since last winter – almost a year!
I had a long talk about the past year and told him that my rapport with Janey was getting much better but I myself felt that I was of flimsy stuff and like “our friend feathers.”
In fact I could actually see myself talking insincerely to people, and felt I appeared and was oberflachlich [superficial].
He said that that was so and laughed!
He said that, way in the background, there was some good in me, but it was far hidden and would have to be got at.
As things were now, I was very unstable and unsound – but he added, “You have learnt something.”
We spoke of Draper, and he said he had seen him and that Draper was ‘thin’ as ever. I said, “Oh thin?”
He said, “I mean spiritually thin!” ~Katy Cabot, Jung My Mother and I, Page 65-66
He [Dr. Jung] then asked me if I had any special dream of late.
I said that the night before I had dreamt that I had a big swelling on my right thumb, and a man suggested cutting it open with a huge knife, a yard long, and putting disinfectant in it.
He explained that the long knife was really a sword – a sword is used in one’s right hand to kill – if one’s right thumb is incapacitated one can’t use a sword. (The Romans used to cut off their enemies’ thumbs to incapacitate them.)
The right hand denotes the wisdom and understanding one has, so that it is most important to keep one’s wisdom and not have it go off in an abscess.
Therefore, I have been living wrong and allowed myself to be infected – otherwise there wouldn’t be an operation with a sword.
Now, I want him (Dr. Jung) to cleanse my thumb and perform an operation with a sword.
He said I had become infected by the atmosphere of St. Moritz, and that one is all wrong inside to go to such a place.
The atmosphere of St. Moritz is the worst possible one.
It shows my conscious is wrong to wish to go there and to look at or be with such people.
At any rate I want Dr. Jung to cut out the abscess on my right hand.
The right hand, as I said before, shows one’s understanding and conscious conduct of life – all that must be wrong for me and I wish to cut the abscess out. I am too easily swayed.
I should not put myself in St. Moritz positions and expect not to be swayed.
I said to Jung, “What about putting oneself in such positions and being able to stand firm, wouldn’t that be the ideal?”
“Yes,” said Dr. Jung, “but that is very difficult, for if you went there, you would perhaps be swayed.”
Jung said he would only go to St. Moritz if he had to, but if he stayed on and said to himself, “Let’s stay and look at these people,” then he would probably begin to say, “Why has that terrible person got the Rolls and that terrible one such lovely clothes, etc.”
He went on to say, “If I had the mentality to go and look at them, then I’d probably be jealous.
If you go into a situation which is wrong then you are wrong.
If you have contracted a wrong situation then you must purify yourself – you can’t put a whole crowd right!
Try to understand yourself and clarify your motives so as to recuperate your former right attitude.
You can clear out of the place!
Leave things to themselves if an unparalleled wrongness is in place.
Certain places are wrong just as certain places are right and have a beneficent effect in style and atmosphere.”
He went on to say that the Rainmaker of Cracow came to an arid province where he was asked to induce rain.
He promised to do so if he were allowed to stay three days by himself in a lonely house. At the end of three days, it snowed! When asked why it snowed at that time of year, he said that he had gone wrong because he had got into the atmosphere of such wrong people! ~Katy Cabot, Jung My Mother and I, Page 68-69
I told Dr. Jung that I occasionally had the ‘fears.’
He said that evidently the ‘Lump’ still got loose and rolled around.
Certain people have a lump when they get into the swell.
A lump is an inherited, and not assimilated piece that is like an Imp who keeps civil until you get into rough waters.
It causes instability and in the important moments of your life comes up and plays you a trick and ruins things.
A person will say, “I’m O.K. but it is always circumstances which ruin things for me!”
You can always say it is circumstance or the other fellow who is wrong, when it is you who always gets into trouble.
Facts can heap themselves up to such an extent that it is as if you were always accompanied by an Imp who spoils everything.
Dr. Jung said he stayed with Dr. Curtius in Duisberg, Dr. Curtius would never have come to analysis if it had not been for the War [First World War] and the German economic situation.
He hankers after the Baur-au-Lac [Hotel] life, as he is always saying that he is through with it.
One also talks about bettering oneself because one isn’t doing it.
Jung advised me to live amongst decent people and not a St. Moritz crowd. ~Katy Cabot, Jung My Mother and I, Page 69-70
December 1st, 1933
First I spoke of the panics which I had in the Dolderbahn the other day, so that I finally had to speak to the Schaffner [ticket collector].
He said that it showed I was not enough with people in spirit – not near enough to them – that I hold myself too much aloof.
The unconscious is trying to drive me to people.
He said that my speaking to the Schaffner was an interesting experience.
Also, he went on to say that a ‘thirst for liberty,’ an insatiable thirst for liberty, came from being held in too much in childhood.
However, I explained to him that it didn’t come from that but from too much liberty.
I had been allowed to choose my own schools and governesses, and had had freedom of spirit and of pocket while my parents were in China. Dr. Jung said that was an unusual situation,·and one rarely ever heard of such a bringing-up, so now he could see that what I craved was a ‘settled situation,’ though my conscious was afraid of it and thirsted for liberty.
My conscious was afraid boxed up in the Dolderbahn, but my unconscious was delighted as it was looking for a frame.
He then gave me an example of such a conflict: A young girl who is afraid of men, runs away from them, is shy and blushes etc. . .. it is all because in her unconscious she longs for a man – which is the right thing.
One’s conscious usually behaves strangely when in conflict with the unconscious because the conscious attitude is wrong and the unconscious is usually after the best thing for one.
He said that I had no roots, have lived a precarious existence and my unconscious craves a box – a frame to be fixed in – something stable and permanent.
That is one reason I like Oswald [Tommy].
He is absolutely the antithesis to Draper: stable, dependable, rational and with real substance, and that appeals to me.
On the other hand, I am afraid of losing my liberty so that is why I want Oswald to go to Africa for six months.
But, as Jung says, I must neither suggest the trip to him nor deter him from it.
It is his own concern and must be his choice. Maybe he prefers being near me!
My unconscious likes the way Oswald holds me in bounds and anchors me.
He goes after women outside of his conventional circle because his unconscious feels that to compensate him he must get a woman who is ‘different.’
If he didn’t get such a woman nothing would happen and that would be too dreadfully dull for him to be alone with nothing happening.
He can afford to go out after such a woman as me because he has so much stability that he can hold me down.
Dr. Jung told me again the story of a man who was afraid, a Trappist missionary, who was finally killed in Africa.
He said that he too had always been afraid of tropical diseases, so he went out to Africa and into wild dangerous regions where the tsetse fly was etc. [to overcome his fear].
[H. G.] Baynes was very· difficult out there and went into moods, and sometimes did not speak for three weeks.
One day Bevers ( the other American with them) heard a shot, looked out of the tent and said, “I hope it’s Baynes blowing out his brains!”
I had an unconscious desire for a mold.
We spoke of Roosevelt, and Jung said that is what comes of electing a man with no legs – only brains and surrounded by a bunch of scientists. He said that Roosevelt must be a terrific optimist if he could accomplish all he has [in mind] in face of his infirmity. ~Katy Cabot, Jung My Mother and I, Page 71-72
December 7th, 1933
This is the last session this term.
At first, I spoke of coming out to Kusnacht in the train, how easy it was and much cheaper [than a taxi!].
We spoke of my trying to be franker with regard to people.
In other words, I must be conscious that I want to say something rude, then either not say it, or make it milder.
For instance, when I said to Mrs. Strong, after her remark, “We shall miss you so much in Chateau d’Oex this winter,” “But you never saw me last winter,” I should have thought out and let out a platitude which could not possibly have offended her. ~Katy Cabot, Jung My Mother and I, Page 74
We then spoke of Hannah [Barbara].
He said she was like a bad dog, some days so nice and other days so snappy.
He said it was a pity she did not have a lump as it might hold her in check.
When I mentioned the fact that she wanted to share a studio with me, he said, “So that she can have someone ori whom to vent her nasty remarks.”
He went on to say that Hannah was jealous and tried to get me fussed about nails the other day at the Pfauen when she announced to the whole table that she did not like them.
He then said that I still have the Lump, it was still rolling about, and I should know, for instance, that the Dolderbahn frightened me because my conscious didn’t want to get into a fixed mold (whereas my unconscious does!). ~Katy Cabot, Jung My Mother and I, Page 74
I then read him the fantasy of the cruel old woman and child.
He quite rightly said that the old woman was my dark and shadow side, and the child was me at times, too. I said I had lost my sex and my digestion.
He said that sex might be in the Lump and some other strange things as well, for after hearing about the old woman he could bet that the Lump contained every old thing imaginable!
He said he thought the Lump must be something rather ghastly!
I told him that 0. [Oswald, or Tommy] was here and my sex was gone.
He was just opening his mouth to say something when the lights went out and we were in utter darkness. We roared with laughter!
He said that 0. being here and my having no sex made the whole thing ridiculous, which of course it does.
There was so much to tell him and the time so short, that I could hardly catch up on it all.
Jung went on to say that by writing [fantasies] one slowly gets out what is in the Lump, and then gets to know oneself.
A person must know himself; otherwise, he becomes self-conscious.
You can always tell that people are self-conscious inasmuch as they know not themselves – it is a sure sign they don’t know themselves!
One must let a child gain all the knowledge that it wants to get.
The senator story was my animus flying around – superficial and unstable. ~Katy Cabot, Jung My Mother and I, Page 85-86
December 10, 1934
One builds up one’s external persona not knowing that one is compensating.
Nurses are frequently sadists. That is why they make themselves so understanding and devoted.
I have something like sadism in me when I am in a mood of rage.
If I put myself on the level of a stupid person, I will understand wanting to marry Dr. Jung. Dr. Jung has an extraordinary understanding for women’s unconscious. Every woman is: Cave woman
Primitive
Medieval woman
In my dream of Dr. Jung, in which I belittle him by saying, “He’s sleeping with his cook,” I am an enraged woman in a love plot which has been thwarted. I felt Dr. J. was unable to take me seriously because ‘that old swine’ was sleeping with his cook.
If he were a decent chap, he would love me and not that elephant of a cook – a low down eros and not living up to a wonderful height! Disappointed love.
One can bring down everyone to a lower level where they give up their mind and get into an emotional condition.
My pa-in-law must be sensitive as he acts so hard – maybe to disguise his tender side.
Dr. Jung went on to say that in analysis first lovely feelings are exchanged, but after that one can go lower to affectionate gestures and a kiss, then on the ground floor is bed.
Dr. Jung said that if I talk psychological jargon these Zurich spinsters would like me, but of course it would be precieux.
The Vaudois man [Professor Vodoz] is a distinguished lecturer [who spoke at the Psychological Club].
I get along with society people because I put myself out to please. ~Katy Cabot, Jung My Mother and I, Page 90
June 11, 1935
I spoke first of his front door, which is utterly charming swathed in green trees and is the only thing visible in the vista of his house from the street.
“Almost symbolical,” I said, and he said, “Yes.”
He spoke of the Lump and asked me how it was getting on. I told him that I had digested the horrible old woman and realized that she was me, or in me.
He said there was much else to come out in me and that I must find my shadow side before I find out my other side. I said I had felt depressed when I got back to Zurich, and that Mrs. Fierz saying, “Prozit caviar,” had made me realize there was nothing in me.
He said that depressed meant a depression. One must go down before one can come up.
One has a black and a white side.
One must get to know both sides within, and when one knows them one can conciliate them, so to speak, and sit astride of them.
He then went on to say things I couldn’t grasp.
He said that one had to experience all that to grasp it, so I sat dumbly by while he spoke as I did not understand a word!
Maybe he meant that by finding out my two sides, one gained a spiritual freedom?
At any rate he pointed out to me vigorously that by having got to know myself inasmuch as the cruel woman is part of the Lump,
I have not harmed myself.
On the contrary, I have done myself lots of good!
Panics in the funiculaire show that all the contents of the Lump are still unknown, and that J must get the shadow out.
I told him I was miserable as I felt there was nothing in me.
He said, “You take the panics seriously, don’t you?”
I said, “Yes.” “Well,” he said, “if you take the panics seriously then there is seriousness within you.”
If a person stands in front of a picture and raves over it, and feels inferior because he cannot create such a lovely thing, then it shows there is beauty in him for otherwise he could not feel that way. ~Katy Cabot, Jung My Mother and I, Page 91-92
