Jungian Therapy, Jungian Analysis, New York

Hysteria

from Jung Lexicon by Daryl Sharp

Hysteria. A state of mind marked by an exaggerated rapport with persons in the immediate environment and an adjustment to surrounding conditions that amounts to imitation.

Hysteria is, in my view, by far the most frequent neurosis of the extraverted type. . . . A constant tendency to make himself interesting and produce an impression is a basic feature of the hysteric. The corollary of this is his proverbial suggestibility, his proneness to another person’s influence. Another unmistakable sign of the extraverted hysteric is his effusiveness, which occasionally carries him into the realm of fantasy, so that he is accused of the “hysterical lie.”[“General Description of the Types,” CW 6, par. 566.]

Hysterical neurosis is usually accompanied by compensatory reactions from the unconscious.

[These] counteract the exaggerated extraversion by means of physical symptoms that force the libido to introvert. The reaction of the unconscious produces another class of symptoms having a more introverted character, one of the most typical being a morbid intensification of fantasy activity.[Ibid, par. 566.]