I am not what happened to me. I am what I choose to become.

The wording occurs in an online extract headed ‘Individuation: Jung’s Myth for Our Time (by James Hollis)’, labelled as an extract from Hollis’s The Middle Passage. The Carl Jung Depth Psychology reprint has publication metadata dated 22 December 2022 and modification metadata dated 28 May 2024; the quotation and warning against the Jung attribution were checked in its current text on 28 October 2026, not in an archived 2022 version. Its surrounding argument attributes the passage to Hollis, and the site’s note explicitly says Jung did not say the sentence. The original book and page have not been inspected here, so the book attribution remains secondary. Austel’s 2021 INSEAD thesis cites Hollis (1993), p. 97, so that book reference is secondary here rather than an independently checked book page. An earlier dated web excerpt, a blog post displaying 10 July 2015, prints the sentence under Hollis’s name; no historical snapshot was checked. Wikiquote’s Jung talk page also carries the period-separated wording in its unsourced material. The reprint’s link to its apparent upstream copy now redirects to a domain-for-sale page. No first use of the saying or first attribution to Jung was established. Searches covered Jung’s Wikiquote article and talk page, Quote Investigator’s Jung results, and web searches of the exact wording with Hollis; there is no Jung full-text corpus in this atlas, so this is not a claim to have searched his collected works.

1. 10 July 2015Earliest found · credited to James HollisA blog post of excerpts from Hollis’s The Middle Passage prints the sentence. The date is the post’s displayed publication date; no archived 2015 state was inspected, and its page markers are not an independently checked original-book page. It is the earliest dated web excerpt inspected, not the first use.I am not what happened to me; I am what I choose to become.eightysevenflorida, Excerpts of The Middle Passage, by James Hollis, 10 July 2015. Checked in a full-text transcription. Source
2. 2021Spread · credited to James HollisBarbara Austel explicitly attributes the sentence to Hollis (1993), p. 97. The original book was not inspected, so this is secondary evidence for that book and page.I am not what happened to me: I am what I choose to become.Barbara Austel, Finding my place: A systems psychodynamic exploration of role taking in the family business, INSEAD Executive Master in Change thesis, 2021, p. 41. Checked in the text of a page scan, not the image. Source
3. 22 December 2022Spread · credited to James HollisA blog reprint labelled as an extract from Hollis’s The Middle Passage repeats the sentence and explicitly corrects the Jung attribution. Its page publication metadata is 22 December 2022; the presently visible wording was inspected in 2026, not in an archived 2022 version.I am not what happened to me; I am what I choose to become.Carl Jung Depth Psychology, ‘Individuation: Jung’s Myth for Our Time (by James Hollis)’. Checked in a full-text transcription. Source
4. 28 October 2026Credited to Carl Gustav JungObserved on Wikiquote’s Jung talk page among unsourced quotations associated with Jung. This is an observation date, not a date of first attribution or of the Wikiquote contribution.I am not what happened to me. I am what I choose to become.Wikiquote, Talk:Carl Jung, unsourced quotation material; observed 28 October 2026. Checked in a full-text transcription. Source

A passage republished as an extract from James Hollis’s The Middle Passage discusses individuation: separating one’s identity from acquired roles and consciously confronting one’s circumstances. The sentence is a first-person formula offered within that discussion, not introduced as a quotation from Jung. The republisher explicitly warns against attributing it to Jung.

Past experiences need not be the final definition of a person; responding to them and choosing a direction remain possible.

It is often circulated as Jung’s own declaration. Even in the Hollis passage, the surrounding discussion acknowledges limits imposed by circumstances; the slogan is not a promise of unlimited self-invention.

Life, Freedom, Change, Wisdom, Self-knowledge

• You may trod me in the very dirt But still, like dust, I’ll rise. Maya Angelou
• I’m not interested in money. I just want to be wonderful. Marilyn Monroe
• You have power over your mind—not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength. (not found) Marcus Aurelius
• It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for what you are not. André Gide
• Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth. Henry David Thoreau

• carljungdepthpsychologysite.blog/2022/12/22/myth-9
• en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Talk:Carl_Jung
• eightysevenflorida.wordpress.com/2015/07/10/excerpts-of-the-middle-passage-by-james-hollis
• flora.insead.edu/fichiersti_wp/InseadEMCtheseswave32/97939.pdf

“I am not what happened to me. I am what I choose to become.” Attributed to Carl Gustav Jung. No. James Hollis wrote it, not Jung. Quotogeny, https://quotogeny.com/q/i-am-not-what-happened-to-me/ (checked 28 October 2026).

Have a different wording, or a source we missed? Check it or submit it.

Do you hold the rights to anything on this page? Tell us.