Sublimation - one of the defense mechanisms of the human psyche, which allows redirecting energy from interests and objects that are not approved by society to the socially approved sphere: to creativity or to the achievement of various significant goals.
Freud Sublimation - a positive phenomenon, allowing to reduce the mental stress of a person, pushing for self-development and useful activity.
What does this word mean in psychology?
The first to describe the phenomenon of sublimation was Sigmund Freud - the famous Austrian psychiatrist, who had a great influence on the development of psychology and psychiatry.
Sublimation Theory other specialists studied, such as:
- Carl Jung. Jung's views on sublimation were significantly different from Freudian. He mystified this phenomenon and criticized Freud's opinion.
- Theodore Adorno. According to the research and ideas of Theodore, a person realizes his psychological, often destructive, drives by watching certain television programs.
They allow a person to create the feeling that his aspirations, desires, which he could not realize in reality, were nevertheless realized.
Modern specialists, relying on Theodore's research and theories, believe that a person who has destructive psychological cravings sublimates them in the process of viewing or reading artistic content containing violence and cruelty, but does not realize it in reality. As a result, this reduces the crime rate.
- Anna Freud. Zygmund's daughter continued to develop her father’s ideas and studied sublimation theory more deeply. She considered her one of the most significant mechanisms of mental defense and was of the opinion that a person who learned to redirect libido energy can be considered a full-fledged, mature personality.
- Herbert Marcuse. He introduced the concepts of “repressive desublimation” and “repressive sublimation” into psychology and revealed them, was an adherent of Freudianism and in many respects relied on Freud's ideas.
- Paul Ricoeur. Engaged in philosophy, not psychology as such. Reconsidered the essence of sublimation and some other phenomena described by Freud in his works.
This phenomenon has a close relationship with the theme of socialization, the influence of society on the behavior, thinking and perception of each individual.
Sublimation in its various manifestations is considered in age psychology, in social psychology, psychology of creativity and in other sections of this science.
Sublimation, as a psychological defense:
Freud Sublimation
For the first time about sublimation, Freud spoke in 1900.
In Freud's theory, sublimation is inextricably linked with libido - sexual attraction.
He believed that the man due to the pressure of society unable to fully realize sexual energy in the sphere of sexual interests, therefore it becomes necessary to direct it somewhere else: to creativity, to work, to the achievement of important goals, to cognitive activity.
The process of redirecting energy libido is called sublimation.
Also, according to Freud, sublimation - favorable phenomenon, compared to other types of protective mechanisms that were described to them.
This is due to the fact that a person with the help of sublimation can eliminate deep-seated mental conflicts, redirecting the energy associated with them into the labor sphere, and not divert them deeper into the subconscious, as is the case with other defense mechanisms.
In his writings Sigmund Freud cited as an example Leonardo da Vincione of the key figures of science and art of his time, who reached unprecedented heights in drawing, made a lot of inventions, wrote music and books, but at the same time had no sexual activity and, in principle, had no interest in sex.
Art and science became for Leonardo a zone into which he redirected his unspent sexual energy. Therefore, he managed to achieve amazing results that have not lost their importance in our time.
In modern psychology, sublimation means not so much the redirection of libido energy, as redirection of mental energy in general, often in order to replace affective, destructive inclinations that are unacceptable for a particular person or society as a whole, with something that is acceptable and positive.
Sublimation method is actively used in the framework of psychoanalysis, because it allows to solve mental conflicts, rather than push them deeper into the subconscious.
The essence of psychoanalysis, the beginning of which Freud gave, implies that sublimation is a transformation of sexual impulses.
Nowadays, this definition has a number of different interpretations, but the essence of it remains the same: negative drives (or defined as negative by a single person) are redirected.
Sublimation - the concept and use of yoga:
Process value
Sublimation, being the most sensible and valuable mechanism of protection both for the person himself and for the society that surrounds him, allows each individual to be effective, work productively and handle destructive impulsesthat arise from him.
With the help of sublimation, internal conflicts can be eliminated, which makes it possible to reduce the risk of developing various mental illnesses associated with the presence of one or more conflicts.
These are depression, neurosis, and some anxiety disorders. Reduced stress levels.
A person who has mastered the ability to sublimate experiences, sexual fantasies, various internal conflicts, can be considered a mature personwhich is able to benefit both themselves and those around them.
The ability to project internal destructive impulses on what is happening in the artwork allows reduce the desire to realize them in realitytherefore, the likelihood that such a sublimating person will become a criminal is greatly reduced.
The remaining mechanisms of mental defense are neurotic to one degree or another and are therefore capable of driving the mental problem deeper, which will lead to negative consequences for a person.
Work mechanism
Like any similar phenomenon, sublimation have their own mechanism of work and it consists in the following: the human psyche endures experiences, destructive and sexual impulses in a sphere that can benefit the person and society, and therefore is approved.
At the same time, the experiences and impulses themselves are either partially or fully exhausted by involvement in the activity, and are not suppressed.
An artist who broke up with a partner can reduce your experiencesif you draw several pictures using this negative energy.
Freud, under sublimation, assumed predominantly the transfer of energy into something high: in the field of art, science.
However, sublimation may also imply energy transfer to more ordinary spheres: into work, into physical activity.
Even chopping wood or cleaning the premises can be attributed to sublimation under certain conditions.
Examples
There are many examples of how people can sublimate their experiences, carry negative negative impulses into something.
When an individual is not able to realize his subconscious aspirations, he begins to unconsciously look for a sphere in which activity will allow him to effectively redirect impulses and relieve mental stress.
Most often, the pulses are redirected as follows:
- If a person has a craving for aggression, sadism, violence, he can try to realize himself in sports, mainly in wrestling: in boxing, in martial arts. Also, people at the subconscious level, striving for violence, often choose for themselves work in power structures: in the army, in the police. Parents, especially mothers, who sometimes find it difficult to realize destructive impulses through work, because of their own position, tend to raise their children strictly, sometimes too strictly. And people with sadistic inclinations can choose the field of medicine, especially surgery, dentistry.
- The desire to redirect impulses associated with excessive sexual desire, leads a person into the field of creativity, art. Drawing, modeling, making sculptures - areas that are most often chosen by people who have expressed sexual desire.
However, there are many who choose other areas of art: writing works of art in poetic form, in the form of prose.
- To sublimate love, tenderness, eroticism, people unknowingly go into the sphere of friendship.
- People with heightened unconscious subject death, corpses, decomposition they choose the work of a pathologist, employee of the morgue, employee of ritual service, gravedigger.
Any destructive impulse can be redirected to a favorable course and benefit society, or at least yourself.
Desublimation - what is it?
Desublimation - This is the process that is the opposite of sublimation.
This term was introduced by Herbert Marcuse, a philosopher, cultural scientist and sociologist, who in his writings relied heavily on Freudian theories.
is he witnessed a massive change, taking place in the society in the sixties of the twentieth century: watched the protests, how the society sexually liberated and retreated from postulates that were unshakable throughout human existence.
Reasoning about this prompted him to create this definition.
Desublimation is a phenomenon in which a person does not redirect his sexual energy into a non-sex channel, but implements it directly in sexual activity.
Marcuse believed that desublimation acts negativelySince a person who has realized himself in sex does not advance, he does not have the need to move on to development, to self-improvement, to creativity, he is not trying to deal with social constraints, he does not ask important questions.
Example of sublimation: students, who already have little restrictions, actively have sex with each other, get drunk, try drugs and at the same time try to study in order to get a profession.
But in their heads the question does not arise, for what reason they are obliged to pay a large amount of tuition money, and they continue to follow the rules formed in society.
Sublimation - an important part of the life of any adult person with a mature psyche, which allows him to achieve significant success and simultaneously cope with mental stress.
It is, in contrast to desublimation, an important element of the mechanism that helps humanity move forward.
About the sublimation of sexual energy in this video:
