Essay:

https://therationalmale.com/2017/04/10/sublimation/

Excerpt:

We expect much of the same modern day self-control over our evolved sexual response too. The more noble, higher-order thinking aspects we value today are really mechanisms intended to sublimate evolved aspects of ourselves that used to be the most pragmatic and efficient means of solving the problem of reproduction and survival. Mind (or spirit) over matter doesn’t preclude the influences of these evolved motivators – nor does it (or should it) absolve men of consequences of his behavior.

In psychology, sublimation is a mature type of defense mechanism where socially unacceptable impulses or idealizations are unconsciously transformed into socially acceptable actions or behavior, possibly resulting in a long-term conversion of the initial impulse.

Sigmund Freud believed that sublimation was a sign of maturity (indeed, of civilization), allowing people to function normally in culturally acceptable ways. He defined sublimation as the process of deflecting sexual instincts into acts of higher social valuation, being “an especially conspicuous feature of cultural development; it is what makes it possible for higher psychical activities, scientific, artistic or ideological, to play such an important part in civilized life”. Similar views state that sublimation is when displacement “serves a higher cultural or socially useful purpose, as in the creation of art or inventions”.

In short, sublimation is a result of restraining those evolved aspects of ourselves and channeling that motivation and impetus to other endeavors. I think one of the key understandings that Red Pill men need to grasp is how these underlying motivators operate in themselves as well as how they affect women. Game is greatly enhanced by a real good understanding of how a woman does or does not sublimate certain aspects of herself. In fact, I would argue that since the time of the Sexual Revolution, and the social unfettering of Hypergamy, women have systematically changed how they sublimate their evolved impulses. The rise of our feminine-primary social order has been molded by how women have been absolved of the consequences of realigning this sublimation, or unapologetically dropping it altogether.

Simultaneously, this social order has increased the liability for men who cannot or will not adopt the forms of sublimating their own impulses according to feminine-primacy. As you might guess, this coincides with the Male Catch 22, men’s Burden of Performance and men being held to old order social contracts while also being expected to respect new order social mandates. Men are held accountable for any marginal lack of self-control (sublimation of evolved imperatives), while women are socially absolved of, and sometimes rewarded for a lack of control over their Hypergamous impulses.