Flexibility of Desire

Flexibility of Desire names the structural property by which desire is not fastened to a single fixed object but moves across and through objects while maintaining a constitutive orientation toward the always-partially-unreadable Thing (das Ding). The concept, as elaborated in mari-ruti-the-call-of-character, specifies two distinct but related axes of this flexibility: (1) a lateral or substitutive axis, whereby the subject can shift from one libidinal object to another—a mobility already implicit in the Freudian theory of displacement and in Lacan's account of objet petit a as object-cause rather than fixed object; and (2) a temporal or perspectival axis, whereby the same object can be apprehended in qualitatively different ways at different moments, meaning the relationship between subject and object is not sealed once and for all but remains open to ongoing re-articulation. Together these axes mean that desire is not an arrow aimed at a target but a circling movement that continually renegotiates its relation to the structural void (Lack) at its center.

Crucially, this flexibility is not arbitrariness or mere fickleness. Because desire is always organized around das Ding—the unreachable Thing that no empirical object fully incarnates—every object is already a substitute, a stand-in for a constitutively lost original. The flexibility of desire follows necessarily from this structural condition: since no object is ever the Thing itself, the field of potential objects remains perpetually open, and the same object can at different times crystallize the echo of the Thing more or less vividly. Idealization, on this account, is not a defensive distortion but a possible mode of access to the sublimity of the Thing in a given beloved—an act of "raising an object to the dignity of the Thing" (the Lacanian definition of sublimation). The mobility of desire thus has an ethical upshot: relationships should be evaluated not by their longevity but by whether they sustain the animating force of desire, i.e., whether they keep the subject in productive proximity to its constitutive Lack without collapsing it.

Within mari-ruti-the-call-of-character, the concept of Flexibility of Desire appears as a theoretically productive specification of several interlocking canonical Lacanian concepts. It presupposes and extends the account of Desire as a structural effect of Lack — desire persists precisely because no object ever fully satisfies it — and it makes explicit what the canonical account of the Lost Object implies: if every empirical object is already a substitute for a constitutively lost original, then the subject's libidinal field is inherently plural and mobile. The flexibility is, in this sense, not an addition to Lacanian desire theory but a consequence drawn out of it. The concept also engages Das Ding and Objet petit a: the lateral substitutability of desire maps onto the structural function of the objet a as object-cause (any contingent object can come to occupy the causal position), while the temporal-perspectival axis maps onto the sublimatory logic of das Ding (the same object can at different moments radiate the Thing's echo with varying intensity).

The concept also touches Jouissance insofar as the animating power Ruti attributes to desire — the reason a relationship should be valued — is tied to the subject's capacity to sustain proximity to something sublime and excessive, an echo of the Thing's impossible fullness. The link to Narcissism is implicit: idealization as a legitimate mode of access to the Thing involves a libidinal investment that has both anaclitic and narcissistic components, and the flexibility of desire names the structural condition that makes idealization reversible and renewable rather than rigidly fixated. Finally, the concept resonates with Relationality as Process of Becoming, since the temporal axis of flexibility explicitly frames the relationship itself as an unfinished, processual affair rather than a stable possession. In this way, Flexibility of Desire functions as a conceptual hinge that connects Lacan's structural account of desire to an ethics and aesthetics of relational life.

The Call of Character: Living a Life Worth LivingMari Ruti · 2014 (p.94)

there is a great deal of flexibility to our desire not only in the sense that we can shift between objects, but also in the sense that we can appreciate one object in various ways at different points in time

The quote is theoretically loaded because it disaggregates "flexibility" into two distinct structural operations — inter-object substitution ("shift between objects") and intra-object temporal re-articulation ("appreciate one object in various ways at different points in time") — which maps directly onto the Lacanian distinction between the metonymic sliding of desire along the signifying chain and the sublimatory re-investment of a single object with the dignity of the Thing. The phrase "at different points in time" is especially significant: it temporalizes desire's relation to its object, implying that the subject is not a fixed interpreter but is itself transformed by the ongoing encounter, consistent with Ruti's broader argument about Relationality as Process of Becoming.