The Tease

The missing piece in the puzzle of language, like the missing piece in the puzzle of humans' desire for wholeness, guarantees our never-ending longing for something, and a never-ending generation of language. Our desire is continuously displaced among different objects as we see in them possible solutions to fill a void that is constitutive and therefore impossible to fill. Once we achieve an object of desire, we see that it doesn't provide what we were looking for. How could it? Pure wholeness seems to be only touched asymptotically by the subject, never reached, but impressing upon the human mind the impression that it can be. Identically, the signifier will only refer us to another signifier for the signified is the missing piece, and only as such it is constituent of language. As long as we are alive, we are only teased it seems to me. We are teased with the seemingly extreme proximity of something that we will never reach. We are teased in believing that we can reach a meaning that is not even there.
Dr. Shelden's explanation of the death drive makes me thing that the "death drive" is our reaction at acknowledging the teasing nature of life; the way we react when we acknowledge that reaching wholeness could not be possible to us. At certain moments, tired of pursuing objects of desire that only displace desire and do not satisfy it, the death drive takes place. We long for and reach the only wholeness that is possible to the human condition. Tired of pursuing a wholeness that seems to be impossible to reach-wholeness through building a satisfied, self-sufficient identity through the means of inner structures and constructions- we wholeheartedly resign to the only possible wholeness, letting go of all the structures that we have built to separate us from the universe, and reaching the only wholeness possible to us, that of dying as a subject and becoming part of the universe. Lacan 's example is orgasm, a moment when merging with a human partner, one actually lets go of all subject identity. It seems that the French have come very close to this wisdom by calling orgasm "la petite mort"- the little death, as Dr. Shelden explains. Other instances might be deep meditation and other spiritual, religious experiences. But is orgasm always an expression of the death drive?
Lacan claims the death drive is manifested in the sexual act and orgasm because it is the moment when people forget themselves. This is interesting because you can still have other things on your mind at the moment of orgasm. For some, there may be theatrics or performance involved so their partner is aware of the pleasure they are experiencing. Or they may just not have a satisfying enough orgasm to shatter their sense of self. It just might not be the same for all people all of the time. It is also possible that there could be other moments or other ways of achieving a manifestation of the death drive. Listening to a piece of music might cause some to forget the world and their sense of self. Other instances might be deep meditation and other spiritual, religious experiences. Or people commit crimes in moments of passion that arguably cause them to forget who they are and what they are doing or the consequences of it. In other words, does the death drive always have to be manifested in sexual gratification? Are there not other things ways of experiencing jouissance?
To add a piece of interesting information, we can relate the death drive to a notion in psychology called "flow". Unlike the death drive, which is the total disinvolvment with the physical word, flow is the experience of optimal functioning. The death drive is the complete detachment from oneself and one's identity. Flow is the result of an increase in brain functioning, when one is totally involved in the moment, focusing on one specific task. This total involvement reinforces an aspect of one's identity, since identity always exists within the symbolic.