A Longing for Beauty

Whitehead's Phenomenology of Desire

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“Apart from the experiences of subjects, there is
nothing, nothing, nothing, bare nothingness.”

— Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality

​The Metaphysics of Desire: All Actualities Seek Satisfaction

A fundamental metaphysical question of Western philosophy has been: What does it mean to be? Here "be" does not refer to what a thing is or to how it came into being. It refers to the activity of being itself: to the act of being or, better, be-ing, What is this activity? 

From the perspective of Whitehead’s philosophy, to be is not to be a static substance that simply “is” in isolation. And it is not to be something measured by observers through mathematical or scientific analysis, as if being were reducible to the point of view of others. Rather, to be is to become subjectively, as a reality that has being for itself. More precisely, to be is to feel the presence of others—to receive what the world offers, to respond to that offering, to desire satisfaction amid the response, and to make a momentary decision as to how to realize that satisfaction, relative to what is possible in the situation at hand. The being of this activity does not precede the activity, as if the activity were merely the predicate of a grammatical subject that already exists. The being is the activity. It is the subjective becoming.

In human life, much of this—perhaps even all of it—happens beneath the surface level of consciousness. Or, to put it another way, consciousness—here understood as clear and distinct perception—may or may not be present in an occasion of experience. The response can include conscious reflection, but it does not require it. “Consciousness presupposes experience,” says Whitehead, “but not experience consciousness.”
This moment of subjective becoming is what Whitehead calls concrescence. It is an actual occasion of experience, as lived from the inside. It is the fundamental unit of reality: a drop of experience, internally complex, feeling the presence of the past, feeling possibilities for responding, responding creatively in the present, and shaping the future. As shaping the future, the subject of the momentary experience is what Whitehead calls a superject. And as the very act of feeling and responding, it is what he calls a subject.

An Example from Daily Life

Imagine you are standing at your front door, about to leave for the day, when a neighbor approaches. She seems upset, holding something back. Her expression, her body language, her hesitance—they come to you not just as data, but as feeling. You receive her presence as a moment of significance. Perhaps you're in a hurry, already late, but something in her demeanor calls you to pause.

In that moment, you feel multiple possibilities: to stay and ask what’s wrong, to smile politely and walk away, to gesture that you're in a rush but promise to talk later. You are not merely a passive observer; you are an active participant in reality’s unfolding. You feel her. You respond. You desire a meaningful resolution—perhaps compassion, or efficiency, or mutual understanding. And then you choose: you say, “Hey, is everything alright?”
This moment—this lived, concrete, relational moment—is an actual occasion of experience. It is metaphysics embodied. You have received the world, evaluated its meanings, desired a kind of outcome, and acted creatively. That, for Whitehead, is what it means to be.

Cosmic Continuity

In Whitehead’s view, something like this happens at every level of actuality—not just in human interactions, but in the very depths of nature. Every actual entity, from a quantum particle to a tree, from a star to a cell, is a moment of experience—a subject feeling its world, responding to its environment, and seeking some form of satisfaction or intensity. These entities may not possess consciousness as we do, but they still feel in a primordial sense. They inherit data from their past, respond to the influences around them, and make decisions—however minimal—among the possibilities available. The universe, then, is not made of inert stuff but of momentary acts of becoming: feeling, responding, and reaching for value.

The things we see in our world—rocks, rivers, animals, people, and planets—are either actual entities of this sort or aggregate expressions of such entities, forming groups or “societies” of them. A tree, for instance, is not a single actual entity but a society of countless cells, each undergoing its own process of becoming, collectively giving rise to the living organism we recognize as a tree. Likewise, a human being is a society of societies: a vast orchestration of experience within experience. At every scale, from the microscopic to the cosmic, the world is composed of actual occasions—drops of experience participating in the ongoing rhythm of the creative advance. To be, in this view, is to be part of a living, relational cosmos where everything, in its own way, feels and becomes.

Whitehead and Heidegger

In presenting “the meaning of being” in light of everyday experience, Whitehead stands in the tradition of Heidegger’s Being and Time, although he seems not to have been influenced by it at all. Both philosophers take the immediacy of lived experience as the key to understanding the meaning of being. Whitehead, of course, was also deeply interested in science and mathematics, and he took seriously the idea that quantum events in the depths of atoms are likewise momentary “occasions of experience.” In Whitehead’s case, lived experience is not an exception to being as found in nature—it is an expression of it. What we experience inwardly—our feelings, responses, and desires—is not uniquely human, but a complex instance of a universal process of becoming that pervades the whole of nature.

A Whiteheadian Existentialism

If we speak of “existentialism” in general terms as a name for points of view that take lived human experience as an example of being, then the analysis above provides a basis for a Whiteheadian existentialism. But this kind of existentialism has its own Whiteheadian slant.

It is a relational existentialism, in that it speaks of the subject of the momentary experience as emerging out of felt relations with others, apart from which it cannot exist. In human life these "others" include the more than human world, to be sure, but also fellow human beings at home and in the workplace.

It is a cosmological existentialism, in that it assumes the more-than-human world—atoms and molecules, hills and rivers, animals and plants, stars and galaxies—is likewise composed of subjects of self-enjoyment and self-creativity, not just objects (or superjects) for others. They, too, have their lived experience.

It is a theological existentialism, in that it includes the idea that the evolving cosmos as a whole—the living whole of the universe—is itself a subject of experience, and that finite subjects at every level feel the non-coercive aims of this living whole in their own subjectivity.

And it is a bodily existentialism, in that, as with Merleau-Ponty, it includes serious attention to the role that bodily experience plays in human life—both as a site through which we receive the world and as a medium for agency. For Whitehead, experience is never disembodied; it is always situated within the physical presence of a body. He speaks of this as “the withness of the body”—the way the body is not just an object we possess, but a participant in perception, feeling, and decision-making. Our sense of self, our access to the world, and our capacity to respond are all mediated through bodily feeling.

A Longing for Beauty

Given this point of view, we can now approach the subject of desire. From the perspective of Whitehead, desire is not merely a psychological phenomenon. It is a metaphysical dynamic—an aiming for satisfaction in the immediacy of experience. It is intrinsic to the very act of be-ing, woven into the fabric of existence itself. At its core, desire is a longing for Beauty—understood not as superficial attractiveness, but as a satisfying intensity that brings a sense of vitality, aliveness, and a felt coordination with the wider world.

Whereas Heidegger speaks of mitsein, being-with others in the human world, Whitehead extends this notion further. For him, we are not only with other people, but also with the more-than-human world, with the past actual world that shapes us, and with the future as anticipated and felt. This expanded relationality is part of what it means to exist.
At every moment of our lives, consciously or unconsciously, we seek satisfaction in the immediacy of experience—a felt intensity, harmony, or coherence. This satisfaction, as anticipated, is what Whitehead calls the subjective aim: the emotionally felt possibility of what this moment—and we ourselves—might become. It is not a mere abstraction but a visceral pull, a desire to actualize some potential form of value, beauty, or meaning.

This subjective aim might be as simple as the pleasure of sipping tea on a quiet morning, the fulfillment of completing a creative project, the relief of walking away from conflict, the joy of sharing a laugh with a friend, the peace of stillness after a long day, or even the courage to endure a painful situation. In each case, we are drawn toward a momentary sense of “rightness”—a feeling that something good, even if small or costly, is being realized.

Yet often, we experience conflicting subjective aims. We may long to rest but feel pressured to work. We may wish to speak honestly but also fear harming a relationship. We may crave solitude even as we ache for connection. These conflicting desires arise simultaneously, each with its own emotional gravity, presenting itself as a possible path to satisfaction.

In Whiteheadian terms, we prehend these aims—they are not just ideas we consider, but feelings we embody. Each prehension carries its own subjective form: a tone, a mood, an energy. At a technical level, these aims are propositions—lures for feeling, proposals for how this moment might unfold. They are shaped both by the past we carry and by the immediate context in which we find ourselves.

And always, among these felt possibilities, Whitehead suggests there is also an ideal aim: a lure toward the deepest possible satisfaction given the particular situation. This is what he calls the initial aim—a quiet, persuasive offering from the divine reality, God, who beckons but never coerces. This divine aim expresses God's own desire that we move toward wholeness. We may respond to it, distort it, postpone it, or ignore it altogether. But it is always there—persistent, loving, and renewed with each new moment.
The divine aim within us is always for Beauty—understood as harmonious intensity—but it changes from moment to moment, because what constitutes Beauty is always relative to the situation at hand.

Examples of Subjective Aims in Daily Life

• A mother rising early to pack lunch for her child feels both the tiredness of her body and the satisfaction of providing care—drawn by a felt aim of love in action.
• A student hesitates before raising their hand in class, torn between the desire to contribute and the fear of embarrassment—each aim a lure for a different kind of becoming.
• An artist is pulled between finishing a commission and exploring a new idea that excites them—two aims with different forms of beauty and fulfillment.
• An older man chooses to forgive someone who wronged him years ago—not because he has forgotten the pain, but because he feels a lure toward peace, dignity, and release.
• A protestor speaks out at a city council meeting, sensing an inner pull not just toward justice, but toward the harmony of aligning action with conscience.
• A person recovering from addiction sits quietly at a support group meeting, struggling between the temptation of escape and the lure of self-respect and community.

In all these instances, we see the drama of becoming—of desire shaping the moment, and the moment shaping the self. This is Whitehead’s vision: not a static world of fixed beings, but a dynamic cosmos of yearning, becoming, and the ever-unfolding pursuit of Beauty. 

The Beauty sought in these instances is not infinite, abstract, or cosmic. It is specific to the person at issue and situation faced in life. This specificity is itself metaphysical, an instance of what Whitehead calls the ontological principle. This is the idea that agency and feeling always arise in and out of the contingencies of the world.  The person who longs for Beauty, and the kind of Beauty sought, is particular. The same applies to the more than human world. In atoms and molecules, in living cells and other animals, in stars and planets, we see the outcomes, sometimes microscopic and sometimes galactic, of longings for Beauty. Even the cosmic womb, even the divine Life that includes all lives, is a longing for Beauty.  The ideal aims felt by creatures and the ideals aims felt by God are the same. God and the world, at a very deep level, long for Beauty together.

Conflicting Desires

For us human beings, of course, the path to satisfaction is rarely straightforward. We are often pulled in more than one direction at once. We may want to speak our truth and also protect a fragile relationship. We may crave rest and simultaneously long to accomplish something meaningful. We may yearn for solitude while also aching for connection.

Whitehead’s philosophy helps us see these moments not as failures of clarity, but as the very texture of reality. Desire, in his view, is not simply about choosing what we want—it is the creative negotiation of memory, mood, feeling, value, and context. Every decision, even unconscious ones, shapes the person we are becoming. Over time, we develop different ways of responding to these inner tensions. What follows are five such ways, each valid in its time, each offering a glimpse into the art of becoming.

Sometimes we respond to conflicting desires through trade-off. We make a choice between two competing aims and release one in favor of the other. This kind of decision-making often brings clarity and relief, even if it involves sacrifice. Imagine being torn between finishing a late-night work assignment and getting the rest your body needs. You choose to sleep, knowing the task will have to wait. In this moment, your becoming takes shape through decisive prioritization. The other desire does not vanish entirely, but the self is momentarily constituted by the choice that was made. Here, satisfaction comes not through balance, but through resolution.

At other times, we engage in creative synthesis, finding a way to hold both desires together and act from their intersection. Rather than choosing one over the other, we integrate them into a richer, more nuanced response. For instance, we may want to be honest in a conversation but also wish to be kind. The creative path forward may involve speaking a difficult truth with gentleness, allowing both values to inform the moment. This is not compromise in a reductive sense—it is a deepening. For Whitehead, this kind of integration through contrast is the essence of aesthetic intensity: the weaving together of tensions into a whole that is more than the sum of its parts.

Sometimes a new possibility emerges that transcends the original conflict entirely—an emergent aim that we couldn’t see before. This is not a compromise or a balancing act, but the creative birth of a third way. You might, for example, feel torn between a need for solitude and a longing for connection. Then, almost intuitively, you decide to take a quiet walk while talking on the phone with a friend—satisfying both needs in a way you hadn't initially imagined. In such moments, we experience what Whitehead calls the work of the divine lure: the quiet invitation to imagine our way into novelty, into something previously unthought but deeply satisfying.

There are also times when the wisest response is to practice critical discernment—to recognize that one of our desires is malformed, reactive, or harmful, and to let it go. This is not repression or denial, but a moral and spiritual act. In the heat of an argument, for example, we may feel a strong urge to say something cruel or belittling. The impulse feels emotionally charged and real. But we pause, breathe, and release it. This is an act of moral creativity—choosing to become a certain kind of person rather than simply indulging a passing feeling. Discernment of this kind draws upon conscience, relational sensitivity, and an intuitive sense of the good.

And finally, there are moments when no synthesis, choice, or clarity appears. In such times, we may find ourselves simply living with the conflict—unable to resolve it, yet unwilling to deny it. We carry two or more desires that remain in tension, and neither is clearly wrong or dispensable. A person might feel torn between a deep love for someone and an equally deep sense of being called to a path that may lead elsewhere. There is no immediate answer, no reconciling insight. In such moments, Whitehead reminds us that life includes tragic beauty—the dignity of carrying unresolved tensions with grace. This too is a form of becoming: to endure ambiguity without collapsing into despair or premature resolution.

Addictive Desires

Not all desires arise in freedom. Some become compulsions—rigid, habitual patterns of feeling and action that override the subtlety and responsiveness of our becoming. In process terms, these are addictive desires: malformed aims that once may have promised satisfaction but now entrap us in repetitive cycles of diminished intensity. They offer a kind of satisfaction, yes—but one that is fleeting, shallow, and ultimately self-defeating. The lure they present is loud, insistent, and narrowly defined, often drowning out gentler possibilities.

From a Whiteheadian perspective, addiction is not merely a psychological or chemical problem. It is a distortion of the metaphysical dynamics of desire. The subjective aim in each moment has been narrowed and hardened, shaped not by fresh responsiveness to the situation at hand but by ingrained habits inherited from the past—often linked to trauma, pain, or unmet needs. Instead of creatively negotiating among possibilities, the self is drawn into a kind of pre-set concrescence, where the range of felt options is drastically reduced.

Yet even in the grip of addiction, Whitehead affirms that the initial aim—the divine lure—is still present. It may be faint, buried beneath layers of repetition and resistance, but it is never entirely lost. The divine lure meets each moment where it is, not where it ought to be. And it offers, again and again, new possibilities for transformation. The path out of addiction is not one of willpower alone, but of reawakening to possibility: rediscovering forms of satisfaction that are deeper, more relational, and more whole.

This reawakening often requires support—spiritual, communal, therapeutic. The addictive desire cannot simply be rejected; it must be understood and recontextualized. It may point to a deeper longing for intimacy, control, transcendence, or safety—longings that have taken distorted form. Healing involves finding new forms through which these deeper desires can be honored. Creative expression, meditative stillness, service to others, and compassionate relationships can all become alternative lures, inviting the person toward a different kind of satisfaction.

In this light, recovery is not just the cessation of harmful behavior. It is the repatterning of desire. It is a spiritual and existential journey—an ongoing process of concrescence in which the person gradually becomes someone new, not by rejecting the self they were, but by integrating it into a richer, more responsive form of life. Even addiction, then, can become part of the creative advance, when held in love, courage, and the hope of becoming.

Shared Desires

Desire is never purely private. We live in webs of influence, and our desires are continually shaped by the desires of others—our families, friends, communities, cultures, and media environments. In Whiteheadian terms, this shaping occurs through prehension: we inherit and feel the emotional tones, values, and patterns of our social worlds. And we do not merely receive these desires—we amplify, reflect, and transmit them. Desire moves through us, linking us together in fields of mutual influence.

This shared nature of desire has been explored deeply by thinkers like René Girard, who described how desire is often mimetic: we want what others want because we see their wanting. We feel their longing and begin to mirror it. Mimesis, in this sense, is not imitation in a superficial sense, but a profound affective resonance. In mimetic relationships, our aims are not isolated or original; they are interwoven. We prehend not only what others do, but what they hope for—what they are reaching toward. And they, in turn, are shaped by what we reach toward.

Mimetic desire can lead to deep harmony or deep conflict. On the one hand, it forms the basis of empathy, cooperation, and communal flourishing. Shared desires can build families, fuel social movements, sustain religious traditions, and inspire artistic collaboration. Communities may come together around shared dreams of justice, healing, beauty, or peace. These desires become more powerful because they are held together, reinforced in ritual, language, and collective memory. In these contexts, desire is communal becoming: not merely individual striving, but a symphony of longing, shaped by shared feeling and vision.

Yet mimetic desire can also become destructive. When communities mirror one another’s fears, envies, and rivalries, desire becomes competitive, possessive, and polarizing. We begin to want what others want simply because they have it—or because we fear they might take it. Whole societies can become caught in cycles of mimetic escalation: vengeance, consumption, domination. Collective desire, once distorted, may aim not at peace but at conquest—not at justice but at punishment—not at healing but at exclusion.

In these situations, the divine lure is still present, not only for individuals but for the collective. God, in Whitehead’s view, is not merely the companion of isolated souls but the lure toward harmony within societies themselves. Just as each actual entity receives an ideal aim, so too can communities feel, however faintly, the call to turn toward compassion, imagination, and shared well-being. The transformation of communal desire involves remembering other possibilities, re-opening ourselves to values that bind rather than divide, and recognizing the sacred in the presence of others—even when that presence is unfamiliar or difficult.

To live well in community is to become attuned to the atmospheres of desire around us, to discern when they are luring us toward wholeness and when they are pulling us into distortion. It is to participate in the shared project of becoming—not just for ourselves, but together.

Atmospheres of Desire

Desire is not only shared between individuals and communities; it also takes on a kind of ambient life of its own. We live within atmospheres of desire—felt but often unnamed moods that saturate spaces, shape imaginations, and influence what feels possible or worthwhile. These atmospheres are the emotional climates of our lives. They are neither wholly inside us nor outside us, but dwell in the relational space between: in churches and classrooms, in households and workplaces, in towns, subcultures, and entire societies.

In process terms, we might say that these atmospheres are prehended collectively: they are built from the emotional residues and aspirations of many lives, layered over time. They linger and accumulate. Some are heavy with competition or fear. Others shimmer with openness, creativity, and trust. Each atmosphere exerts a kind of gravitational pull on the desires that form within it. The range of what we feel we can hope for, ask for, or become is shaped by these shared emotional fields.

A consumerist society, for instance, may generate an atmosphere where desire is funneled into acquisition—where satisfaction is imagined as something we buy, own, or control. In such a space, desire is constantly stoked but rarely fulfilled. Conversely, a contemplative community may cultivate an atmosphere of patience, attentiveness, and gentleness—where desire is not eradicated but deepened, refined, and slowed. Here, the lure of wholeness can be felt more clearly because it is not drowned out by noise.

Atmospheres of desire are not static; they shift and evolve. They can be intentionally cultivated. Art, ritual, architecture, music, conversation, silence—these all help generate and sustain particular affective tones. A sanctuary, for instance, might be designed not only for worship but for mood shaping: to evoke humility, awe, compassion, or joy. The same is true of a well-held circle of friends or a classroom animated by wonder. In this way, atmospheres are not just backdrops to desire—they are part of its formation.

To become wise in desire, then, is not only to reflect on our inner longings, but also to become attuned to the atmospheres that shape them. It is to ask: What kind of desires does this environment nourish? What possibilities are being opened—or foreclosed—by the mood of this space? And it is to remember that we, too, help generate these atmospheres through our own presence, our own patterns of attention, our own emotional resonance.
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In this light, spiritual and social transformation involves not only individual healing or action but the crafting of new atmospheres—places and communities where healthier desires can breathe and grow. This is itself a form of divine collaboration: participating in the gentle, ongoing shaping of the world’s mood toward beauty, compassion, and peace.

The Relinquishment of Ego-Based Desires

As we reflect on the many layers of desire—its cosmic roots, its personal tensions, its communal expressions, and atmospheric fields—we also come to a threshold: the call to let go. Not of desire itself, which is woven into the very fabric of experience, but of a certain kind of desire—what we might call ego-based desire. These are the desires that arise from the illusion of separateness: the craving to dominate, to possess, to secure identity through control, recognition, or accumulation. They are shaped by fear and sustained by social pressures that tell us we must assert the self in order to be.

Whitehead does not advocate the erasure of the self, but he invites us into a deeper becoming that transcends self-centered striving. In his late reflections, particularly in Adventures of Ideas, he writes of Peace—not as mere tranquility or absence of conflict, but as a spiritual depth, a cosmic composure. It is, he says, a gift. We do not manufacture it. It arises when we relinquish the restless grasping of the ego and receive something greater: a sense of harmony that encompasses all contradictions, embraces all suffering, and affirms the inherent worth of life in its complexity.

This Peace is what Whitehead calls a Harmony of Harmonies. It is not the simple resolution of dissonance but a wholeness that includes the dissonance itself. It does not avoid the tragic; it transfigures it. In this state, we see the world not as something to conquer or consume, but as something to cherish—a luminous web of relations, each moment valuable, each life a song in the greater music. There is beauty here, but not an easy or sentimental beauty. It is tragic beauty: a beauty that arises from compassion, from recognizing suffering without being overcome by it, and from living in ways that honor the deep call of connectedness.

To taste this Peace, ego-based desires must fall away. Not through repression or judgment, but through a kind of exhaustion—a sacred disillusionment with their false promises. We come to see that no amount of achievement, approval, or control can grant us what we truly seek. What remains is a quieting of the soul, an openness to something more expansive. In this stillness, the divine lure is felt not as a voice among many, but as a pervasive presence—the call to let go, to be, to belong.

This relinquishment is not an endpoint, but a threshold. It opens us to a life shaped not by acquisition, but by receptivity; not by self-assertion, but by shared becoming. In relinquishing ego-based desire, we do not lose ourselves—we rejoin the wider dance of existence. And in that dance, we may come to know Peace: not as an escape from the world, but as a way of being within it—with gentleness, clarity, and a love that is no longer afraid.

Appreciating Different Forms of Beauty
If desire is ultimately a longing for Beauty, then part of the art of living well is learning to recognize, honor, and celebrate the many forms that Beauty can take. In Whitehead’s metaphysical vision, Beauty is not a single, fixed ideal but a multiplicity of intensities and harmonies arising in different contexts. Each moment of experience offers its own potential for satisfaction—its own flavor of Beauty—shaped by its unique circumstances. So too with lives, with people, with cultures.
Each individual person embodies a distinctive form of Beauty. No two people desire in quite the same way, feel in quite the same tone, or are drawn toward quite the same forms of satisfaction. One person might find Beauty in solitude and silence, another in joyful noise and gathering. One might be drawn to order and clarity, another to spontaneity and improvisation. These differences are not errors to be corrected, but gifts to be appreciated. A life well lived includes learning to recognize these diverse forms of beauty in others and in oneself.
Non-human creatures, too, embody their own forms of Beauty. The elegance of a fox’s movement, the slow dignity of an old tree, the playful curiosity of a dolphin—each reveals a kind of satisfaction that is appropriate to its own nature. These creatures are not merely resources for human use; they are centers of experience in their own right, each with its own way of inhabiting the world, each participating in the unfolding of Beauty in its own creaturely way.
So also with cultures and religions. Each tradition, shaped by its historical context and the longings of its people, offers its own vision of Beauty—its own stories, symbols, rituals, and values. The music of one culture may seem strange to another; the gestures of reverence in one religion may appear unfamiliar to outsiders. But each is a response to the divine lure within that particular setting. To appreciate these differences is to see the sacred not as a monopoly but as a many-colored tapestry, where no single thread defines the whole.
Appreciating different forms of Beauty is not about agreeing with everything we encounter. It is about recognizing that the world is more beautiful, more vibrant, and more alive because of its diversity. It is about cultivating a posture of hospitality toward the unfamiliar, an openness to learn from difference, and a reverence for the particular.
In this light, the good life is not only about seeking one's own satisfaction, but also about becoming attuned to the satisfactions of others. It is about expanding one’s sympathies, learning to feel the lure of Beauty not just for oneself, but also on behalf of others and with others. It is, as Whitehead might say, to feel the feelings of others from the inside, to prehend the richness of the world in its multiplicity.
In this way, the pursuit of Beauty becomes not a solitary journey but a shared one. We are not just desiring beings, but appreciative beings. And in our appreciation—in our acts of noticing, listening, honoring, and celebrating—we participate in the divine activity itself: the ongoing weaving of Beauty from the many into the one, and from the one into the many.