In Heidegger’s work, desire must be understood as a postponing of actualization, through which a holding on to the possible is preserved. In this context, Heidegger speaks of the ‘long time’, in which for a long time and again and again it is not time yet. Therefore, a certain holding out is necessary, for which Heidegger uses the word “Langmut”. According to him, this word means “not the empty (idle) and dull awaiting, but the courage to reach, to reach for the coming feast” (GA 52, 181). “Langmut” is explained by Heidegger as being able to reach for the coming. Poets in particular can express what a poem is for them only in expressing that which precedes all the actual: the coming (GA 4, 114); in other words, when they can truly desire.

The element of the long time is also present in Heidegger’s definition of boredom, “Langeweile”. In “Langeweile”, time becomes long. In the slow movement of time, Heidegger sees a homesickness. He points out that in a certain usage the expression “lange Zeit haben” not accidentally means something like “being homesick”. Someone who has “lange Zeit”, is homesick (GA 29/30, 120). At the same time he observes, with reference to Novalis, that homesickness is a basic mood of philosophizing (GA 29/30, 270–272). The words “Langmut”, “Langen”, “Langeweile”, “Lange-Zeit” denote how Heidegger in his later work characterizes the holding on to the possible and the coming. This indicates that it is always time that carries the “Langen” in “Langeweile” (GA 29/30, 237, 253).

Particularly because of this holding on to the possible, the German word “Verlangen” (the English “longing for”) is very appropriate for comprehending Heidegger’s thinking of being. It applies to a holding on to the fullness of the possible that never becomes a fixed possession. The word “Verlangen” does justice to this notion completely. The “Mögen” can be understood as “Verlangen” because “Verlangen” implies being open to the coming and to the possible. That is what happens in “Mögen”.

Because this stipulation of “Verlangen” (longing) differs from the usual way of speaking about longing and desire, it is good to sum up the main characteristics of this longing once more:

This authentic desire is not born from a lack. The experience of lack is a consequence that springs forth from a preliminary understanding (preunderstanding) of the abundance and the fullness of the possible, which is given with the primordial temporalization.

This authentic desire does not take up a position midway between the poles of abundance and lack. In performing the primordial temporalization, this desire is determined primarily as a producing movement. This movement does not rest on two poles but exists primarily as movement.

This authentic desire is a given that is not to be appropriated by Dasein; it happens to Dasein rather than being controlled by Dasein.
Nor is this authentic desire focused on a goal that is to be realized. Desire itself is enacted as a being open to the coming and the possible. It is therein not focused on the content of the coming and the possible, but on the coming and the possible as such.

From this notion Dasein is determined essentially as desire. Dasein is essentially desire, because as long as Dasein is Dasein, the possible is always higher than the actual.

The ontology of the present-at-hand is inclined to change the possible into the actual without holding on to the possible as such. In the notion of desire that is presented here, the possible remains standing above the actual. The essential structure of desire is such that it entails this. With this explanation of desire Heidegger positions himself in opposition to western ontology, which, according to him, is ever concerned with dominance of the actual over the possible. From Greek philosophy on, being-in-act, the actual, has been placed above the possible. Heidegger in contrast wants to define the actual from the measure of the possible.

Heidegger on Desire, Continental Philosophy Review 31.4, 365-367

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