Sartre’s concept of the for-itself projects itself toward objects as lacks.

Evidence

Th e future is the world. A for-itself, whatever it may be, grasps an aspect of the world only as an opportunity to annihilate in the in-itself the lack that it itself is. Whatever the object considered may be, it is a plea to the for-itself to project itself beyond it as causa sui. Were it an armchair that “stretches out its arms to us,” to have the project of sitting down in it is to project oneself into that armchair as the existent which has determined itself to exist as seated in an armchair, and which will exist as seated with the plenitude of the in-itself. (WD, 214-15;26 CG, 444) Near the beginning of She Came to Stay, Beauvoir describes a similar scene in a deserted theatre: Th e safety-curtain was down; the walls smelled of fresh paint; the redplush seats were lined up in their rows, motionless and expectant. — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 240

Categorization

• DEFINE: The for-itself/in-itself distinction and the causa sui project are core Sartrean concepts given precise articulation here.
• XREF: connects to: Sartre’s For-itself is a radicalized version of Plato’s Other.; For Sartre, the For-itself is constituted by desire, so annihilating desire destroys consciousness itself. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 59; The possible is a real lack the For-itself projects beyond itself. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 387 (+5 more)

Broader Connections

• The for-itself’s lack is internal to it, not imposed from outside #expands (0.90)
• Sartre divides being into free for-itself consciousness and inert in-itself matter #expands (0.85) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 496
• The for-itself’s relation to its future is a project toward its own suppression #expands (0.75) — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 615