Projection (meeting wants and needs)

Projection can also be used to "fill in the gaps" when we desire or need someone to fit an image we have in our mind, but their looks or behaviour at the time don't completely match.

This can happen, for example, at a BDSM social event when we meet someone who we think or feel should be, say, a dominant, but we either don't known them well enough to have seen that side of them fully, or when their looks or behaviour appears to be lacking in that regard. We project parts of our inner image of a dominant onto them, thus filling in the gaps.

It can also happen with someone we are very familiar with, such as with our partner when they are not fully engaging us how we want or need, and we fill in the rest from an inner image of either them, or an archetypal Dominant, or both.