Moving from posistion of castration

From a post by Paul Kingsnorth on his Substack.

Christianity turns power on its head. This is not the same as rejecting power. It is, instead, transforming it. God’s power is not human power. Our petty little attempts to impose our will by dominance, force and violence mean nothing to the Father, who scorns them. Power is wielded through love; power is wielded through sacrifice. There is something vast and oceanic about it. It is what greatness actually looks like.

Reading this calls to mind the psychoanalytic idea of castration, the way that Lacanians use this concept in particular. Kingsnorth's prose clearly establishes the difference between people who try to act in a non-castrated way ("petty little attempts to impose our will by dominance, force, and violence") and those who operate from a position of castration ("Power is wielded through love [...] through sacrifice").

I think it leans into the counterintuitive way that not rejecting our castration can help us live better lives.

Later, in the same post, Kingsnorth writes:

I can write these words, but I’m not sure I really understand them. I certainly don’t practice them - and yet, sometimes, in a split second of time, there will come a moment when, in fact, I do. Just for a second, in prayer or in everyday life, something will happen and the veil will twitch and I will see what all of this really means and how I can live it. Then it falls away again, and so do I. But it happens. It is possible.

This, too, shows something I experience as profound. Being a castrated subject and acting as such is not natural or normal for people. (Or, even if it is natural and normal for some people, it's not for me.)

Be that as it may, when I can do it, I don't get to linger in what I've done and feel wonderful about it. Life goes on, and I'm back in the grind of things.