 One’s recognition of the beauty/order of the world has implications, once again, for the subject. Because beauty is to be contemplated at a distance and not consumed through the greedy will, it trains the soul to be detached in the face of something irreducible, and in this sense it is similar to affliction. Both de-center the self and demand a posture of waiting (attente). Contemplating beauty, then, means transcending the perspective of one’s own project. Because beauty, as external to self, is to be consented to, it implies both that one’s reality is limited and that one does not want to change the object of her/his mode of engagement. Furthermore, beauty has an element of the impersonal coming into contact with a person. Real interaction with beauty is decreative. True to this idea, Weil’s aesthetic commitments are reflected in her style: in her sharp prose she scrutinizes her own thought while tending to exclude her own voice and avoid personal references; thus she performs “the linguistic decreation of the self” (Dargan 1999: 7).