Attention & Focus · “You Become What You Hold”
De Sales' Direction of Intention
To consecrate ordinary activity by pausing before each action to offer it to God and ask grace — turning routine work into meaning-laden, deliberately chosen behaviour.
Direction of Intention in one line: Before each action, pause for a heartbeat — offer this action to God and ask grace to do it well; afterward, a brief glance to offer its fruit or ask pardon. Set the tone each morning by foreseeing the day and offering the whole of it in advance. Keep it light: a lifting of the heart, not a ceremony.
What it is
The “Direction of Intention” is Francis de Sales’ practice of pausing before each action — interior or exterior — to offer it to God and ask His grace to do it well. Many readers of de Sales (and his Oblate followers) regard it as the very heart of his spirituality: not adding more religious activities to a busy life, but transforming the activities you already have by the intention you bring to them.
A few seconds, repeated all day, consecrate the whole day. It rests on his conviction that holiness is not found by escaping ordinary work but by doing ordinary work deliberately, for love, rather than on autopilot.
The Method
De Sales teaches this in two places in Introduction to the Devout Life. A. The morning offering of the whole day (Part II, ch. X — “Morning Prayer”). First thing on waking he prescribes a short morning exercise. Within it:
- Adore and thank God for having preserved you through the night.
- Foresee the day — recall the actions, occasions, and likely temptations the coming day holds.
- Resolve concretely — make a firm resolution to serve God and avoid the particular faults you can foresee, according to the actual circumstances awaiting you (not in the abstract).
- Offer the whole day in advance — present to God all the good you will do, asking His grace to carry it through, and commending the day to His care. This is a single, sweeping “direction of intention” laid over everything that will follow. B. The action-by-action offering (Part III, ch. X — doing each ordinary action well). Throughout the day, before each task — work, conversation, a meal, an errand — make a brief inner act:
- Offer this particular action to God, and
- Ask His grace to do it well and for love of Him. The Salesian distillation, repeated by his Oblates, captures the principle in his own register: those who would advance in the way of our Lord should, at the beginning of their actions, both exterior and interior, ask His grace and offer to His divine Goodness all the good they intend to do. De Sales’ point is that this need not be a long prayer — a momentary lifting of the heart suffices (“My God, this is for You; help me do it well”). When the action is finished, a brief inner glance — offering its fruit, or asking pardon for its faults — completes the loop. The practice is deliberately light and unforced: a glance, not a ceremony. Done habitually, the small pause becomes nearly automatic and colours every activity with chosen purpose. (Sourcing note: the morning-offering structure is de Sales, Pt II ch. X; the do-each-action-for-God teaching is Pt III ch. X. The crisp “Direction of Intention” wording is the Salesian/Oblate formulation of his own counsel — flagged as such, not presented as a verbatim chapter heading.)
Source & Lineage
Francis de Sales (1567–1622) wrote for lay people in the thick of ordinary life. → (de Sales). The Direction of Intention became a hallmark of Salesian spirituality and is practised to this day by the Oblates of St.
Francis de Sales, who treat it as his central method. It belongs to the broader tradition of sanctifying ordinary work — later echoed in Brother Lawrence’s “practice of the presence of God,” in the “morning offering” of popular Catholic devotion, and, in secular form, in any practice of bringing conscious intention to routine activity.
The Traditions' versions
Morning offering (Catholic devotion)
offering the day’s prayers, works, joys, and sufferings in advance; the popular descendant of de Sales’ Pt II ch. X.
- Brother Lawrence — practice of the presence of God — doing each small task (even washing dishes) consciously for God; the same consecration of the ordinary.
- Mindful intention-setting (secular) — pausing before a task to name why and how you’ll do it; reduces autopilot and raises engagement.
- Sankalpa (yoga/Hindu) — a resolve or intention set before practice; structurally akin to the pre-action offering.
- “Dedication of merit” (Buddhist) — framing an action by dedicating its benefit beyond oneself; a parallel intentional bracketing of activity.
Common refinements
Making it long or elaborate. De Sales meant a glance, not a liturgy. A wordy interior prayer before every task is unsustainable and self-defeating; keep it to a breath.
- Scrupulous over-application. Turning it into “I must perfectly offer every single act or it’s worthless” produces anxiety and paralysis — the opposite of his gentle spirit. Aim for habit, not perfection; a missed offering is no crisis.
- Skipping the morning frame. The morning offering (Pt II ch. X) sets a default intention over the whole day, so individual offerings need only renew it. Without it, you’re starting cold each time.
- Vague foresight. His morning step asks you to foresee today’s actual occasions and resolve concretely; a generic “I’ll be good” is weaker than naming the specific moment you tend to fail.
- Front-only. The complete loop includes a brief after-action glance (offering the fruit, or asking pardon); dropping it loses the reinforcing feedback.