Affirmation · “The Subconscious Says Yes”
It is the Lord!' / 'Fiat'
To meet each event — pleasant or unwelcome — with a single short spoken phrase that reframes it from ‘random circumstance’ to ‘God addressing me now,’ and consents to it, training a habit of trustful recognition instead of reactive resistance.
In 5 lines: When anything lands — interruption, bad news, irritation, or a good thing — pause for one breath and say inwardly, “It is the Lord… fiat” (recognize, then consent). Treat the event as God addressing you, and let it be — without suppressing what you actually feel. Use it many times a day, for ordinary and good moments too, until it becomes your default lens. It changes your relationship to what is, not the outcome.
What it is
Caussade teaches that “things proceed from the mouth of God like words” — every event is, to the eye of faith, God saying something to you in the only language circumstances speak. The matching practice is to answer each event with a short, repeatable phrase that (a) recognizes God’s hand in it and (b) consents to it.
Two such phrases sit at the heart of his text: “It is the Lord!” (Saint John’s cry of recognition on the shore, John 21:7) and “Fiat” — “let it be / let it be done” (Mary’s word at the Annunciation).
The heart, he writes, “listens and pronounces its ‘fiat.’” Used moment by moment, the phrase is a tiny verbal hinge that turns a reactive “why is this happening to me?” into “it is the Lord — let it be.” Unlike a goal-affirmation, it is not aimed at changing circumstances; it is aimed at re-seeing and accepting them.
The Method
Caussade left no drill; this distills the “faith reads each event, the heart pronounces fiat” pattern of Book I (faithful description; short quotes only):
- Pick your phrase. Caussade’s two are: “It is the Lord!” (recognition) and “Fiat” / “may Your holy will be done in all things” (consent). Choose one, or pair them: recognize, then consent.
- Apply it to each event as it arises. When something lands — an interruption, a delay, news good or bad, an irritation — instead of reacting first, say the phrase inwardly: “It is the Lord… fiat.” Caussade’s premise: “that which God does at each moment is a divine thought expressed by a created thing.”
- Mean the recognition, then the consent. First see the event as addressed to you by God (“It is the Lord”); then accept it (“fiat — let it be”). The two beats are perception then surrender.
- Keep it short and frequent — not a meditation. This is an ejaculatory phrase (a one-breath prayer), used many times a day in the flow of ordinary life, not a set sitting.
- Apply it to pleasant moments too. Recognition isn’t only for hardship; greeting good things with “it is the Lord” trains the same trustful attention without it becoming mere grievance-management.
- Let it become habitual. Caussade calls this “continual recognition of the will of God as manifested and revealed in all things” — the aim is that the phrase fires almost automatically, so faith becomes the default lens. (Sourcing note: “things. proceed from the mouth of God like words,” “a divine thought expressed by a created thing,” “the heart. pronounces its ‘fiat’,” and “continual recognition of the will of God. in all things” are from Abandonment to Divine Providence, Book I. “It is the Lord!” is John 21:7, which Caussade’s tradition uses for this recognition. Step phrasing is faithful paraphrase.)
Source & Lineage
Jean-Pierre de Caussade (1675–1751), French Jesuit spiritual director, taught this in Abandonment to Divine Providence, compiled from his letters/conferences to the Visitation nuns of Nancy.
The short consenting phrase belongs to the Catholic tradition of the ejaculatory prayer / aspiration (brief, frequent darts of prayer) and to Salesian simplicity (Francis de Sales).
“Fiat” echoes Mary’s fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum (Luke 1:38) and the Lord’s Prayer’s “thy will be done.”.
The Traditions' versions
Ejaculatory prayer / aspirations — short, repeated darts of prayer through the day; Caussade’s phrase is one.
- The Jesus Prayer / breath prayer — a brief phrase repeated continuously to keep the heart turned toward God.
- “Thy will be done” — the Lord’s Prayer phrase as a lived consent.
- Acceptance phrases / cognitive reappraisal — a short reframing line said in the moment to defuse reaction.
- Mantra/japa — short repeated formula, here event-triggered rather than counted.
- Byron Katie’s “turnaround,” Tolle’s “say yes to the now” — modern secular cousins of consenting to what is.
Common refinements
Using it to suppress real feeling. “Fiat” is consent, not denial. Recognize the event and feel the grief/anger honestly; saying the phrase over a stuffed-down emotion is bypassing, not acceptance.
- Turning it into magical control. This is not an affirmation to change outcomes; it’s to change your relationship to what is. Expecting events to bend because you said it misreads the practice.
- Saying it only in crisis. Reserved for disasters, it becomes mere coping for the worst; used for ordinary and good moments too, it trains the lens before you need it.
- Mechanical mumbling with no recognition. The power is in the brief seeing (“it is the Lord”) that precedes the consent. Don’t drop the recognition beat.
- Forcing serenity. Striving to feel peaceful reintroduces self-will; just say it and let go.