What if you can transform your life just by following four simple rules? In Don Miguel Ruiz’s book, The Four Agreements, he teaches Toltec wisdom to attain happiness and personal freedom. I recently read the book as part of my yoga teacher training. Short and practical, this book is packed with sensible concepts that can transform your worldview. It’s simple yet powerful. Read on for a summary of what I learned from this book. Want to dig deeper? You can buy it from Amazon here: The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom
Personal freedom
The Four Agreements is a practical guide to personal freedom. What is personal freedom anyway? Personal freedom means living life in your own terms – you’re not limited or trapped by anyone else’s idea of how you should be. It means you’re comfortable with who you are, you’re grounded and at ease, your intuition guides your decisions, rather than others.
Personal freedom is just that, personal. It has nothing to do with others but everything to do with how you view the world and how you interact within it. It begins with introspection. What robs us of this personal freedom? Well, according to Ruiz, you can blame domestication, which he also calls the “outside dream.”
Domestication – it’s all a dream
Ruiz says that we are all in a dream, an “outside dream.” We were born into this dream that was passed on to us by society. Starting from infancy, we were domesticated and conditioned to think and act a certain way. The outside dream includes all of society’s rules, its beliefs, its laws, its religions, its different cultures and ways to be, its governments, schools, social events, and holidays.
We accept the outside dream as reality or truth. However, it was not our choice. Did you choose to speak your native language? Did you choose your name, your religion, or your moral values? They were there before you came into existence. The choice was made for you and you agreed.
Agreement is a very important concept in the book. It’s titled The Four Agreements, after all. As children, we didn’t choose our beliefs but we simply agreed with the information that was passed on to us. Agreement turns into belief. Then, those beliefs turn into a system that controls our whole dream of life.
Fear controls the outside dream; though it comes in varying degrees, it is full of lies, violence and injustice. Almost everything we were taught as children was based on fear. This blinds us to the truth. You may think of the outside dream as a blindfold you were made to wear as a baby.
Society dream is conveyed to your personal dream
Through domestication, the adults convey the outside dream to your inside or personal dream. As children we didn’t know right from wrong nor beautiful from ugly. We were taught these polarities. But through constant reward and punishment, we became so conditioned that we eventually agreed. Hence, we lose awareness and consciousness. We lose our personal freedom.
Every human has a personal dream. Sadly, our personal dreams reflect the outside dream – the society dream. We become ruled by fear. We cannot fit into the society’s idea of what it means to be good, beautiful or successful and so we become our own harshest critics. Endlessly, we search and struggle for a higher and deeper meaning but with no end in sight. The blindfold is still there and we often get stuck.
“We have the need to be accepted and to be loved by others, but we cannot accept and love ourselves. The more self-love we have, the less we will experience self-abuse. Self-abuse comes from having an image of what it means to be perfect and never measuring up to that ideal. Our image of perfection is the reason we reject ourselves; it is why we don’t accept ourselves the way we are, and why we don’t accept others as they are.”
Don Miguel Ruiz
Make new agreements with yourself
The prelude to a new dream is making agreements for yourself. While you were forced to agree to the ideals of society before, and therefore confined to whatever those ideals were, you can now forge a new path for yourself. You can dream a new dream.
While Ruiz refers to this as a new dream, I like to think of it as waking up. By waking up from the society dream, we gain the awareness to make our own choices, consciously. We gain a deeper understanding of who we are and the blinders come off.
The Four Agreements
Rather than conforming to countless societal rules, cultural norms, and even rigid religious doctrines, Ruiz emphasizes that these four simple agreements are all you need to break free from unnecessary suffering.
These rules are agreements you make with yourself. They are profound lessons we inherently know but have forgotten along the way.
1. Be impeccable with your word
This is the most important agreement, says Ruiz. The word is the most powerful force we have as humans. We use it to communicate, think, and therefore to create anything in our lives.
Being impeccable with your word means never using the word against yourself. You go against yourself when you judge or blame yourself for any reason. Think of how often you engage in negative self-talk or self-rejection.
The word can destroy life
The author uses Hitler as an example of misusing the power of the word for mass destruction. Hitler used his word to convince otherwise intelligent people to commit unspeakable crimes. That is how powerful the word is; it can create or destroy lives.
So what happens when others try to use the word against you? Understand that they are hurting themselves and you have the choice not to participate. When you are impeccable, you still take responsibility for your actions without judging or blaming yourself. However, you treat those around you in the same way. You also do not use the word against others. You do not criticize, blame, judge or destroy.
Use the word to share your love
Being impeccable means you only use the word in the direction of truth and love for yourself. In doing so, you will emanate this love and extend it to others. When you have self-love and self-acceptance, feeling compassion for others becomes second nature.
2. Don’t take anything personally
We often take things so deeply that we allow one word, one conversation, or one interaction to cause so much stress, heartache and suffering. Ruiz says that “nothing others do is because of you. It is because of themselves.” Anything anybody ever says is only a projection of that person’s own perspective or dream.
Taking things personally is egocentric
Taking things personally is incorrectly assuming that everything is about you. When someone criticizes you, they are dealing with their own poison. In the same token, they want to hand you some of this poison to bear. Yet you do not have to take it. You do not have to agree. See if you can take something constructive from the interaction and if not, simply move on.
There are malicious people out there that use this intentionally to hurt others. They spread poison knowing that their victims will take it personally. The reason? it’s because they are themselves hurting.
When you judge another, you do not define them, you define yourself.
Wayne Dyer
One of my favorite quotes is from Wayne Dyer. He says that when you judge others, you define yourself. Remember this when someone criticizes you. They are really talking about themselves, not you. For example, when a person calls you “stupid,” it’s because that person feels the need to be superior, which is an action stemming from fear and insecurity. It’s about their own fears of inadequacy.
Before you judge someone, pause and think what this action may reveal about you.
Don’t take compliments personally
This works both ways. Don’t be too attached when someone compliments you. Simply say thank you and move on. Don’t let it feed your ego. Though it feels good to be acknowledged, your self-worth should never be based on anyone’s feedback.
Other people’s opinions are always based on their own beliefs and perceptions, and never about you. Don’t take things personally. Instead, know and accept yourself completely so much so that your identity is never dependent upon the words of others. How liberating is that?
3. Don’t make assumptions
We often make assumptions because we don’t understand something. Rather than ask questions or take things as they are, we create elaborate stories in our heads. We stay in an illusory dream thinking this is why and how things are. In reality, we are often mistaken. We cannot assume why others behave the way that they do.
The human mind wants to explain everything because that is how it feels safe. Making assumptions is a fear-based action. We do it because we are afraid to ask and we feel safer in a false sense of knowing.
The biggest assumption that humans make, says Ruiz, is that we assume that others think and feel the same way we do. This causes a lot of struggle in relationships, especially romantic ones. We often want or expect our partners to think and act a certain way. We assume that our way is the right way and we demand our partners to agree.
“Real love is accepting other people the way they are without trying to change them. If we try to change them, we don’t really like them.”
Don Miguel Ruiz
Wouldn’t it be much easier to be in a relationship where you accept each other as you are? There’ll be no need for the discomfort and drama of projecting a false image. Either you take each other as is or leave. This kind of agreement is clear, respectful and impeccable.
You become fearless when you don’t make assumptions
Asking questions is the best way to avoid assumptions. Do not be afraid to ask if you don’t understand something. When you stop making assumptions, you become free of guessing, gossiping and internal turmoil. You also become unafraid to speak up and ask for what you want. More importantly, you become unafraid of rejection because your own wants and needs become clear and you do not take it personally even if someone disagrees.
4. Always do your best
The fourth and last agreement is an action you take from the first three. Your best will vary from day-to-day and from situation to situation. The variation does not matter. Ruiz says what matters is that you try your best in every circumstance of your life. Don’t do too much or too little. Just do whatever your best is in the moment.
Doing your best is living intensely. You do your best out of love for the action itself. Not for reward or punishment. You can say “yes” or “no” as needed. This liberates you from doing anything you don’t want or from doing things to gain approval from others.
Doing your best also means being aware and learning from your mistakes as you go along. In doing so, you remain impeccable with your word and you refrain from self-judgment.
Do your best and only do things you love
When you make the agreement with yourself to always do your best, you start to enjoy life more. You take more action and you’re neither complacent or stagnant. You do things you truly enjoy. Life not only becomes easier but pleasurable.
Always doing your best also means living in the present. You let go of the past, the former dream. You become more aware of the now because that is where your best self is.
“When you don’t do your best you are denying yourself the right to be you. That’s a seed you should really nurture in your mind. You don’t need knowledge or great philosophical concepts. You don’t need the acceptance of others. You express your own divinity by being alive and by loving yourself and others.”
Don Miguel Ruiz
A beautiful life
When you make the four agreements with yourself, you will escape so much anguish and live life in your own terms. You will be free from the society dream, the outside dream you didn’t know you were living.
There will always be obstacles but if you remain impeccable with your word and try your best, no one can ever put a blindfold on you again. No one can poison you with their words because you won’t take anything personally and your path will be clear because you will value truth instead of making assumptions.
This is the best way to honor yourself, life and God. If you believe in God, you honor him best by following the four agreements because through it, you cultivate a life of compassion for yourself and others. The four agreements plant the seed of new beliefs and habits so you can attain personal freedom and live the life you want.