Book Review: The Four Agreements
Nate and I were gifted a book for our wedding shower in Chicago. It was called The Four Agreements and it’s by Don Miguel Ruiz. I sat on the main shelf of our bookshelf for about six months before I packed it up along with everything else to move down to Georgia. Then it sat on our bookshelf in Atlanta for another 2 months before I actually picked it up to read it.
I decided to start it after hearing about how great it was from a few people in my Calm Meditation Facebook Group. Because the Calm app has helped me so much, I trusted that these people were likeminded and that was a good next step in taking care of my mental health. I read one section a night right before bed so it could take a beat and do some introspection that would stick with me as I slept.
Generally speaking I am not one for slightly flowery self-help books but from the moment I started reading it I knew this one was different. While it definitely has the hippy, flowery, love is all you need vibe, it actually was the first book that really got through to me with those messages.
Being one for more pragmatic advice, I was skeptical about the concepts of Toltec wisdom because all of it sounded so lofty and hypothetical, but the meat of the book is super impactful.
It focuses on agreements we make with ourselves. Things we say to ourselves every day and how they impact our life. These agreements start being made by out parents at a very early age. Things like “you can’t do that” or “that’s bad” stick with us throughout our lives and we never really get to formulate our own opinions because these agreements have ben cemented in our mind.
The book focuses on breaking the old agreements and formulating new ones. The idea is that the new ones will free you and allow you to feel calmer, more confident, secure, and happy. (See. It sounds like hippy nonsense, right?).
The four agreements are these:
Be Impeccable with your word
Don’t take anything personally
Don’t make assumptions
Always do your best
Unknowingly, these agreements were actually things that I was trying to work on, I just didn’t really have the right words to talk about them.
The first one, is one of my primary focuses for the winter. I know I need to be more careful with my language. Be more precise. Say what I mean and listen fully and attentively before speaking. It’s not the easiest thing to do, but it’s important to building quality relationships and learning more about people before judging.
The second agreement, don’t take anything personally, has been a huge challenge for me my entire life. I tend to take everything personally and it has the tendency to lock me into a minefield of assumptions and cloud my better judgement. Ruiz says that taking things personally give people unnecessary power over you and that it clouds your judgement and makes it hard to make informed decisions and choices. It’s funny, I’ve been told a million different ways why I shouldn’t take things personally and this was the first way that actually stuck.
The third agreement, not making assumptions, is another thing I have been working on. Assumptions can often lead to misunderstandings and mistakes. Assumptions also tend to play into confirmation bias, and as we have seen in the current political climate, it’s not always best to jump to assumptions without knowing the whole story.
Finally, the fourth agreement, always do your best, is something that was often tell people, but don’t necessarily practice ourselves. We are so hard and judgmental on ourselves and we don’t give ourselves the freedom to learn and make mistakes. As long as you are growing and learning and always doing your best, you can walk away proud at the work you have accomplished each day.
This is obviously a very cursory glance at The Four Agreements, but it honestly was significant perspective changing book for me. I recommend it to anyone who is searching for the words to describe the work they are trying to do on themselves.
The new year always tends to focus more on the outward appearance than the inward health and wellness and this book has been a great way to remind me that we need to focus on our inwards health just as much as out outwards appearance.
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