The Four Agreements

The Door That Opened

The Four Agreements first came into my life just before I did my Yoga teacher training. It was actually a book we had to read before starting the course in Bali - I remember thinking to myself, wow this book must have a lot of meaning if it’s an integral part of the training. I now see why. Being a short book, its easily manageable, yet its probably one of the books that has changed my life the most. It was after reading this book that I felt the door open on my real spiritual path.

The First Agreement

Be Impeccable with your word

To be Impeccable with your word. What does that mean to you? Does it mean to always follow through with what you say you’re going to do? Or does it mean more than that?

You see, being impeccable with your word translates into many different areas of our life, big and small. There’s a reason it’s the most difficult Agreement, and the hardest one to honour.

Your word is power. It is a gift given to you by the highest God. It was given to you with the intention to make change — to create magic — to manifest — to express your creativity.
Don Miguel describes the word as being ‘a force’ or my favoured description, “A tool of magic.”
As humans this is our most powerful tool, no other animals can speak. We were given this gift and we need to use it to its full potential. It would be a dishonour not to.
But like most good things, there’s also a darker side, a side that’s sharp and hurtful. If used in the wrong way our word can destroy everything around us. Misuse of the word can change our life as we know it. Don Miguel Ruiz describes one side as being beautiful magic, and the other being black magic.

One scenario he mentions, is the word of one German man who managed to change the world with his word, n the darkest of senses. One, who’s word manipulated almost an entire country to do the most atrocious things known to man. Hitler’s word was a dark force, one that created fear and brainwashed its listeners, which lead to great destruction.

When I think of a human being who’s word changed the world for the good, I think of a man who had a vision of a world where race was not an issue. Sadly this journey is not completely over — and there is still a lot to accomplish in the battle of civil rights, but his word definitely made a change. You know who I’m referring to right? This change began by Martin Luther King’s word. His inspirational optimistic word.
One that called for equality and in its purest form, love.

Opinions are another strong use of our word. Your opinion of someone can change their complete outlook. No matter how grown you are, or how comfortable you are with your own being, a negative opinion from someone you care about can really hurt and make us question everything we thought we knew.
It is like putting a dark spell on someone. Spread your good magic, not your black magic.
All the beliefs you have now and opinions of things, all started with someones word. Everything we learn, everything we see, begins with the word. Do you see the power in it now?
It may even be an opinion of yourself — a negative use of your word, towards yourself. All it takes is for someone else to come along and use their word in a positive way towards you and it can vanish that opinion you once had of yourself, in an instance.

To simplify the First Agreement - impeccability means ‘without sin’. A sin is anything that you do which goes against yourself. When you judge yourself you are going against yourself. Love yourself and others, impeccably.

The Second Agreement

Don’t take anything personally

Tough one right?
We’re living in a time where the internet and social media are such a prominent part of our lives, that it becomes very tricky not to take things personally when peoples opinions are so widely visible.
The thing is, others opinions are not about you, they are merely a reflection of themselves.
We cannot recognise others faults if we do not recognise a fault in ourselves. When we analyse others, it is almost like looking into a mirror.
We did an exercise during my training where we had to write a letter to someone in our lives that had hurt us, or who’s actions upset us.
We then had to write a letter to someone we looked up to and admired.
After the exercise we looked back at the letters and changed the names to our own — as if we were writing the letter to ourselves. It was an extremely powerful exercise and brought up things about us we may have never realised before. So others opinions of you are irrelevant — it's a reflection of them and it’s something they need to work through.
So have compassion for them and wish them well.
We are all on our own journey.
If you take certain things personally, maybe you believe it yourself — which in turn can bring up something about you that you didn’t want to admit to. You take it personally because you believe it to be true. Once you believe it, you suck it inside of you and you’re now trapped.
Don Miguel refers to it as being a sign of selfishness — as were always thinking it’s about us. We were raised to think this way, thinking everything is always about me!
Well, it’s not, and it’s time to let go of this belief.

Opinions are others beliefs and conditioning they have undergone in their lives. It’s a result of the things they have learnt and the dream they have in their minds. You taking it personally, is accepting that they can see into your dream you have in your own mind. Which we know, can never be true.
We all have our dream world inside of us, that nobody, no matter how close, can ever enter.

The Third Agreement

Don’t make assumptions

I have a very vivid memory. I was working for someone in Australia and I once didn’t do something, and when he asked why I didn’t do it I replied “I assumed you didn’t want me to.” To which he replied: “Assuming, makes an arse out of you and me” (Ass-u-me). It’s stuck with me ever since.

It’s true right? I mean, why assume when you can just ask? This links back to the use of our word. If we used our word productively, we would never have to assume anything. We make assumptions over everything in our lives — we can literally destroy relationships by assuming. Trust me - I’ve done it! The problem is, when we assume, we believe it to be true and we take it personally.
Do you see how all of the agreements are linked in some way?

Assumptions lead to us gossiping about these assumptions — and gossiping is the worst type of poison to transfer to each other. The problem is, we’re too afraid to ask for clarification on things, so we assume. This in turn, leads to emotional hell. No question is a stupid question — it shows not only intelligence, but bravery.

I was always taught; “if you don’t know, just ask.” Didn’t some of our teachers say this to us back in school? This is why I think shame on the teachers who judge students for questions. Referring to them as silly questions. Or saying something like “didn’t you listen?” We’re all human and sometimes we miss things. We should never create fear in someone to ask questions. This is how assumption manifests.

We also do this by creating fantasies. Put yourself in this scenario: There’s someone you’re interested in, romantically. They show you some attention, maybe it’s a conversation or simply a smile. From this we then create an entire fantasy in our minds, making up a reality that isn’t in fact reality. We create such a story in our heads that we start to believe it. We are assuming they are interested in us. Then if we come to find out that this isn’t the case, we feel genuinely upset and let down. All from one assumption!
Can you see how damaging it can be to ourselves to make assumptions?

We do the same in relationships. We assume the other person knows how we feel then we feel hurt when they don’t act in the way we expect them to. We’ve all done it. We say things like: “He must know I feel this way!” or “I just assumed she wouldn’t do something like that.”
We’re creating a harsh reality for ourselves. Use your word to ask questions — it is power.

The Fourth Agreement

Always do your best

I remember a piece of work I had to do back in college on critical thinking. Part of it was about the term ‘a good student.’ What is the meaning of good? How could you refer to a student as being good? What does a good student even look like?

See, when you describe something as good, especially in a learning environment, you’re being very vague with the meaning. If you tell someone to be a good student or describe them as already being a good student, how are they supposed to know what that is? Their idea of good might be something completely different to yours.
Whereas, if you talk about someone doing their best — all they can ever do is their best, and you know the outcome was the best that they could possibly do, at that time.

All we can ever really do is our best.
If we’re doing our absolute best, theres nothing more to do. We can rest peacefully knowing this. We have a clear conscience.

Under any circumstance, always do your best, no more and no less. Remember, this will be different at different times. Sometimes your best isn’t what it was yesterday. Thats ok, there are things happening all around us and it can affect us in many different ways. So as long as you’re doing your best in that moment, you’re on the right track.
Have compassion for yourself and let go of judgement.

Here’s a story I wish to share with you from the book:

There was a man who wanted to transcend his suffering so he went to a buddhist temple to find a Master to help him. He went to the Master and asked, “Master, if I meditate four hours a day, how long will it take me to transcend?”
The master looked at him and said, “If you meditate four hours a day, perhaps you will transcend in 10 years.”
Thinking he could do better, the man then said, “Oh, Master, what if I meditated eight hours a day, how long will it take me to transcend?”
The Master looked at him and said, “If you meditate eight hours a day, perhaps you will transcend in 20 years.”
“But why will it take me longer if I meditate more?” The man asked.
The Master replies, “You are not here to sacrifice your joy or your life. You are here to live, to be happy, and to love. If you can do your best in two hours of meditation, but you spend eight hours instead, you will only grow tired, miss the point, and you won’t enjoy your life. Do your best, and perhaps you will learn that no matter how long you meditate, you can live, love and be happy.”

I hope this story resonates with you.
I am merely scraping the surface of this book of wisdom - I urge you to buy your own copy, and hopefully it opens a door in your life, as it did mine.

I’ll be posting a list of some of my favourite high vibe books for you soon, so keep an eye out for that.

In the meantime,

Live fully, Love fully and sprinkle your magic

Em J

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