Book Review: The Four Agreements

Do you find yourself in shackles, and wish to live free? Here is a book that shows the way out through its simple practical suggestions- ‘The Four Agreements’ by Don Miguel Ruiz. It tells us about our present domesticated conditions. By domestication, he means that the way we express, the way we live happens to be the result of how our family, our society has nurtured and cultured us. If we observe minutely, we find ourselves not living our true Self. 

Then what is the solution? These four simple agreements have the power to help us in that. The first agreement is to be impeccable with our word. It means, while thinking or saying something, we must be ‘without sin’ about our use of words. Our choice in use of words should not be such that it hurts others or ourselves.

The second agreement is not taking anything personally. By someone saying good about me, I don't become that, and if something bad has been told about me that also doesn't define me. Only I know what exactly I am. When one says something one expresses oneself and not exactly me. Then why should I worry by taking it to be me or mine, when it can be one’s perception or one's own conditions or personality?

The third agreement is not to make assumptions which I personally feel as very important. Most of the time we find the reason for someone's quarrel or tension being the assumption about the other. It is very much clear that we can't know what's there in someone's mind; even, we don't know exactly what was the reason for someone's particular behaviour. Assuming the intention or the situations don't help us in resolving the matter. So, leaving this habit of assuming is a strong step towards freedom.

The fourth agreement is to always do our best. It doesn't leave us with regrets. It has been warned as well to not overdo and exert much because that will leave us with bad physical conditions or lack of energy for the future efforts, actually affecting the overall performance.

Closing the message, he has mentioned that breaking the old agreements is also a necessary step because the domestication process has given us all those. Certainly without breaking that, one cannot be freed and real Self can't be expressed.

Some quotes from the book that I find worth reflecting -

"The adults around us hooked our attention and put information into our minds through repetition. That is the way we learned everything we know."

"With that fear of being punished and that fear of not getting the reward, we start pretending to be what we are not, just to please others, just to be good enough for someone else."

"Eventually we become someone that we are not. We become a copy of Mamma's beliefs, Daddy's beliefs, society's beliefs, and religion's beliefs."

"We need a great deal of courage to challenge our own beliefs because even if we know we didn't choose all these beliefs, it is also true that we agreed to all of them. The agreement is so strong that even if we understand the concept of it not being true, we feel the blame, the guilt, and the shame occur if we go against these rules."

"If you want to live a life of joy and fulfillment, you have to find the courage to break those agreements that are fear-based and claim your personal power."

While reading it, I kept on reflecting on my own thoughts and actions, and my observations, ...and found it very much real, very much practical. This book seems to be the result of deep reflections of the author.

But I didn't like some points, especially those mentioned in the last few pages in which the author himself seems trapped in the social and religious belief systems, about freeing from which he has talked in the initial pages. Has it become difficult for the author to break the imposed belief system, or have those been established as the truth, or is it my problem of not getting the true meaning? Find it out yourself.

Overall, the book is worth reading.

If you read the book, do share your learning and review.