The Four Agreements PDF

In the Four Agreements, Don Miguel Ruiz reveals the source of the self-limiting beliefs that take away our joy and create unnecessary suffering. Based on ancient Toltec wisdom, the Four Accords offer a powerful code of conduct that can quickly transform our lives into a new experience of freedom, true happiness and love. The four agreements are: be flawless in your word, don't take anything personally, make no assumptions, always do your best.

Review

I am reading this book, and although it is a small book, when I finish page 129 I will start from page 1. I've been reading it for about eighteen years now, and I suspect I'll keep reading it as long as I can read. A couple of pages at a time is more than enough to munch on my head for a few days or a week. This is a book that challenges you to live up to four simple truths and offers transformative results if you could live a life fully dedicated to the four chords. They are so concise that I can state them here.

1) Be flawless with your word.

2) Don't take anything personally.

3) Don't make assumptions.

4) Always do your best. Easy right? Track a day and see how many times you break a deal (in your actions or in your head).

The four agreements PDF

To my constant amazement, I stumble upon one or the other of these chords with some regularity. It helps to remind me of the constant rereading. I do not read in the hope of reaching a mystical state, I read because I find that the author's explanation of how our minds, our society and especially our relationships work is instructive, even if it is based on a paradigm that is completely beyond my legacy of growing up in a small New England town. Understanding the Toltec dream metaphor is an essential part of realizing the deeper meaning that guides our relationships within the world around us.

Ruiz does a good job of making these concepts clearer. Ruiz helped me shed many of my limited belief structures and opened up insights into life that are valuable to both young and old souls. Lately, I've felt like some of his complicated explanations for how dreams take over our lives are needlessly complex. That only makes the four chords more relevant to me in my daily life. It's 2021, eighteen years after I wrote that first review, and the book is still on my nightstand by my bed. Currently, I don't read it every day (I think I'm starting to understand), but every time it is a good read.