Name: The Four Agreements
Rating: 3.966767371601208 (331 reviews)
ISBN: 9781878424501

Don Miguel Ruiz

Identifies four self-limiting beliefs that impede one's experience of freedom, true happiness, and love.

A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom

The Four Agreements

Daya Montes

If others say one thing, but do another, you are lying to yourself if you don't listen to their actions. But if you are truthful with yourself, you will save yourself a lot of emotional pain. Telling yourself the truth about it may hurt, but you don't need to be attached to the pain. Healing is on the way, and it's just a matter of time before things will be better for you. If someone is not treating you with love and respect, it is a gift if they walk away from you.

nanafark

«Being impeccable with your word is not using the word against yourself.»

«When you take things personally, then you feel offended, and your reaction is to defend your beliefs and create conflicts.»

because by taking things personally you set yourself up to suffer for nothing.»

«Your anger, jealousy, and envy will disappear, and even your sadness will simply disappear if you don't take things personally.»

«The problem with making assumptions is that we 

«That is why whenever we make assumptions, we're asking for problems.»

«All the sadness and drama you have lived in your life was root in 

«Because we are afraid to ask for clarification, we make assumptions, and believe we are right about the assumptions; then we defend our assumptions and try to make someone else wrong. It is always better to 

 than to make an assumption, because assumptions set us up for suffering.»

«The first three agreements will only work if you 

. Don't expect that you will always be able to be impeccable with your word. Your routine habits are too strong and firmly rooted in your mind. But you can do your best.»

even if you still make assumptions, still take things personally, and still are not impeccable with your word.»

«If you do your best in the search for personal freedom, in the search for self-love, you will discover that it's just a matter of time before you find what you are looking for.»

«Under any circumstance, always do your best, no more and no less. But keep in mind that your best is 

 going to be the same from one moment to the next.»

«Everything is alive and changing all the time, so your best will sometimes be high quality, and other times it will not be as good.»

«Regardless of the quality, keep doing your best — no more and no less than your best. If you try too hard to do more than your best, you will spend more energy than is needed and in the end your best will not be enough. When you overdo, you deplete your body and go against yourself, and it will take you longer to accomplish your goal.»

«But if you do less than your best, you subject yourself to frustrations, self-judgment, guilt, and regrets.»

«And if you don't judge yourself there is no way you are going to suffer from guilt, blame, and self-punishment.»

«When you do your best you learn to accept yourself. But you have to be aware and learn from your mistakes. Learning from your mistakes means you practice, look honestly at the results, and keep practicing. This increases your awareness.»

if i could summarise the whole book in a sentence, that would be this one. 

ariana

Estar vivos es nuestro mayor miedo. No es la muerte; nuestro mayor miedo es arriesgarnos a vivir: correr el riesgo de estar vivos y de expresar lo que realmente somos.

Cuatro valores o "acuerdos" a seguir para vivir mejor con uno mismo y con los demás. En esencia es muy útil y plantea una filosofía sencilla y beneficiosa para la vida pero, incluso siendo un libro corto, peca de redundante en un intento de generar contenido. Algunos argumentos se contradicen y otros sólo se podrían haber dicho hace 25 años. Un lindo libro que tiene mayor valor de relectura ágil que la lectura comprensiva inicial.

Greg Talbot

Wonder this planet long enough, you'll start to think about our problematic relationship to the world. Call it sin, call it attachment, call it domestication, call it unfree...you look into the mirror and wonder if you are living an authentic life. The idea that resonated me from the "Four Agreements" was the idea of consent. Ruiz poses four rules for personal integrity:Be Impeccable With Your Word, Don't Take Anything Personally, Don't Make Assumptions, Always Do Your Best. Ironing these out, they do seem not only like sage advice...but a way to respond to the world that can bring out someone's best. The idea of consent, that we are only bound to what we agree to, is a very empowering idea, and I don't think I've ever thought about problems in that way. We may have implict bias or genetic predispositions..but if you have faith in human beings, you have to have some faith in choice, in the ability for people to decide to be one way, or another. These four agreements presented here, are binds we can make to ourself, and take power back. Not all of the book worked for me though. Ruiz's idea that the inexperienced and undeveloped are more happy because they are not "domesticated". Reminded me a lot of Rousseau's idea that the young are free and are chained through societial obligations. I think a lot of adults would opt for the "joy" from preservation under suffering, than a "happiness" from limited life unpleasentness. Also, the book is a guide to "personal freedom", but where is the talk of community? Does the book ever very from an "I" perspective. There is no talk of a church, a sangha, a gathering, and I think because of that we lose that transcending perspective to see ourselves as more than our own animal spirit. Many find this book of Toltec wisdom to be a firehose of inspiration...i'm somewhere in the middle. Overall, I agree with challenging limiting beliefs that we give to ourselves. Because life is mechancial when we define ourselves as a fixed being. There are other paths, generally ecunmenical, that speak to me and my background more. Teachings from "When Things Fall Apart" by Pema Chodron or "The Seven Storey Mountain" by Thomas Merton have lit my fuse, and perhaps hit me when I was younger in ways that other inspiration books will not. Still I stay open. I hope to spend a little more time reflecting on these agreements, and keep the inner space listening.

Kinanti Desyanandini

A lovely, simple book on a few principles to live a life with more personal freedom - quite accurate as per title. 

The Four Agreements, " now printed in Spanish, promotes a powerful code of conduct based on ancient Toltec wisdom. Two-color throughout.

Una Guia Practica para la Libertad Personal

Los Cuatro Acuerdos

trae buenas cositas pero lo sentí muyyyy repetitivo

Simple concepts, but effective to implement (just hard work). 

Miguel has a gentle writing style, which makes the book easy to read. 

Raquel Rademeyer

Simple concepts, but effective to implement (just hard work). 

Miguel has a gentle writing style, which makes the book easy to read. 

Yasmina Paniagua

four agreements.

Elyse 

Miguel Ruiz

gained insight on not taking anything too personally. book was repetitive at certain parts and started to get kinda preachy. also learned a bit about the toltecs

chloe

Paoovi

Un libro que propicia la introspección de una forma en la que sutilmente va dejando aprendizajes en cuanto a la relación con los otros. Lo he leído más de tres veces en distintas etapas de mi vida e incluso escuchado en audiolibro antes de dormir y es sanador.

Kevin Wammer

A very short book, so a very short review: It's a good book, nothing groundbreakingly new, but well presented. I had never heard of the Toltecs before, and I'd like to dig deeper into this culture.

Corey’s Books

The Four Agreements

be impeccable with your word

don’t take anything personally

don’t make assumptions

always do your best

Chris Farrell 

This book was a little hard to get into at first, because, it requires a bit of perspective change too really understand what he is driving at. Once I did that, the book had a lot to say in such a few number of pages. I will be contemplating it long after I finished read it.

Molly Bridge

Banyak hal yang aku dapat dari buku ini. Tulisan yang membuatku nyaman, opini penulis disampaikan dengan kata-kata yang menyentuh hati. Apa yang dibahas di semua bab buku ini benar-benar berhubungan dengan kehidupanku saat ini. Buku ini seperti memberiku penyemangat baru dalam keputusasaan hidup.

Hannah Yoon

This was a super helpful read for someone looking to grow as a person. I didn't like the writing style and felt some ideas were too simplified. It's not as low as a 3 but not a 4 either. I like the premise of the book and what the four agreements entail. Sometimes it felt too new-agey for me but I recognize it helps others.

The Myth Echo

My dad wanted me to read this back in 6th grade (I was beginning to think for myself and all that, and he wanted me to think right), but honestly, I got nothing out of this book except hatred. It over explained things that I (An 11 year old at the time) didn't understand nor need. This is definitely more conservative, and at yk 11 years old, I did not understand why it was SO heavy on that (I was barely in 6th grade, I knew nothing abt politics). Maybe if I re-read this now, I might find it more enjoyable (Or at least less boring, as I literally sat down and MADE myself read the entire thing in 1 day), but from what I remember, it just didn't work well.

Meagan Fischer 

Absolutely terrible book. Nonsensical, inconsistent, does not define terms in any practical way. Someone on here named Holly gave an excellent breakdown of why this book is so incredibly stupid, starting with the fact that this author is NOT "impeccable with his word" despite telling others they should be. I will try to link that review later as it reflects most of my criticisms and this book isn't worth me re-typing them up.

Mia Caven

A very simply put book that encapsulates what all the books about the same thing have been trying to say in the least insensitive way (but arguable at some points)

The first third of this book made me really reflecting on myself and my life. I felt intrigued and motivated, especially reading “be impeccable with your word”. After this, the advice started to sound more generic and I was not as invested in the read. Either way, it was a quick and easy read and had offerings that I hope to carry along with me forever. 

Sarah Panek

Asher Black

Earthshaking book. Distills in a book you can read in one standing a lifetime of possibility.

The four principles that are great to stick by. Short read and definitely a re-read! 

Haley Kirinsky 

This book showed how, what seems like four simple principles, can have a significant ripple effect, if practiced. From transforming the way we view our interactions to the way we view ourselves. 

A few highlights:

“What does it mean to be impeccable with your word? "Impeccable" means "without sin”. Everything you feel or believe or say that goes against yourself is a sin. Being impeccable is not going against yourself.”

"When we believe something, we assume we are right about it to the point that we will destroy relationships in order to defend our position. We make the assumption that everyone sees life the way we do. We assume that others think the way we think, feel the way we feel, judge the way we judge… And this is why we have a fear of being ourselves around others. Because we think everyone else will judge us, victimise us, and blame us as we do ourselves. So even before others have a chance to reject us, we have already rejected ourselves. That is the way the human mind works."

Kota Smith

Sorta repetitive at certain points however I really enjoyed the message within this book. It is an empowering read that looks to direct you towards transcending to a better place in your life and outline 4 steps to achieve that. I think this book did a great job of breaking down each principle in a way any reader could understand. I do think that this could have been a slightly shorter book tho and could have avoided some topics being repeated and beat down so much.

Meghan Navoy

I know a lot of people love this book but I thought it was just ok. it's really short but took me forever to read it because I wasn't that into it.

The Four Agreements A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom

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