Self-Development Book Club - The Four Agreements
- tracymartorana4
- Jun 15
- 8 min read
Book number six in my goal to read or reread a self-development book every month in 2025 is The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz. I originally read this book many years ago and enjoyed it. I have reread it since then and am now reading it for the third time.
I love the fact that it's a quick read (less than 150 pages), so you can likely finish it in a weekend. While it's a short book, it is packed with wisdom and well worth reading over and over.
Watch Me Talk About It
Background
I don't feel like this information is necessary to understand and enjoy the book, but I wanted to share it with you. The subtitle of the book is A Toltec Wisdom Book. If you, like me, wondered "what does that even mean?", you might enjoy this information. I am leaning on my friend Google for this...
The Toltecs were a Mesoamerican civilization in central Mexico. Toltecs are known as people of knowledge. They were also known for their advancements in art, architecture, and agriculture.
Toltecs practiced polytheism, but Quetzalcoatl was their primary deity. Quetzalcoatl was a god of knowledge, creation, and invention. He was worshipped by many Mesoamerican cultures, including the Aztecs.
While this book is based on Toltec teaching, it is also very much steeped in Christianity, with many mentions of God. If that isn't your thing, I invite you to just roll with it. Don't ignore this book because of the Toltec or Christian undertones. You don't have to care about any of that to gain wisdom from this book
The Four Agreements Book Summary
Chapter 1: Domestication and Dream of the Planet
This chapter shares a common theme shared by many great thinkers. Essentially, it's that we all experience reality; we experience the world differently. This is why we can disagree on something and still both be right.
Ruiz explains how, as children, we believe what we are told. If we are born into a catholic family, we are catholic, until we are old enough to decide for ourselves (and even then, many of us never question such things). This chapter is important to understand what Ruiz means by Agreements. I'll give the short version, but don't skip this chapter, even if it feels a little woo-woo to you.
An AGREEMENT is a principle or rule of conduct. Ruiz states that The Four Agreements, when followed, can lead to personal freedom and a happier life. "Whenever we hear an opinion and believe it, we make an agreement, and it becomes part of our belief system."
Chapter 2: The First Agreement - Be Impeccable With Your Word
Ruiz says this is the most important and most difficult agreement and that if you take action to embody just one agreement, let it be this one.
When I read the title of this agreement (Be Impeccable With Your Word), I think, "Yeah, yeah, don't lie, don't gossip". While yes, that is part of this agreement, the meaning of this is much deeper. I'm going to share several quotes, because Ruiz was very concise in sharing all this information in so few pages, it's difficult to summarize what was already so succinct. However, there are several paragraphs on the word 'Impeccable' that are worth reading and considering for yourself.
"The word is a force; it is the power you have to express and communicate, to think, and thereby to create the events in your life."
"By hooking our attention, the word can enter our mind and change a whole belief for better or worse."
"When you are impeccable, you take responsibility for your actions, but you do not judge or blame..."
"Being impeccable with your word is the correct use of your energy; it means to use your energy in the direction of truth and love for yourself."
Ruiz discussed self-talk. We have a constant stream of self-dialogue running through our heads. Meditators often refer to this as our 'monkey mind". Often this dialogue is mean and judgmental. When you focus on being impeccable with your words, it includes this inner narrative.
"You can measure the impeccability of your word by your level of self-love. How much you love yourself and how you feel about yourself are directly proportionate to the quality and integrity of your word."
"Use your word to share your love."
Chapter 3: The Second Agreement - Don't Take Anything Personally
We often take things personally because we have an inflated sense of personal importance. We assume that everything is about us. We each live in our own reality because the way we perceive the world is based on our individual experiences and our own tunnel vision (focused on ourselves). People in the world are bound to do things and say things that we can take personally if we think their words are about us. But really, their words are about them. This makes me think of a quote I have heard before, "Hurt people hurt people".
It is also important to keep in mind that we can take things personally because our inner dialogue isn't impeccable. For example, if a stranger walks up to you and tells you you're dumb, you won't take it personally (because that person doesn't even know you). However, if you already had doubts about your intelligence...if your monkey mind often chastises you for being stupid or thick, you are more likely to take the stranger's words personally and allow them to make you feel bad. This is a perfect example of why Ruiz said that the First Agreement was the most important.
"If someone gives you an opinion..., don't take it personally, because the truth is that this person is dealing with his or her own feelings, beliefs, and opinions."
"When you take something personally, then you feel offended, and your reaction is to defend your beliefs and create conflicts. You make something big out of something so little, because you have the need to be right and make everybody else wrong."
(Did that hit anyone else right in the heart??)
Chapter 4: The Third Agreement - Don't Make Assumptions
Let' start right off with a couple of quotes.
"The problem with making assumptions is that we believe they are the truth."
"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."
I would add to this last quote that sometimes people don't ask for clarification because they are afraid, it's because they are automatically filling in any blanks with more assumptions, and therefore don't even realize that they need clarification.
"It is very interesting how the human mind works. We have the need to justify everything, to explain and understand everything, in order to feel safe. It is not important if the answer is correct; just the answer itself makes us feel safe."
"We also make assumptions about ourselves, and this creates a lot of inner conflict."
Chapter 5: The Fourth Agreement - Always Do Your Best
This is how I would summarize this chapter. Always do your best, accepting that your best is different one day to another. Acknowledging this reminds us that it is important to take care of ourselves. My big takeaway was the importance of self-care. However, the book is also reminding us that if you do your best, you can't feel guilty later for doing something half-assed (my term, not the author's).
Ruiz shares this parable -
"There is 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...?' 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 Master replied, '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 share this parable because trying to share any other tidbits without full context is difficult. So, I will admit I turned to Google and its AI-generated response to answer my request to summarize Ruiz's fourth agreement. This is what it returned - "This means consistently striving to be your best, not in a perfect, superhuman way, but in a way that is consistent with your current capabilities and circumstances. It's about making the most of each moment, recognizing that 'best' can fluctuate depending on your energy, mood, and overall well-being."
Having to turn to AI to summarize this tells me that maybe I'm tired and my best at this moment is less than my best was a little while ago. Maybe I need a nap...
Chapter 6: The Toltec Path to Freedom - Breaking Old Agreements
Ruiz starts this chapter by questioning what we mean when we use the term Freedom. This is one of the first times in this book when I felt he was being a little wordy. So again, I'm jumping to a quote...
The freedom we are looking for is the freedom to be ourselves, to express ourselves. But if we look at our lives we will see that most of the time we do things just to please others, just to be accepted by others, rather than living our lives to please ourselves."
Without some context from deep within this book, it feels like he is telling us not to do things for others and that we should shirk our responsibilities if they aren't enjoyable to us. But this is where we must come back to the agreements. A big part of being impeccable with our word, realizing we aren't the center of the universe and understanding that our wellness requires work (self-care). Freedom means that going to a job we don't enjoy is important, not because others would judge us for being unemployed, but because being able to pay our rent and having a nice place to live is important to us. We might choose to spend time with a crazy Aunt, not because we don't want to hurt her feelings, but because maintaining family relationships is important to us.
We gain our freedom by breaking the agreements that limit us and embracing the four agreements that allow us to live a life based on true happiness and love.
Such a little book, so many words used to summarize it! I hope you enjoyed this post.
Previous SDBC Blog Posts
Read about the other books I've read this year by visiting my previous blog post. If you don't want to miss future posts, be sure to subscribe!
Buy the Books
Does this book sound good? Get your copy of The Four Agreements HERE.
Or check out some of the previous Self-Development books I've read this year:
Gentle by Courtney Carver
I Decided to Live as Me by Kim Suhyun
The Let Them Theory by Mel Robbins
Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman
Body Thrive by Cate Stillman
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