The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz StoryShots Book Analysis and Summary PDF

STORYSHOTS The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz StoryShots Summary and Review A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom  First published by StoryShots 2023 Copyright © 2023 by StoryShots All rights reserved. No part of this public...

STORYSHOTS The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz StoryShots Summary and Review A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom  First published by StoryShots 2023 Copyright © 2023 by StoryShots All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission. StoryShots has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party Internet Websites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. Disclaimer: This is an unofficial summary and analysis. It is not affiliated with, authorized, approved, licensed, or endorsed by the subject book’s author or publisher. 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Find out more at reedsy.com  Contents Preface v About Don Miguel Ruiz 1 Introduction 2 StoryShot #1: The Outside World Domesti- cates You Negatively 3 StoryShot #2: Shackled From a Young Age 4 StoryShot #3: You Are Living in a Dream 5 StoryShot #4: You Can Wake Up From Dreams 6 StoryShot #5: Accept Both Death and Life 7 StoryShot #6: Awareness Is the Starting Line For Your... 8 StoryShot #7: If You Develop Awareness, You Will Develop... 9 StoryShot #8: Once You Can Forgive, You Can Take Action 10 StoryShot #9: We Are All Living in Our Own Dream 11 StoryShot #10: Be Impeccable With Your Word 12 StoryShot #11: Don’t Take Anything Personally 13 StoryShot #12: Don’t Make Assumptions 15 StoryShot #13: Always Do Your Best 16 StoryShot #14: The Three Paths to Freedom 17 Final Summary and Review 19 Rating 20 PDF, Free Audiobook, Infographic, and Ani- mated Book Summary 21 Related Book Summaries 22  Preface Life gets busy. Has The Four Agreements been on your reading list? Learn the key insights now. We’re scratching the surface here. If you don’t already have Don Miguel Ruiz’s popular book on self-help and spirituality , order it here or get the audiobook for free to learn the juicy details. v  About Don Miguel Ruiz Don Miguel Ruiz is a Mexican author whose work is inspired by Toltec spiritualist and neoshamanistic texts. Don Miguel Ruiz was born into a family of healers and raised in rural Mexico by a curandera (healer) mother and a nagual (shaman) grandfather. The family anticipated that Miguel would embrace their centuries-old legacy of healing and teaching and carry forward the esoteric Toltec knowledge. Instead, distracted by modern life, Miguel chose to attend medical school and become a surgeon. A near-death experience changed his life. Stunned by this experience, he began an intensive practice of self-inquiry. He devoted himself to the mastery of ancient ancestral wisdom. He studied earnestly with his mother, and completed an apprenticeship with a powerful shaman in the Mexican desert. In 2018, he was listed as one of Watkins’ 100 most spiritually influential living people. 1  Introduction The Four Agreements is a practical guide to personal freedom written by Don Miguel Ruiz. Don Miguel became an apprentice under a shaman and has extensive knowledge of ancient Toltecs. The Toltecs were an indigenous Mexican culture of great war- riors and artists that lived around 1000 years ago. The book is based on the Toltec belief of freedom from self-limiting beliefs that may cause suffering in a person’s life. The Four Agreements is a highly influential book. It was first published in 1997 and has been an ever-popular book since Oprah Winfrey endorsed the book in 2001 and 2013. The book has since been translated into 46 languages, sold over 8 million copies in the US, and spent over a decade on the New York Times bestseller list. 2  StoryShot #1: The Outside World Domesticates You Negatively Don Miguel points out that the outside world has a significant impact on how we live our lives. Don Miguel calls this domes- tication. Domestication is generally not very positive. Instead, it pushes us towards being fearful and judgmental. As we are punished for bad actions and rewarded when we obey the outside world, we get obsessed with rewards. This is not good for us as it teaches us to pursue good actions to receive rewards. We should be pursuing good actions for the action itself. The punishment of not obeying leaves us feeling like we are not good enough. Based on this, Don Miguel believes our biggest fear in life is not death. Instead, our biggest fear is being who we truly are. So, to be genuinely happy, we have to break away from our shackles. 3  StoryShot #2: Shackled From a Young Age These shackles develop from a young age. We are born into social norms that dictate the dreams we can have in life. The collective dream of the planet influences our individual dreams. This collective dream is taught to us by our parents, schools, religions, and politicians. Through this education, we learn how to behave ‘properly,’ what we should believe, and the differ- ence between good and bad. Our acceptance of these societal agreements is our domestication. If we tried to rebel during childhood or adolescence, we were punished and suppressed by more powerful parents and teachers. Just like an animal, we were also rewarded when we obeyed these more powerful individuals. Subsequently, we all surrendered and decided to follow the collective dream rather than our individual dreams. But as we grow older, we no longer need a more powerful person there to domesticate and control us. These ideas are so in-built that we domesticate ourselves. Don Miguel suggests we can break free from this structure and establish new agreements for ourselves. These are the four agreements. 4 StoryShot #3: You Are Living in a Dream Don Miguel believes domestication leads to us all living in a dream. We base our decisions on irrational and incorrect assumptions about ourselves. We grow up judging and blaming ourselves and others. We also aspire to gain rewards from a system we didn’t even choose. 5  StoryShot #4: You Can Wake Up From Dreams It is possible to wake up from the dream that we live in. It is possible to re-engineer your reality without endless striving to be better. It is possible to live without suffering. To do this, you will need to master three skills: 1. Awareness - You must be aware that you are living in a dream-like state full of illusions; see these illusions for what they are. 2. Forgiveness - You then must accept the consequences of these illusions; how the illusions impact you and those around you. 3. Action - You now need to dissolve this dream and shape it into something more reality-like. If you manage to master all three of these skills, you are said to have reached enlightenment. This is a time with no suffering and can also be described as the second awakening. 6  StoryShot #5: Accept Both Death and Life We must accept death, and the concept of death will teach us how to live our lives. Death, when honestly thought about, allows us to accept that life doesn’t last forever. When we accept this, we begin to care less about what others might think and start to live our life the way we want. Listening to the angels of death allows us to live in the present as much as possible. We can enjoy life without being attached to the concept of life. 7 StoryShot #6: Awareness Is the Starting Line For Your Journey Don Miguel wants us to be aware that our life is like a dream. He also wants us to accept that death is essential for living our lives. That said, awareness is required for us to recognize our life is like a dream, and we will one day die. Your awareness can fade, though, as you go about your life. One moment you are no longer in the dream-like state. Next, you are no longer aware of how you are living. As well as developing awareness in the first place, we must also learn how to maintain awareness. Train your awareness like a muscle. Doing this is the only way to true, consistent enlightenment. Two ways to elevate and maintain your awareness are medita- tion and fasting. Buddha laid a clear path of meditation, fasting, and mindfulness. Don Miguel states we should follow in his footsteps. Don Miguel also suggests a plant-based tradition is hugely important. Plants have altered the experiences of all humans. Indigenous American shaman traditions guide this suggestion. 8  StoryShot #7: If You Develop Awareness, You Will Develop Forgiveness The forgiveness that Don Miguel associates with awareness relates to forgiving our past and ongoing failures against agree- ments we still hold. It is also forgiveness for causing ourselves and those around us to suffer based on our accepted illusions and forgiveness for the suffering others produce through their dreams. Don Miguel believes that universal love is based on acceptance by all. If you are willing to accept the world and people around you, you will feel a huge weight lifted off your shoulders. This greater acceptance does not mean you will always live up to your expectations. You will fail, and so will others. But accepting these mistakes and accepting that you are merely human will help you maintain awareness. 9  StoryShot #8: Once You Can Forgive, You Can Take Action In The Four Agreements, Don Miguel points out that forgiveness unlocks the space, energy, and strength needed to reshape your reality. Forgiveness encourages three actions: 1. Preventing new, unwanted agreements from taking root. 2. Eliminating old, damaging agreements already in place. 3. Programming new agreements that slowly eliminate suf- fering. 10 StoryShot #9: We Are All Living in Our Own Dream As well as accepting our dream-like living, we must also be understanding of others. Don Miguel reminds us that we are not responsible for others; we are only responsible for ourselves. If we accept we are no longer responsible for others, we will no longer be hurt by others’ actions. We take actions against us less personally when we know that others are only behaving based on their own dream-like living. Don Miguel describes this as being immune to other people’s emotional poison. If you avoid this emotional poison, you can move through the world with ease. Not taking things personally also opens up the possibility for us to start trusting our hearts more to guide our lives. You will be less controlled by the opinions and actions of others. Your objective reality will guide you. Building on these ideas, Don Miguel introduced four clear takeaway messages that should be implemented. 11  StoryShot #10: Be Impeccable With Your Word Don Miguel believes this first agreement is the most important but is often the most difficult one to adhere to. He points out that the word impeccable has its root in the Latin word for sin and a Latin prefix for without. Don Miguel explains that sin is anything that goes against who you are. So, being impeccable with your word involves taking responsibility for your actions and remaining nonjudgmental. Non-judgemental towards others and yourself. Don Miguel describes words as more powerful than we realize. They are the building blocks of labels, concepts, and beliefs. We must be cautious before using words as we could potentially create new, harmful illusions. The easiest way to do this is to get into the habit of only saying what you mean and meaning only what you say. If in doubt, say nothing. 12  StoryShot #11: Don’t Take Anything Personally As already spoken about, not taking things personally allows you to avoid harm from hurtful treatment. It prevents you from taking others’ words upon yourself. When someone insults you, imagine that person is full of poison, and their words are poison projected at you. If you take their insults personally, you will ingest their poison. If you eat their poison, you will feel like a victim and find it hard to think clearly. Having a strong sense of self means you don’t have to rely on others’ opinions to feel content or satisfied. We must become less reactive and more detached from other people’s actions. We must acknowledge we would do the same if we were in that person’s reality. Don Miguel believes if we stop taking things personally, anger, jealousy, envy, and sadness can disappear. Don Miguel also explains that taking things personally can lead to personal importance. Personal importance is a state where we believe everything is about us, leading to us taking more things personally. In the end, you are left with a cycle of worrying about what other people think. Don Miguel reminds readers that absolutely nothing people say or do to you is about you. Instead, all their actions are actually about them. Often insults are tied to personal issues or beliefs that an individual is 13 THE FOUR AGREEMENTS BY DON MIGUEL RUIZ STORYSHOTS SUMMARY AND REVIEW having. So, Don Miguel suggests we don’t seek out information from others, as their views are never actually relevant. Instead, focus on accepting and improving yourself. 14  StoryShot #12: Don’t Make Assumptions In Don Miguel’s eyes, making assumptions leads to suffering. Assumptions often have minimal basis in reality and are only real in our imaginations. Thinking about others’ thoughts has the potential to produce stress or conflicts. Often people will perceive their assumptions as the truth, which is why assumptions often lead to negative consequences. To overcome this expectation, Don Miguel recommends asking questions and maintaining clear communication with others. This transparent communication prevents assumptions from taking hold. Don Miguel states that keeping to this agreement will help you avoid misunderstandings, sadness, and drama. The simplest way to include this agreement in your life is to consider when someone or something surprises you. In these instances, remember the failing isn’t theirs but yours. Out-of-control assumptions can often harm our relationships. For example, people often assume their partners know what they’re thinking. This means people believe their partners will do what they want. When this isn’t the case, they are often disappointed or angry with their partner. Again, Don Miguel suggests we ask more questions to succeed. 15  StoryShot #13: Always Do Your Best Doing your best does not mean doing the best that is physically possible. It means doing the best you can individually manage, which can vary by situation and your current circumstances. One way to do your best is to adopt the previous three agreements into your daily life. If you do this, you can avoid regret and accept that people do their best at every moment. You will come to enjoy the action itself, rather than simply enjoying the rewards associated with actions. Similarly, Don Miguel suggests we should work hard because it makes us happy, rather than external motivation. Don Miguel provides an example of salaries. If the primary motivation in our job is money, we will never do our best. We will also be stuck in jobs that pay well but lack fulfillment and joy. Due to insufficient fulfillment in their jobs, these people will then spend their weekends partying, drinking, and doing other things that harm their lives. If doing your best means working hard because you love the task, your work will begin to feel effortless. In this way, the final agreement – to always do your best – will increase all the other agreements’ power while helping you free yourself. 16  StoryShot #14: The Three Paths to Freedom In the book, Don Miguel outlines three basic pathways to freedom: 1. Awareness: According to Ruiz, awareness involves rec- ognizing and understanding our own thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, and the impact they have on our lives. By becoming more aware of ourselves and the way we interact with the world around us, we can begin to break free from limiting beliefs and patterns of behavior that hold us back. 2. Discipline: Ruiz argues that discipline is essential for making lasting changes in our lives and achieving freedom. This involves setting clear goals and making a commitment to taking consistent action towards achieving those goals, even when it is difficult or uncomfortable. It also involves learning to control our thoughts and emotions, rather than letting them control us. 3. Death: While this may seem counterintuitive, Ruiz argues that the concept of death can be a powerful motivator and catalyst for change. By recognizing that our time on earth is limited and that we have a finite number of days to live, we can be inspired to make the most of our lives and pursue 17 THE FOUR AGREEMENTS BY DON MIGUEL RUIZ STORYSHOTS SUMMARY AND REVIEW our passions and dreams with greater urgency. Overall, Ruiz suggests that by embracing these three pathways to freedom - awareness, discipline, and death - we can break free from the limitations and constraints that hold us back and live more authentic, fulfilling lives. 18  Final Summary and Review The Four Agreements outlines four principles for achieving personal freedom and happiness. The four agreements are: “Be Impeccable With Your Word”, “Don’t Take Anything Person- ally”, “Don’t Make Assumptions”, and “Always Do Your Best”. The book discusses the idea that we are all domesticated by society to be fearful and judgmental, but we can break free from these societal norms by practicing awareness, forgiveness, and action. Ruiz also explores the concept of death and how it can motivate us to live more authentic and meaningful lives. The book emphasizes the importance of openness and under- standing, including understanding the experiences and behav- iors of others, to forgive and not let others’ mistakes hold us back. 19  Rating We rate this book 4/5. 20 PDF, Free Audiobook, Infographic, and Animated Book Summary This was the tip of the iceberg. To dive into the details and support the author, order the book or get the audiobook for free. Did you like the lessons you learned here? Comment below or share to show you care. New to StoryShots? 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