The Four Agreements:
A Recipe for Personal Freedom

By Zahoor Farooq

I have recently read a book ‘’The Four Agreements’’ by Don Miguel Ruiz, a practical guide to personal freedom. It has influenced a generation of people over the years gaining a lot of traction. It is a guide to live a simpler yet happy life.
From the very beginning, the child’s attention is hooked. He is taught that if he doesn’t perform well at school or fall short of expectation, he is punished. When he rises to the expectations, he is rewarded. He keeps on doing it untill he becomes used to it. As an adult, he does everything to get attention knowing that he will be rewarded afterwards. He pretends to be what he is not in order to attract attention. When he fails to do so, he starts self abusing, punishing himself in order to be accepted by people because he can’t hook people’s attention. The biggest fear we experience is not about death but being who we truly are. I don’t want to be the person I’m because the image of perfection I have created doesn’t fit with it and as a result I continuously self-reproach and self-abuse. Let me break down the four agreements talked by the author to transcend these parochial beliefs.

1. Be impeccable with your word:
   By this, the author means resigning oneself to being committed to truth, he means to use a word to spread love and joy and forsake the propagation of lies and falsehood. People make assumptions or express their opinions about us be it bad or good, it strongly impacts us and we carry the word with us, believe in it and it turns out to be reality. As a result it alters the entire course of our lives because we made an agreement to whatever was passed on to us. In this way, we make number of agreements on daily basis. One day, a father came to his home from work angry and exhausted, found his son playing continuously guitar. He was trying to get some relief but because of constant noise of guitar being played by his son, he screamed at his son, “you suck at it, you don’t play well,” blurted out he. His son instantly stopped playing, believing in the word of his father as reality. That was the last time he played guitar. From then on, he never touched the guitar because he thought that he really sucked at playing it and it became reality. His father didn’t realise what he did to his son with his word. This is how powerful a word can be. While being engaged in gossips and trash talking, we don’t realise the damage we cause by using our word, we endlessly and thoughtlessly spread the poison about others, we pass on this poison to others to make them infected as well, they repeat the same and it goes on contaminating as many people. The whole planet becomes polluted. However, when we are impeccable with our word, we commit to do whatever we say and prioritise it since it builds our relations with others strong and long lasting. Impeccability of word sets us free, it offers us freedom, success and it takes away fear from us and within it emanates joy. It allows us to love ourselves and be compassionate about ourselves.
2. Don’t take things personally:-
   Taking everything personally they said to us brings endless worry and sufferings into our lives. When a person says something bad about us, it is not about us but about them, since they are dealing with their own feelings and beliefs. What they say is the reflection and projection of their own life and how they are programmed. They feel empowered after we accept what is conveyed to us and we allow this poison run through us, which takes a heavy toll on us. When we hear something good about us, it is not we are good but it is the person who says this. We shouldn’t let ourselves fall prey to other little opinions or words. Saying something bad is the worst form of black magic because it turns our life upside down. Taking things personally sets us up for torment and pain but refusing to take them personally creates room joy and peace. We create an inner conflict as soon as we feel offended by others opinion. Their opinions and assumptions are the results of their belief system they have deep integrated within them. Assumptions they make and options they express about us are in accordance with their belief system. But, we can prevent this needless sufferings by refusing to take everything personally . Forsaking the habit of taking things personally helps us improve our life greatly and we step into a state of complete bliss.
3. Don’t make assumptions:-
   We make assumptions about others and deeming them as true because we don’t have the courage to ask questions. Making assumptions sets us up for suffering, we are asking for problems while we assume and that leads to the creation of conflict. Most of the sufferings and sadness stem from making assumptions, we trap ourselves in unnecessary drama. We believe in the world the way we perceive it not the way it is, and the worst thing is we mistake it for reality on the basis of which we make assumptions. We create so much confusion and choas In our mind by just making assumptions most of which stems from our baseless knowledge. Say, we come across a guy on the way, he passes a smile on us. Based on this smile, we focuss all our attention into making innumerable assumptions saying what could that smile mean? In a relationship, making assumptions is a recipe for separation and conflicts. Because we want our partner to do what we want without informing them what we want and when they fail to do so, we get into long fights, we start abusing them and the whole drama begins that can end the relation. When we stop making assumptions, we communicate more clearly without misinterpreting or misunderstanding anything. To assume is to suffer from what we don’t subscribe to. We liberate ourselves as soon we don’t assume. Instead we should ask for questions for clarification without assuming anything that leads to personal freedom.
4. Do your best:-
   When you do best, all three previously stated agreements occur as a result. Doing your best is the expression of following all the three previous agreements. We don’t resist life or deny anything happening to us, we live our life the way it goes as long as we do our best. Once you cultivate the habit of doing your best, suffering, self-pity, self-judgement and conflicts will subside. However, you should make sure to do your best under any circumstances, whether you are sick, tired or feeling unhappy. In that way, you don’t subject to frustration or dismay as long as you keep this ritual going, no matter what. In any situation, you have to keep doing your best to prevent yourselves from falling into self-judgement and self-criticism. Most people work hard, do what they can to act, but their actions particularly aim at getting the reward, they don’t enjoy the action or the process, they are centred on the result. A worker works not because he wants to but he has to in order to get the reward. With the time, whatever they do becomes monotonous and least enjoyable, with that they end up calling their boss pesky. When you do your best, you are happy doing it, meaning you are living in the present putting all your attention into what you are currently doing and making most of the present moment. It leaves no space for future worries and past regrets. Action means you are living your present fully without having yourselves trapped fantasising the future. You allow yourselves to be who you are by doing your best. Do your best for the sake of doing as long as it is making you happy.

Zahoor Farooq can be reached at zahoorahmad76543@gmail.com