Matte R. (fixedschwinn) reviewed on 6/17/2014 + 10 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 1

When my girlfriend told me about this book, I thought it sounded interesting. The four agreements, as she remembered them, were things that I had kind of already decided for myself. She thought it was a really good book, so I thought I'd give it a read too. The basic premise of the book is that in the process of becoming a person, we are domesticated. During that domestication, we make agreements with ourselves. Some of them are true and some of them are not but they become part of our inner 'book of law.' Challenging those beliefs is difficult because that 'book of law' makes us feel safe, even if it's wrong. In order to break away from the pain, fear, and self judgement that goes along with those agreements, we have to make new ones.

I feel that the four agreements he lists are good ones. Like I said, I'd already started trying to follow them without actually reading the book.
1. Be impeccable with your word.
2. Don't take anything personally.
3. Don't make assumptions.
4. Always do your best.

Of course he expounds on these, explaining why he feels each is important both for us and the people around us. I think much of what he writes makes a lot of sense, but I wasn't thrilled about it being explained through the filter of Toltec wisdom. I don't understand why a practical matter had to be turned into a spiritual one. I guess the pursuit of Toltec knowledge is this author's thing, but I don't feel that making these agreements sort of spiritual helped me in any way, shape or form. It's easy enough to skip over those statements and get to the meat of the agreements, but I just didn't need to be reading things like "Don't resist life passing through you, because that is God passing through you." Or "It is an expression of God to say, "Hey, I love you." Then you get to the very end of the book and there's a prayer to the creator. It seems out of place to me, you've got this whole book teaching you how to be comfortable with yourself and how to live without guilt and fear, but then you keep mentioning this concept whose very purpose is to fill people with guilt and fear.

It is a good book. I feel that living by these agreements had made me a better and happier person, but I didn't need a lot of spiritual mumbo jumbo to come up with them.

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