A five minute abbreviated version as well as the entire interview between David Riklan and Don Miguel Ruiz, author of The Four Agreements and his latest book, The Fifth Agreement (which he authored with his son), can both be found at http://www.selfgrowth.com/blog/fifthagreement.html.
Here are some notes that I took as I listened to the two audios. I thought the notes might also be of help to you.
The Four Agreements:
- Be impeccable with your word. You create your own story.
- Don’t take anything personally. Everybody has a story, their own story. It is not your story, so don’t take it personally.
- Don’t make assumptions. You might try to create things to fill in understanding of someone else’s story, but it is not your story. You might not be filling it in accurately.
- Always do your best. This is the action step.
The Fifth Agreement:
Be skeptical, but learn to listen. Don’t believe yourself or anybody else. Everybody lives in their own story. What they say is true for them, but not necessarily for you.
- We learn everything from our parents, teachers, society.
- We work to create our story.
- Respect your own creation and everybody else’s creation. We are all artists. If we don’t like our story, we can change it.
- We are all messengers, angels – each one of us.
- What kind of messenger are you?
- What kind of messages do you deliver to yourself?
- Do you really believe who you think you are?
- Do you like the way you live your life?
- Are you happy?
- If not, let’s see what you believe about yourself. “I am never going to make it.” “I am a loser.” “I am not intelligent.”
- You use words against yourself, and you create a nightmare of your life. You turn to alcohol, addictions, feel sorry for yourself, you don’t like yourself, you look in the mirror and you see hate – you hate yourself.
- How do you know who you really are? With knowledge you will never know who you are.
- “What I am is really not that important any more. What is important is just to be.” – just the way you are.
- Enjoy life – just the way you are.
- No longer pretend to be what you are not, even when you don’t know who you are.
- You are not your story. You are whatever you are.
