The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom

Ruiz begins this chapter by asserting that true freedom is the freedom to be who one is. Children embody freedom because they’re not afraid to express how they feel. Adults are no longer free because the Book of Law, Judge, and Victim mindset controls their belief system. They live to please and be accepted by others instead of expressing their true desires. The first step toward freedom is being aware that the Book of Law, Judge, and Victim mindset can control one’s reality.

Ruiz then introduces the three masteries in the Toltec tradition. The first, the Mastery of Awareness, is being aware of oneself and who one is with all the possibilities. The second, the Mastery of Transformation, is how to change and be free of domestication. The third, the Mastery of Intent (or Mastery of Love), is how to be one with “God,” the being that connects all energy.

Next, Ruiz compares the Book of Law, Judge, and Victim mindset to a parasite. He defines a parasite as a living being that feeds on other living beings, draining their energy and giving nothing in return, slowly hurting their host. That’s exactly what the Book of Law, Judge, and Victim mindset does to humans. It feeds on people’s emotions and thrives on fear, anger, drama, and suffering.

When one becomes aware of the parasite that is killing their energy, one has two choices: surrender to the parasite and continue living in hell, or rebel and declare war on the parasite. If one decides to be a warrior, that doesn’t automatically mean one always wins. It means that one always does one’s best—and therefore has a chance to be free. Choosing to be a warrior allows individuals to rebel and ensure that they’re not helpless victims of their thoughts and emotions. Being warriors gives people a chance to change their dream of the planet to a heaven on earth where they have joy and peace—and can love freely.

The Art of Transformation: The Dream of Second Attention

The Toltec path to freedom defines three approaches to fighting the parasite. The first is The Art of Transformation: The Dream of Second Attention. In this approach, human domestication is the dream of first attention, because domestication creates the first dream that a human experiences. Therefore, this approach to fighting it is called the dream of second attention because one uses the power of attention to create a new dream.

The first step in fighting the parasite using this approach is to become aware that one is dreaming and that one’s life is a direct result of what one believes. To do this, one must focus on the beliefs one wants to change. Next, one must be aware of the limiting and fear-based agreements they’ve made and choose to change them. This is the Mastery of Transformation at work—changing the fear-based agreements that cause suffering by replacing them with new agreements. After practice in breaking old agreements and forming new ones, one will find the core of all their agreements. This is called going into the desert, where one faces one’s demons. After this journey, those demons become angels.

Practicing the four agreements takes significant willpower, but every time one breaks an old agreement, one’s power returns. For example, because the mother tells her daughter that her singing voice is ugly, the daughter as an adult refuses to sing—but she can break that self-limiting agreement a little at a time: She can permit herself to sing badly and then compliment herself when she sings well. These small acts add power. However, when one breaks an old agreement, one must replace it with a new agreement so that the old one can’t return. Ruiz emphasizes that this can’t be done in one day; one can achieve it only through repetition and practice.

The Discipline of the Warrior: Controlling Your Own Behavior

The second approach to fighting the parasite is The Discipline of the Warrior: Controlling Your Own Behavior. In describing it, Ruiz begins by noting that everyone wakes up with a certain amount of energy. If people allow their emotions to drain them, they have nothing left to give themselves or others. How one feels determines how one sees the world.

Ruiz then uses an analogy: If everyone had wounds on their skin and had to cover them, no one would ever hug anyone because it would hurt. However, if everyone had this condition, everyone would consider it—and the distance between individuals—normal. Ruiz notes that everyone’s mind is covered in emotional wounds that are infected by emotional poison. Whenever those wounds are reopened, they spew emotional poison. Wounded minds are so common that they’re considered normal—but they’re not.

All humans are mentally sick with fear, and the symptoms of fear are the emotions that cause people to suffer: anger, bitterness, hate, sadness, envy, etc. When the fear in the mind is too great, psychotic behavior occurs because the mind would rather withdraw from the world. Viewing the mind as sick allows people to see that the cure is forgiveness.

Ruiz encourages people to forgive out of compassion for themselves, not because anyone deserves it. He suggests that people forgive everyone in their life who they feel has abused them, including God. When people forgive God, they can forgive themselves, and self-acceptance and self-love can grow. One knows that one has truly forgiven another when one no longer has an emotional reaction to the situation.

Ruiz breaks the process of becoming a warrior into three steps. First, people must be aware that a war is occurring in their mind and that fighting in this war requires discipline. Next, people must develop the discipline to be themselves, no matter what. Finally, people must control their emotions—which differs from repressing one’s emotions. Victims repress their emotions because they’re afraid to speak their minds. Warrior refrain from expressing their mind immediately and wait to express it at the proper time, which makes warriors impeccable with their word.

Initiation of the Dead: Embracing the Angel of Death

The last approach to fighting the parasite is called Initiation of the Dead: Embracing the Angel of Death. Ruiz begins with a hypothetical scenario. Those given a week to live have two choices: suffer, pity themselves, and be a victim, or enjoy the time they have left and be their authentic selves. That is the choice that the angel of death presents to everyone. It teaches people to live each day like it’s their last.

The angel of death teaches everyone to be completely open because they have nothing to fear. It shows people that each day might be the last chance to tell the people they love what they feel. In this perspective, it’s unimportant that they love you in return; it’s just important that you love them.

This way of living prepares one for the initiation of death, when the old dream—which the Book of Law, Judge, and Victim mindset ruled—dies forever. Memories of the old dream remain, but the parasite is dead. The initiation of death is difficult because the Judge and Victim fight for their lives. Therefore, one may feel afraid and like they’re going to die, but this fear is the Judge’s and the Victim’s, not the individual’s. Instead of death, the individual receives resurrection to live as oneself. This resurrection makes people free and wild like children, except that they have wisdom instead of innocence to guide their lives.

If one surrenders to the angel of death, one will be happy. The angel of death takes the past away and leaves people unburdened to live fully in the present. The Judge and Victim want people to carry their past with them, but this doesn’t allow people to fully enjoy the present. The angel of death teaches people to live in the present.