Ruiz - The four agreements: a practical guide to personal freedom

T HE F OUR

A GREEMENTS

A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom

A

Toltec

T HE F OUR

A GREEMENTS

Wisdom

Book

DON M IGUEL R UIZ

A MBER -A LLEN P UBLISHING

S AN R AFAEL , C ALIFORNIA

To the Circle of Fire; those who have gone before, those who are present, and those who have yet to come.

I WOULD LIKE TO HUMBLY ACKNOWLEDGE MY mother Sarita, who taught me unconditional love; my father Jose Luis, who taught me discipline; my grandfather Leonardo Macias, who gave me the key to unlock the Toltec mysteries; and my sons Miguel, Jose Luis, and Leonardo.

I wish to express my deep affection and appreciation to the dedication of Gaya Jenkins and Trey Jenkins.

I would like to extend my profound gratitude to Janet Mills publisher, editor, believer. I am also abidingly grateful to Ray Chambers for lighting the way.

I would like to honor my dear friend Gini Gentry, an amazing brain whose faith touched my heart.

I would like to pay tribute to the many people who have given freely of their time, hearts, and resources to support the teachings. A partial list includes: Gae Buckley, Ted and Peggy Raess, Christinea Johnson, Judy Red Fruhbauer, Vicki Molinar, David and Linda Dibble, Bernadette Vigil, Cynthia Wootton, Alan Clark, Rita Rivera, Catherine Chase, Stephanie Bureau, Todd Kaprielian, Glenna Quigley, Allan and Randi Hardman, Cindee Pascoe, Terry and Chuck Cowgill, Roberto and Diane Paez, Siri Gian Singh Khalsa, Heather Ash, Larry Andrews, Judy Silver, Carolyn Hipp, Kim Hofer, Mersedeh Kheradmand, Diana and Sky Ferguson, Keri Kropidlowski, Steve Hasenburg, Dara Salour, Joaquin Galvan, Woodie Bobb, Rachel Guerrero, Mark Gershon, Collette Michaan, Brandt Morgan, Katherine Kilgore (Kitty Kaur), Michael Gilardy, Laura Haney, Marc Cloptin, Wendy Bobb, Ed Fox, Yari Jaeda, Mary Carroll Nelson, Amari Magdelana, JaneAnn Dow, Russ Venable, Gu and Maya Khalsa, Mataji Rosita, Fred and Marion Vatinelli, Diane Laurent, V.J. Polich, Gail Dawn Price, Barbara Simon, Patti Torres, Kaye Thompson, Ramin Yazdani, Linda Lightfoot, Terry Gorton, Dorothy Lee, J.J. Frank, Jennifer and Jeanne Jenkins, George Gorton, Tita Weems, Shelley Wolf, Gigi Boyce, Morgan Drasmin, Eddie Von Sonn, Sydney de Jong, Peg Hackett Cancienne, Germaine Bautista, Pilar Mendoza, Debbie Rund Caldwell, Bea La Scalla, Eduardo Rabasa, and The Cowboy.

T HOUSANDS OF YEARS AGO, THE TOLTEC WERE known throughout southern Mexico as women and men of knowledge. Anthropologists have spoken of the Toltec as a nation or a race, but, in fact, the Toltec were scientists and artists who formed a society to explore and conserve the spiritual knowledge and practices of the ancient ones. They came together as masters (naguals) and students at Teotihuacan, the ancient city of pyramids outside Mexico City known as the place where Man Becomes God.

Over the millennia, the naguals were forced to conceal the ancestral wisdom and maintain its existence in obscurity. European conquest, coupled with rampant misuse of personal power by a few of the apprentices, made it necessary to shield the knowledge from those who were not prepared to use it wisely or who might intentionally misuse it for personal gain.

Fortunately, the esoteric Toltec knowledge was embodied and passed on through generations by different lineages of naguals. Though it remained veiled in secrecy for hundreds of years, ancient prophecies foretold the coming of an age when it would be necessary to return the wisdom to the people. Now, don Miguel Ruiz, a nagual from the Eagle Knight lineage, has been guided to share with us the powerful teachings of the Toltec.

Toltec knowledge arises from the same essential unity of truth as all the sacred esoteric traditions found around the world. Though it is not a religion, it honors all the spiritual masters who have taught on the earth. While it does embrace spirit, it is most accurately described as a way of life, distinguished by the ready accessibility of happiness and love.

I NTRODUCTION

T HREE THOUSAND YEARS AGO, THERE WAS A HUMAN just like you and me who lived near a city surrounded by mountains. The human was studying to become a medicine man, to learn the knowledge of his ancestors, but he didnt completely agree with everything he was learning. In his heart, he felt there must be something more.

One day, as he slept in a cave, he dreamed that he saw his own body sleeping. He came out of the cave on the night of a new moon. The sky was clear, and he could see millions of stars. Then something happened inside of him that transformed his life forever. He looked at his hands, he felt his body, and he heard his own voice say, I am made of light; I am made of stars.

He looked at the stars again, and he realized that its not the stars that create light, but rather light that creates the stars. Everything is made of light, he said, and the space in-between isnt empty. And he knew that everything that exists is one living being, and that light is the messenger of life, because it is alive and contains all information.

Then he realized that although he was made of stars, he was not those stars. I am in-between the stars, he thought. So he called the stars the tonal and the light between the stars the nagual, and he knew that what created the harmony and space between the two is Life or Intent. Without Life, the tonal and the nagual could not exist. Life is the force of the absolute, the supreme, the Creator who creates everything.

This is what he discovered: Everything in existence is a manifestation of the one living being we call God. Everything is God. And he came to the conclusion that human perception is merely light perceiving light. He also saw that matter is a mirror everything is a mirror that reflects light and creates images of that light and the world of illusion, the Dream, is just like smoke which doesnt allow us to see what we really are. The real us is pure love, pure light, he said.

This realization changed his life. Once he knew what he really was, he looked around at other humans and the rest of nature, and he was amazed at what he saw. He saw himself in everything in every human, in every animal, in every tree, in the water, in the rain, in the clouds, in the earth. And he saw that Life mixed the tonal and the nagual in different ways to create billions of manifestations of Life.