The premise of the book is to basically realize that how you feel about your life and the people around you is based on how you observe and interpret the world. I like the message of the book because it empowers its reader to realize that we are in control of our lives - not the person who hurt us, anyone who made us upset, the awful situation that happened. We can flip our interpretation of the events that happen in our lives in order to free ourselves from the emotional struggles that we commonly face.
Ruiz outlines 4 agreements that you should follow:
Be Impeccable With Your Word
I love this one! To be impeccable with your word is to not use your words to spread emotional toxicity - not speak badly about yourself or to not gossip about others. This agreement recognizes the power that words have in creating the world around us. Spreading office gossip will only make your life at the office miserable. Speaking badly about yourself will only make you feel worse and will perpetuate the cycle of people treating you with the same lack of respect. Speak with integrity.
Don't Take Anything Personally
Probably the most important of the agreements is the ability to not personalize every action and word towards you. It's a difficult one but a very important one to achieve. Make yourself immune to the opinion and actions of others. Ruiz says that we take things personally because on some level we believe about ourself what others have to say. Release yourself from personalizing people's words otherwise you can walk around getting hurt by everyone and everything.
Don't Make Assumptions
You can completely transform your life if you learn how not to make assumptions in your relationships or in your interactaction with people. How many of us, before even asking any questions, assume that a person tried to hurt us or had ill intentions towards us? You took something that they said to you personally without asking them what they truly meant by it. We make the assumption then that everyone is judging us, victimizing us, or abusing us. Which is more so a reflection of how we view ourselves.
Always Do Your Best
Plenty of the hurt and disappointment that we feel is based on our own feelings of self-judgment, self-abuse, shame and regret. Release that and instead vow to ourselves that we will always do our best in the current situation that we are in - keeping in mind that your best today may not be your best tomorrow. Learn to have patience with yourself. The hardest thing to do and something that I'm learning each day to do better is to be kind to myself. Tell myself that it's okay if I didn't do all that I set out to accomplish for the day or if I didn't say the right thing to someone - striving for perfection is the quickest road to stress and disappointment.
Did you watch 'Super Soul Sunday' this weekend? Have you read the book? If so, tell me about the lessons that you've learned. Would love to hear it!
Thank you for the article. I would like to recommend a book. What Makes You Great? Uplifting New Book Inspires Readers to Fight through Adversity & Pursue Life’s Greatest Dreams. ISBN-13: 9781490529271
ReplyDeleteWritten by Tasha Hoggatt, ‘What Makes You Great?’ serves as a guide to staying on track during faith-testing times. Urging readers to create opportunities for themselves and pursue them no matter what curveballs life throws, the book is resonating with readers from all walks of life.
‘What Makes You Great?’ is more than a self-help book; it’s a blueprint to living the fullest life possible, even when darkness overshadows all light.
Synopsis:
The goal of the book is to inspire others who can create an opportunity for themselves, to follow their dreams. Please read this book often to help you stay focused. In this life, we do not have the luxury to live to 500 years old. We are lucky to live to 90. With that said, we should make every second, minute, hour, day, week, month and year count. It is important to always move in the direction that will bring you closer to realizing your dreams and living a positive life.