Considering the huge challenges and difficulties facing the world in the present day, not to mention the personal anxiety that some people are now experiencing, I thought it would be a good idea to share with you the following four steps, or more-so, four agreements taken from the book The Four Agreements: Practical Guide to Personal Freedom written by Don Miguel Ruiz.

Rooted in traditional Toltec wisdom beliefs, four agreements in life are essential steps on the path to personal freedom.

The Toltec culture created these simple precepts of wisdom for the people to adopt daily towards helping them to liberate the mind from ignorance, improve relationships and avoid any self-imposed difficulties.

Ultimately, the agreements provided guidance for one to negotiate life with a more wise, practical and common sense approach. The Toltec perhaps hoped that these precepts would not only benefit the individual in their lifetime but would also produce peace and harmony within the community as a whole.

However, there is nothing stopping the rest of us, in these uncertain times, learning something of worth from these agreements, and perhaps adopting them for the betterment of our own lives and securing a more wiser, peaceful and stress-free future globally.

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We are now at a point in time when the ability to receive, utilize, store, transform and trasmit data — the lowest cognitive form — has expanded literally beyond comprehension. Understanding and wisdom are largely forgotten as we struggle under an avalanche of data and information.

~ Dee Hock

Man’s highest blessedness,
In wisdom chiefly stands;
And in the things that touch upon the Gods,
‘Tis best in word or deed
To shun unholy pride;
Great words of boasting bring great punishments,
And so to grey-haired age
Teach wisdom at the last.

~ Sophocles, from his tragic play Antigone

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Who can free himself from achievement, and from fame, descend and be lost, amid the masses of men? He will flow like Tao, unseen, he will go about like Life itself with no name and no home. Simple he is, without distinction. To all appearances he is a fool. His steps leave no trace. He has no power. He achieves nothing, has no reputation. Since he judges no one no one judges him. Such is the perfect man. His boat is empty.

~ Chuang Tzu

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Here is a nice little parable of wisdom for those who think that having a huge amount of possessions, being wealthy, having high position and owning many businesses equates to one enjoying life to the full and attaining happiness.

Heed the lesson of the following story well…

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“But the transformation of consciousness undertaken in Taoism and Zen is more like the correction of faulty perception or the curing of a disease. It is not an acquisitive process of learning more and more facts or greater and greater skills, but rather an unlearning of wrong habits and opinions. As Lao-tzu said, “The scholar gains every day, but the Taoist loses every day.” ~ Alan Watts

Alan Watts (1915-1973) who held both a master’s degree in theology and a doctorate of divinity, is best known as an interpreter of Zen Buddhism in particular, and Indian and Chinese philosophy in general. He authored more than 20 excellent books on the philosophy and psychology of religion, and lectured extensively, leaving behind a vast audio archive. With characteristic lucidity and humor Watts unravels the most obscure ontological and epistemological knots with the greatest of ease.

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