Author Topic: The Four Agreements -- Don Miguel Ruiz (Read 2561 times)

Sage · « **on:** April 07, 2014, 04:22:17 pm »

Hello friends,

My therapist this week recommended that I read the book The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom by Don Miguel Ruiz. This book claims to be a "Toltec wisdom book" and quite honestly looks like nuage plastic shamanism. It looks short so I may skim through it the next time I'm at the library. Has anyone else had experience with this book or author?

My therapist knows I'm Pagan and is into alternative approaches to mental health; in addition to talk therapy we talk about yoga, visualizations, what is essentially energy work to stop anxiety, herbal and aromatherapy practices for depression, etc. She's a great therapist and many of her techniques have helped me a lot over the past several months, hence why I'm considering her suggestion to read this book (even if it does look like a title I'd usually pass up).

Sage · « **Reply #1 on:** April 07, 2014, 06:56:09 pm »

Quote from: Sage;144681

Hello friends,

My therapist this week recommended that I read the book The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom by Don Miguel Ruiz. This book claims to be a "Toltec wisdom book" and quite honestly looks like nuage plastic shamanism. It looks short so I may skim through it the next time I'm at the library. Has anyone else had experience with this book or author?

My therapist knows I'm Pagan and is into alternative approaches to mental health; in addition to talk therapy we talk about yoga, visualizations, what is essentially energy work to stop anxiety, herbal and aromatherapy practices for depression, etc. She's a great therapist and many of her techniques have helped me a lot over the past several months, hence why I'm considering her suggestion to read this book (even if it does look like a title I'd usually pass up).

Neeeeeeeeever mind. I read 30 pages in the library and had to put it back. Same "your dreams create reality" bs from the Secret, same victim-blaming. 0/10 would throw against the wall again.

Faemon · « **Reply #2 on:** April 08, 2014, 01:46:20 am »

Quote from: Sage;144681

Has anyone else had experience with this book or author?

My therapist knows I'm Pagan and is into alternative approaches to mental health; in addition to talk therapy we talk about yoga, visualizations, what is essentially energy work to stop anxiety, herbal and aromatherapy practices for depression, etc. She's a great therapist and many of her techniques have helped me a lot over the past several months, hence why I'm considering her suggestion to read this book (even if it does look like a title I'd usually pass up).

It was extraordinarily idealistic. One of the agreements was "take nothing personally" but it didn't exactly break down how, it's just something that would make your life better if you agreed to it as if it were really that easy. So, in that sense, I found it insubstantial thought generally harmless and very vaguely generally likable. (Compared to my reaction to Eckhart Tolle's The Power of Now, which I did throw across the room at the wall just because the introduction basically went, "People who don't like this book just don't get it and aren't as enlightened as I am".)

Lately I've been reading On Becoming An Alchemist by Catherine MacCoun, which I found a very thorough and accessible introductory text. It has a lot of heterosexuality in it, though, and she tries to mix it in with "Tibetan Buddhist Alchemy" and chakras and karma in a way that I don't think quite works. And maybe someone with a stronger background in Hermeticism that I do would just loathe this book, with its synchronicities and Harry Potter references. But the second half of the book goes on about a transmutations of emotions that I've personally found quite helpful.

A couple of other books that I'm curious about: Healing Dream and Ritual by Carl A. Meier (just because I heard it has something on the Aesclepeion, so, Hellenists who've read this, please feel free to weigh in) and Awakening to the Divinity of Trauma by S. Kelley Harrell (I think I found that book recommendation here...is this Neo/Core Shamanism based?)

Sophia C · « **Reply #3 on:** April 08, 2014, 02:36:38 am »

Quote from: Sage;144692

Neeeeeeeeever mind. I read 30 pages in the library and had to put it back. Same "your dreams create reality" bs from the Secret, same victim-blaming. 0/10 would throw against the wall again.

That's not the awful book that says we choose which situation we are born into when we reincarnate*, is it? Someone told me about that once, and I may have got a bit upset...

*Disclaimer: I don't believe in reincarnation - and definitely wouldn't believe the victim-blaming rubbish that says we choose what 'challenges' (read: potentially horrendous life situations) we face in our lives if I did.

RandallS · « **Reply #4 on:** April 08, 2014, 08:17:40 am »

Quote from: Sage;144692

Neeeeeeeeever mind. I read 30 pages in the library and had to put it back. Same "your dreams create reality" bs from the Secret, same victim-blaming. 0/10 would throw against the wall again.

Has your therapist actually read the book? I'm not sure I would want a therapist who had and still recommended it.

Sage · « **Reply #5 on:** April 08, 2014, 10:30:30 am »

Quote from: Naomi J;144734

That's not the awful book that says we choose which situation we are born into when we reincarnate*, is it? Someone told me about that once, and I may have got a bit upset...

*Disclaimer: I don't believe in reincarnation - and definitely wouldn't believe the victim-blaming rubbish that says we choose what 'challenges' (read: potentially horrendous life situations) we face in our lives if I did.

YUP it is exactly that kind of book. It literally said "if you're abused it's because you're allowing the abuser to do it to you." That's when I noped out of there.

Sage · « **Reply #6 on:** April 08, 2014, 10:46:22 am »

Quote from: RandallS;144742

Has your therapist actually read the book? I'm not sure I would want a therapist who had and still recommended it.

I'm not sure, actually. She's fairly young herself and may have been a teenager when the book first came out in 1997, so I'm willing to accept that she read the book a long time ago and just remembers liking it at the time.

My therapist overall is great, and I've made a ton of really good progress in the past few months. In many ways I prefer my current therapist (an LPC) rather than my one at Roanoke College, who was a psychologist focusing mostly on talk therapy. However, current therapist is a bit... mm. I hesitate to say "fluffy" because it has so many negative connotations and she's very practical and helpful. But her approach is very much centered in "what can you do to work around your depression" rather than "let's try to get to the root of why you're feeling bad."

Siren · « **Reply #7 on:** April 08, 2014, 01:03:17 pm »

Quote from: Sage;144749

YUP it is exactly that kind of book. It literally said "if you're abused it's because you're allowing the abuser to do it to you." That's when I noped out of there.

Yeeeesh. I would ride out of there on a wild Nopetopus. That's awful.

Arthurine · « **Reply #8 on:** April 10, 2014, 02:40:18 am »

Quote from: Sage;144749

YUP it is exactly that kind of book. It literally said "if you're abused it's because you're allowing the abuser to do it to you." That's when I noped out of there.

UUUUUGH I reacted exactly the same way. ._.

Yei · « **Reply #9 on:** April 11, 2014, 10:05:30 pm »

Quote from: Sage;144681

Hello friends,

My therapist this week recommended that I read the book The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom by Don Miguel Ruiz. This book claims to be a "Toltec wisdom book" and quite honestly looks like nuage plastic shamanism. It looks short so I may skim through it the next time I'm at the library. Has anyone else had experience with this book or author?

My therapist knows I'm Pagan and is into alternative approaches to mental health; in addition to talk therapy we talk about yoga, visualizations, what is essentially energy work to stop anxiety, herbal and aromatherapy practices for depression, etc. She's a great therapist and many of her techniques have helped me a lot over the past several months, hence why I'm considering her suggestion to read this book (even if it does look like a title I'd usually pass up).

As a general rule anything that uses the term 'Toltec' which is not a history book should be regarded as highly suspect. We have no Toltec writing and in all probability their beliefs were probably similar to other Mesoamerican beliefs anyway.

Aerinfridh · « **Reply #10 on:** April 16, 2014, 11:01:53 am »

Quote from: Sage;144681

Hello friends,

My therapist this week recommended that I read the book The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom by Don Miguel Ruiz. This book claims to be a "Toltec wisdom book" and quite honestly looks like nuage plastic shamanism. It looks short so I may skim through it the next time I'm at the library. Has anyone else had experience with this book or author?

My therapist knows I'm Pagan and is into alternative approaches to mental health; in addition to talk therapy we talk about yoga, visualizations, what is essentially energy work to stop anxiety, herbal and aromatherapy practices for depression, etc. She's a great therapist and many of her techniques have helped me a lot over the past several months, hence why I'm considering her suggestion to read this book (even if it does look like a title I'd usually pass up).

I actually read this book and did a report on it for my Holistic Nursing class. Someone told me how wonderful it was. It is a very easy read, but it seems really basic, not a lot of meat for you to figure things out with. If you look up "Toltec Wisdom" on the internet you will find historical stuff and then some new age stuff by Castaneda which gets a little sketchy.
Actual the back story of Toltec Wisdom maybe more interesting than the actual books!:p

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Author Topic: The Four Agreements -- Don Miguel Ruiz (Read 2561 times)

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