The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom

The goal of the Four Agreements is to challenge the self-limiting beliefs learned through human domestication. According to Ruiz, all humans are domesticated at a young age and taught to live within the dream of the planet, which is “the collective dream of billions of smaller, personal dreams, which together create a dream of a family, a dream of community, a dream of a city, a dream of a country, and finally a dream of the whole humanity” (2). The dream of the planet includes society’s rules and expectations, religions, governments, schools, and even holidays. Children aren’t given the opportunity to choose their own beliefs, but they’re conditioned to agree with the information that their parents, schools, and churches give them. By agreeing with this information, children form agreements, which then form belief systems. Ruiz refers to this process as human domestication.

Throughout the book, Ruiz encourages people to challenge the agreements they’ve made and create a new dream for themselves. To do this, Ruiz explains, is difficult because the Book of Law, Judge, and