The Four Agreements Part 2 of 5: Be Impeccable With Your Word
January 13, 2009 by dr. lam
The first agreement is the most important agreement that you must have with yourself; it is at once the most powerful but also the most difficult to keep. We must struggle with it on a daily basis but we must not let a failure from yesterday influence our decision to continue with our fulfillment of this agreement. Many times we live either in the past or in the future, but we must live in the present moment so that we maintain each agreement as a daily renewable contract with ourselves.
Words are magical. The words that we use reflect more of ourselves than of those we speak. In the Gospel of John, it says, “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word is God.” The words we choose to use can either be pure magic filled with love, compassion, and generosity or be black magic that casts a spell on all those who hear it. One man in Germany stirred up an intelligent nation to commit the most grievous atrocities and acts of violence 70 years ago simply through the use of his word.
To be impeccable with your word means to be without sin in your use of words. Impeccable comes from the Latin “im-” meaning without and “peccatus” meaning sin. We sin against ourselves first and foremost but we sin against others when we use words in a harmful way. When a child singing beautifully hears her mother say, “Stop singing! You have an ugly voice.” That child carries that agreement, or belief system, for the rest of her life. Even though the mother may have been irritated by any voice in her proximity no matter how angelic, the child will bear the burden of not wanting to sing forever until someone might break her spell with a new agreement, “Wow, you have the most amazing voice! Why don’t you sing for me?”
When we call someone “stupid”, we are not being impeccable with our word. If someone called you stupid in the past, and you are living with that legacy, you must make a new agreement with yourself to free yourself from the chains of another’s black magic. That person calling you stupid, uneducated, foolish, or whatever is pointing his or own finger at himself not at you.
The most emotionally poisonous black magic that we can throw is gossip. When we speak ill of someone else around us, we cast a terrible spell. If you are impeccable with your word, the spell cannot be cast on you no matter how black the magic the person uses. Being impeccable with your word creates an aura of love and acceptance that does not accept the black magic of the other person’s word. But you cannot be impeccable with your word if you cast that black magic. Using words to demean others reflects more on the person that speaks it than it does on the person against whom the words are used.
This first agreement must be made with yourself. It is an agreement to leave your own self-imposed hell. It allows you to only use words in an impeccable way. If you fail, do not abandon your quest. But begin anew. Be impeccable with your word.
Comments
11 Responses to “The Four Agreements Part 2 of 5: Be Impeccable With Your Word”
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Makes me think of a quote I read somewhere
“Watch your thoughts; they become words.
Watch your words; they become actions.
Watch your actions; they become habits.
Watch your habits; they become character.
Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.”
Lots of truth to this, I believe.
U.
thanks again vancouver. this looks as if it is a dialogue between you and me. come on guys. anyone with thoughts or ideas about the blogs??? thanks again for sharing.
yeah, come on everyone – the more, the merrier! There’s got to be more people out there interested in personal growth, spirituality, buddhism, ancient wisdoms, etc:)
Well, I’m for one am on the waiting list at the library for the “Four agreements” – seems to be a high demand item as all copies were out. I’m always interested in what other books people may have read on these topics, so if anyone has any suggestions, it would be wonderful if they shared them here. To kick things off, here is another one of mine: Eckhart Tolle’s “The power of now”.
U.
that’s funny. that’s my blog in 2 weeks!
Dr. Lam-I don’t know what I am doing incorrectly re: posting/blogs….I am able to post in questions, yet not here. I just signed up with this new name. I post responses often and when I never see them appear here, I just attribute it to editor’s choice.
Thanks.
no, we do have a spam filter but i have never intentionally rejected your posts. it appears this one got through. please keep posting. don’t give up!!!
Hey-I’m thinking there MAY be some subtle glitch here. I use my regular screen name with my usual alphabetic password and system allows all the way…I think it replies ‘comment submitted’ or similarly–then comments never appear. I’m chewing on this because I think it MAY explain where a few people have been. HTH
O.k., system does NOT tell user “comment submitted” (my bad), but it does give user impression that he’s good to go e.g. “howdy_____” . Then user fills in comments, hits submit comment and it takes a moment, form is blank again and then you are free to log out, left to wonder where your comment went. Do we need a reminder that our blog password is different from “Ask Dr. Lam” password? (MM here, btw.)
maybe you should make it the same. i am trying to get rid of these passwords. let me send a reminder to my webmaster.
Okay, guys, you no longer have to register to leave comments. our spam filters are up out the whazoo. we’ll see how this goes.
[...] (FYI: I did a blog series on The 4 Agreements that you can review in my archives: first blog, second blog, third blog, fourth blog, fifth blog.) Set your intention this week toward being like a child. [...]