This week we are on to the 4th and final agreement: Always do your best!!!

Under all circumstances, no more, no less!   It’s important to note that your best is never going to be the same. Sometimes your best will be high quality and other times it will not be as good.  For example you wake up in morning, refreshed and meditate, journal and go to yoga something happens and you react vs 8pm at night, no yoga, long day - react differently, show up differently.

Your best is different when you are sick, vs healthy, feeling happy and light or upset and angry.  spiritually fit versus not!

 

As you build the habit of the 4 agreements, your best will become better than it used to be.  If you believe you are always doing your best, there is no way you can judge yourself.  And if you don’t judge yourself there is no way you are going to suffer from guilt, blame and self punishment.  If you can say, I did my best - there are no regrets.  You learn to accept yourself.   You become aware and learn from your mistakes, you can take inventory and look honestly at the results and keep trying.  This is really not easy at all and our intention - “Today I Choose To Judge Nothing That Occurs” once again fits perfectly!  No judgement of ourselves and of the events around us.  Can we simply release guilt, blame and self punishment?

Read the following paragraph a couple of times:

God is life. God is life in action.  The best way to thank God is to live your life doing your best and by letting go of the past and living in the present moment, right here and now.  Whatever life takes away from you, let it go. When you surrender and let go of the past, you allow yourself to be fully alive in the moment.  Letting go of the past means you can enjoy what is happening right now.  You were born with the right to be happy.  You were born with the right to love, to enjoy and to share your love.  You are alive, so take your life and enjoy it.

 

If we live with these agreements then we are able to fully live life in the moment and that is truly living.  What is holding you back from this?

 

Ok so this is where I am going to get very personal.  I have not been living my life to the fullest for a year and a half and I want to share with all of you so I can open up space for you to dig deep and access your life and the 4 agreements.  Hopefully this sharing will also lesson the situation’s hold on me.

 

Here goes……In the summer of 2020 I had a situation and in it I was not impeccable with my words, I made assumptions, I took things personally and it certainly was not my best.  I have been living with the guilt, shame and regret of this situation ever since.  We moved to our dream home in the summer of 2021 and while I was overwhelmed with excitement and gratitude, underneath it were very strong feelings of unworthiness, the other shoe will surely drop and regret, regret, regret.  My mind has latched onto all of this for 18 months and has been ruminating and spinning - replaying the situation, replaying the conversation, hating myself for letting fearful feelings lead me to being selfish and self centered.  I can see very clearly what this agreement is referencing in that I have not been living this life that God gave me to it’s fullest.  My life has been dulled by my all consuming thoughts.

Now if I were to apply this agreement into my life today I would remember:

At the time I was recovering from surgery number 3 for breast cancer, I was not sleeping and exhausted, my hormones were completely shut off 2 months prior, it was COVID and the small community I was living in was having a lot of internal conflict, and finally our house of 15 years was being knocked down that week, we were making a huge and scary commitment financially, physically and emotionally as we would be leaving the NYC area and living in RI full-time.  As I write all of this I can see where it would be difficult to “ do my best” at this point in my life, however I still hold on strongly to the ruminating replaying thoughts - how could you? You are awful? How can you call yourself a spiritual teacher?  Because of you, your family has missed out on a tremendous opportunity, you have lost this part of your life for good and thats just what you deserve, you are the worst!  Well its no wonder I am still not sleeping, who could sleep with hormonal imbalance and that must self hatred in their mind on a daily basis?  This is extremely embarrassing to share with all of you.

 

Diaz writes:

“The first 3 agreements will only work if you do your best.  Don’t expect that you will always be impeccable with your word, that you won’t take things personally and you won’t make another assumption - by doing your best these habits will become weaker and less frequent with time, we learn everything through repetition.  Don’t judge yourself, feel guilty, or punish yourself if you can’t make these agreements.  If you are doing your best, you will feel good about yourself even if you still make an assumption, take something personally or use your words wrongly.”

 

I do this work so I can live my life to the fullest.  This month has been enlightening for me and I will continue to try to offer myself the forgiveness that I would so readily give someone else.  The bottom line is, I need to give up fearful control and trust the God of my understanding right now and trust all is unfolding as it should.  They say a crisis is a terrible thing to waste and if I look back I was truly in crisis mode and it has not been wasted because through the pain I have inflicted on myself, I have relied on my spiritual practices more than ever.  Years ago I was in a training with my dear teacher Patricia Moreno and she asked us to list characteristics of a successful leader and I thought a leader should be relatable, teachable, feel like a peer and be vulnerable.  So if that is what I believe, then yes I can be here now as my and your spiritual leader!  I am grateful to travel this journey with all of you, you make me work harder everyday!

Today let’s keep searching and believe what Diaz said: “If you do your best in the search for personal freedom, in the search for self-love, you will discover that it’s just a matter of time before you find what you are looking for.”

It’s not about day-dreaming or sitting for hours dreaming in meditation, its about living. We need to take our spiritual work and our yoga off the mat!