The Four Agreements

on the eve of my daughter's wedding

No time for a post, for obvious reasons but I wanted to send this video. Here’s the description: In the week of my daughter's wedding, I re-read The Four Agreements as if my life depended on it. I look at A Course in Miracles as having the same content in a different metaphorical language--and 1000+ more pages. I tell the story of conflict and crisis, and finally realizing I was the problem. I end with John O' Donahue's poem 'For Marriage'.

The Toltec wisdom teachings interpreted by Don Miguel Ruiz as The Four Agreements are:

1. Be impeccable with your word.

2. Don’t take anything personally.

3. Don’t make assumptions.

4. Always do your best.

And here is John O’Donahue’s poem from To Bless the Space Between Us:

For Marriage, by John O’Donohue

As spring unfolds the dream of the earth,
May you bring each other’s hearts to birth.

As the ocean finds calm in the view of land
May you love the gaze of each other’s mind.

As the wind arises free and wild,
May nothing negative control your lives.

As kindly as the moonlight might search the dark,
So gentle may you be when light grows scarce.

As surprised as the silence that music opens,
May your words for each other be touched with reverence.

As warmly as the air draws in the light,
May you welcome each other’s every gift.

As elegant as dreams absorbing the night,
May sleep find you clear of anger and hurt.

And as twilight harvests the day’s colors,
May love bring you home to each other.

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Best wishes to Veronica and James for many, many years of contentment and intertwingling!

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The two follow-up videos I recommend are:

Interdependence vs. Interbeing on Sebastian Junger

Wearing my Halloween cheetah spots, I respond to Russell Brand's interview of Sebastian on "Our Individuality vs. Our Need for One Another" and go one step further from interdependence to interbeing. I ask whether Christianity and democracy were both designed to serve the empire, and if all hierarchy is patriarchy. To design political, economic and spiritual systems that serve the feminine, I consult a tentacled alien from Octavia Butler's book, Lilith's Brood.

Spiritual Optimism & Political Radicalism on Marianne Williamson

Explains the premise of A Course in Miracles, which Marianne has studied for 45 years and me for nearly 20. Looks at the rules for discerning whether any scripture, aka channeled text, could be considered as the word of God. Reads Caitlin Johnstone's poem, Sources Say, and the introduction to my future book, A House for the Soul in the Land Beyond Faith. Asks what spiritual optimism is and why it's so important.