The Third Agreement

Humans are inquisitive creatures! We have all these questions we need answers to and  instead of asking questions when we don’t know something, we make all sorts of assumptions. 

I don't know about YOU, but I have a powerful imagination... and when there are unanswered questions, it becomes quite "natural" to imagine all kinds of ideas or stories; I start imagining what other people are doing, what they’re thinking, what they’re saying about me, and I dream things up in my imagination. Do you do the same? I assume you do, because that is part of the human condition. 

The problem with making assumptions is that we believe they are the truth! We invent a whole story that’s only truth for us, but we believe it. One assumption leads to another assumption; we jump to conclusions, and we take our story very personally. Then we blame others and react by sending emotional poison with our word. Making assumptions and taking them personally creates a lot of emotional poison, and this creates a whole big drama for nothing. We make assumptions, we believe we are right about our assumptions, and then we defend our assumptions and try to make someone else wrong. We even assume we are right about something to the point that we will destroy relationships in order to defend our position.

This agreement can be hard to do for us "over thinkers". But I've had the greatest success with this agreement. When I have unanswered questions like "Why did that person stop talking to me?"  I had to let it go because I have no idea what's going on in that persons life and I refuse to make assumptions about it. I can rest assured that it wasn't because of anything I said or did because I was impeccable with my words and I didn't take things personally (when that person was so shitty to me) and react out of anger.

Don’t make assumptions. By making this one agreement a habit, my whole life was completely transformed. If I don’t make assumptions, I can focus my attention on the truth, not on what I think is the truth. Then I see life the way it is, not the way I "want" to see it. When I don’t believe my own assumptions, the power of my belief that I invested in them returns to me. Once I recover all the energy that I invested in making assumptions, I can use that energy to create a new dream: my personal heaven.