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If you have frequented a bookstore in the past several years, you may be familiar with the small book by Don Miguel Ruiz entitled, The Four Agreements. Most anyone could easily read the book cover to cover while standing in the store, but when you read it with awareness and openness, the words will stay on your mind and begin to impact your thoughts and your life as they expand and shift your mindfulness like water pouring through sand.
The first agreement and truly powerful one is ?Be impeccable with your word. Say only what you mean. Avoid using the word to speak against yourself or to gossip. Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love.?
The term word means more than the words you speak or write. It means not only the expression of words and beliefs you project out to others verbally and non-verbally, but also inwardly, through self talk. The Latin origin of impeccable means ?to be without sin?. Obviously, being impeccable with your word is easy to say, but requires a lifetime of practice each day to reach mastery. The words you say when you are not mindful are based on the conditioning you have received over your entire life. As humans, we are conditioned by a reward/punishment mindset, both verbally and physically. As adults, negative self talk such as ?I?m fat? is sinful, limiting and damaging according to the definition of impeccable. Saying, ?I will workout five times this week? means you are breaking these negative patterns and approaching your words from the spirit of love. If we can hurt ourselves internally this much with words, just imagine all the ways we hurt or sin against others in the words we express outwardly and unconsciously on a daily basis.
Negativity can quickly expand when you choose to express your opinion of someone or something outside of truth and love. Words that are judgmental and critical ultimately stem from our own underlying fears. Gossip is rampant in spoken word and written word. Hang out at the office water cooler, turn on the news or pick up a magazine at the check out counter of a grocery store and you will see that we have become a society conditioned to gossip. It is why we often find it difficult to avoid in our own personal conversations. It takes consistent mindfulness of integrity and self control to avoid.
As you and I increase our awareness and mindfulness, we begin to use the power of the word in the direction of truth and love. This means that we start by letting go of past hurts and conditioning that no longer serve us through the power of forgiveness.Its about forgiving others and more importantly, about forgiving yourself. Through forgiveness, you are able to reframe the past and let it go in order to clear a new path for truth and love to flow inside your mind and body. As it flows in, you can then begin to express truth and love each moment with integrity and say ?only what you mean in your words, expressions and actions. Being impeccable in your word begins when you allow truth and love to replace unforgiveness, fear and judgement.
This week, I am setting an intention to pause to remember the power of the first agreement before I speak and to use my words in the direction of truth and love both in how I talk to myself and to others. Please join me on this journey to change ourselves and the world, one word, one expression and one action at a time.
Traci Vincent
Source: http://blog.morningcoach.com/2012/08/26/your-word-is-it-impeccable/
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