Fantasy lives in Mexico. Don Miguel Ruiz' way of explaining himself is full of colour. This makes his philosophy readily accessible to even the most casual reader. Yet, it also makes it sound overly simple.
To some extent it is, and that's also part of The Four Agreements' appeal. Telling anyone that enacting four commandments will change their life for the better is a sure way to get their attention. I only worry that the agreements are a little shallow.
Taking nothing personally and making no assumptions are, indeed, good ways to live, but I'm not satisfied by Ruiz' explanation of how these things work. What troubles me is an apparent emotional solipsism in Ruiz' philosophy.
Such an outlook follows from taking nothing personally, but what also follows on that is the idea that if everyone becomes impeccable in their emotional world, there will no longer be fiction, an art form that relies on assumptions and drama.
Perhaps fiction (and poetry) are agreements in themselves, and of the sort that Ruiz calls "black magic." That doesn't seem too far fetched, since Ruiz' system lends itself to a sort of utopianism similar to that of Plato's Republic. Regardless of that classical connection, those are agreements without which I could not live.
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