[NOTE: This article, written by Maureen Moss, was published in Panegyria, Issue 100, 2008, and is reproduced here in its entirety.]

I have been thinking for a month about how I was going to write this piece on keeping agreements. I don’t plan what I’m going to write in the newsletters until I sit down and start writing. This month however, I had a strong inkling that what was coming up over and over and over again was going to be written about this month. It’s called “Keeping Agreements.” I was awakened at 4:00AM several days ago to write this.

In this past month I and many others close to me have noticed a seeming pandemic of agreement breaking. One agreement after the next being broken…. and broken in cavalier manners leaving people reeling as to what just happened. I questioned whether it was a current mirror experience or whether it was an up to be healed from all time experience? I discussed “agreements” with friends, family, and a deeply respected psychologist and author.

Pondering, discussing and writing I realized it didn’t matter if the issue was from now or later, it was blasting up all over the place because we haven’t deeply and properly taken care of this agreement breaking business, or incompletions with ourselves or each other. The alarm has gone off. It’s a wake-up call to take a deeper look at agreements… our keeping them and our breaking them. And I for one am paying attention to my part in it all and taking responsibility to correct my part in it all.

This agreement breaking has to be healed once and for all in every single one of us because it’s creating a deepened decline in humanity. In my awareness of this, I realized this issue seems to be off our radar as we busy ourselves with things like learning to love ourselves in ways that are not all-inclusive of all aspects of Soul and Self, being in the moment (and forgetting agreements made two moments ago), discovering our passions, finding our purpose or perfect relationship outside of ourselves, helping those less fortunate than ourselves with strings attached, or a litany of other things on our list to seemingly raise consciousness. I sense that if we take care of this ‘agreement breaking business,’ other things will take care of themselves.

This appears to be a “big give”(thank you Oprah) we would be wise to give to each other and ourselves. Keeping our agreements is one of the biggest gives we’ve got to give. We don’t reach into our pockets for this one, yet we must reach into our hearts of consciousness.

All month as I watched agreements being broken all over the place, and watching the hurt and chaos it caused, I thought, is there any wonder why hearts are broken, psyches are bleeding, and the walls to protect ourselves are being constructed quicker than usual? We’ve been duped or dismissed over and over and over again and not just by another but also by ourselves.

We’ve done it in big and small ways and it’s got to stop. We humans have made “little white lies” acceptable, giant incongruencies tolerable, and agreement breaking a matter of “Oh! I forgot” or “oh, well, things change.” We are creating confusion, distortion, power outages and chaos in the minds and lives of others and ourselves when we break agreements. We are supposed to be living up to ourselves not stripping down ourselves or another because we don’t have the consciousness of follow-through. (We do tend to have Master Degrees in excuses don’t we?)

When we don’t keep agreements, we live in a state of incompletion and leak energy all over the place. Psychologist Gay Hendricks shared with me “..when we make complete agreements the power of phenomena cannot be overstated.” In the same conversation I said to him “and when we don’t keep agreements that low level of consciousness goes into the planetary grid and into mass consciousness and creates a ripple of fear and mistrust. On some level everybody suffers,” I said… as I felt my own constriction and sadness of where I have contributed.

It is time for each of us to understand at the deepest and highest levels how impeccable we must become with our agreements, whether it’s to call when you say you will, send a person something you said you were going to, follow through on a business agreement, work out 3 times a week, honor what you promised your friends or your lovers, and do so when you say you will. We need to take oaths of impeccability starting this day. There is power in agreement completion.

Agreements kept establish our true Divine identity and enrich every relationship we have. They create a solid platform where others feel safe to stand next to u,s and it creates a place where we feel safe to be with ourselves! Broken agreements establish weakness and mistrust, not just in the minds of others, but in ourselves as well.

When we don’t keep agreements with ourselves, we can go to the bank on the fact that if asked if we trusted ourselves, our answer would be NO. Once we don’t trust ourselves it is impossible to accept ourselves. Another pitfall of human nature. We don’t need any further setbacks in consciousness. We need every reason to love ourselves back into wholeness. Once we commit to no further agreement breaking, there can be no hypocrisy, no contradictions in thought, word or deed.

Once we say we will, we must, unless there is a reason so big that it’s created an impossible hurdle. Then we are responsible to talk about it and work something out that feels right for each. Keeping agreements elevates the human spirit into Divine Spirit. When we make our agreements big or small with ourselves or with another, we would each be wise to take them as sacred vows, or say nothing at all. Keep in mind any agreement left open in this incarnation will be re-created in another.

I don’t know about you, but I no longer have any plans to deal with unfinished business here or somewhere else. It’s been along haul and I choose to create a clean slate with myself here. I sense my soul (and all souls) will be relieved. So here’s the action I have created: Perhaps you would like to entertain this for yourself. Write down every single agreement or incompletion that you can remember (this is not to judge yourself, it is to become aware of what’s left hanging open that’s energetically taking you or another down). WARNING: Your ego will start to give you a thousand and one reasons to either not acknowledge something as an incomplete agreement, or make excuses for why you didn’t follow through. DON’T PAY ATTENTION. Move forward.

Once you’ve written each incomplete agreement, go back through your list (it will most likely be pages) and just be with each one. Feel what you feel like when you notice each agreement that you didn’t close, including ones you made to yourself. For me, this was like what I believe a life review would be like. It was very painful and it was quite impacting. Ask yourself, “if I could do this over (each one), what would I do to have kept this agreement?”

One by one, if it’s possible, contact any person you have made agreements with and let them know you have come to realize that it is important for you to first acknowledge and take responsibility for an incomplete agreement, and then ask them if there is something you can do now to close the circle of the agreement. And then DO IT! You will be surprised in a pleasant way at some of the responses you will get. If you absolutely can’t contact the person (NO EXCUSES!), then create a sacred ceremony of completion around each one.

Remember you can always speak to another’s soul. When you are complete with the above (it will take a while, but it’s worth every bit of it), please write yourself a letter of forgiveness. Then write yourself another letter of commitment. The second letter will be easier. “I promise that from this day forward, every agreement I make will be met with completion at the time I agree to do so. And so be it.”

In closing, I would just like to say this. I have come to learn that from now on, I will not make any agreements with another until I have given myself 24 hours to be with whatever I am going to make an agreement about. I will not make any agreements or promises based on fear. (Fear is the number one reason we make erroneous agreements to begin with that we can’t follow through on.) I have also decided that when anyone makes an agreement with me, I am going to ask them to give themselves a day to make certain it’s something that really feels good, and they feel certain they will follow through on it.

As for agreements with myself, they must now be made from sacredness to my God Self regardless of their size.

© Maureen Moss 2008.

Ms. Moss is a multi-published author, keynote motivational speaker and Executive Producer of the World Puja Network. Please feel free to pass this on with proper credit. More at http://www.worldpuja.org