Vows Then and Now
Wedding vows: ”I promise to keep and love you in sickness, in health, in good times, in bad. Through summer and winter, fall and spring…”
Are marriage vows just a bunch of words? Are we just showing off our best side when we say all of these things that may or may not happen? Should vows be included in a wedding ceremony anymore? At Olive Tree Officiating we want to make sure your vows, like all other elaborations, are unique and customized to your beliefs, values and tradition.
Wedding vows stand the test of time…even when our best intentions do not.
I’ve heard a lot of vows over the years and though they aren’t necessarily lies, they certainly can stretch the truth. Come on! What bride or groom could do the things they promise to do at a wedding ceremony, everyday, for the rest of their lives? After all, even though we act like we’re getting married because we want to “support” someone else’s life-goals, aren’t we kinda’ in this for ourselves too?
Vows represent the ideal: they are a benchmark for which we are always trying to reach.
Wedded bliss is certainly an ideal. And like all ideals, “bliss” is unobtainable. But you can start your marriage with the kind of honesty couples married 30+ years finally learn. They learn to stop saying “Yeah, that sounds good,” and they start saying, “No.” Not to be confrontational but to engage their full selves. They say what’s on their minds in order to truly collaborate and not just to coexist. Vow writing is easy. Two strangers, relying on each other to partner in creating meaning, joy and a better tomorrow…that’s tough!
Marriage is a series of moments in which one person gives and the other takes.
Marriage is also a collaboration. At any given moment one partner is going to feel less than awesome. This means the spouse should/can rise to the occasion. In other words, most couples are never exercising their marriage vows, to their fullest, all of the time or at the same time. Marriage collaboration is a give and take. And some days you won’t be willing or able to do everything your vows promised to do. But you can do some things better than your spouse. Offer those abilities as gifts to your partner. Don’t hold their weaknesses against them or hold your strengths over their heads.
Even though we marry someone because of their strengths, a life-together becomes a matter of accepting and redefining the relationship when weaknesses become obvious. Vows are easy to write but the true strength of a relationship is measured by how each couple deals with the I wonts, I donts, and I cants. The I dos are just icing on the cake!
Recent Comments