Tom Allen, Celebrant

It’s my opinion that in all we do, understanding what we hope to achieve before setting out is critical. Understanding your why makes everything else much clearer.

So why make a vow?

A vow is a commitment, but it’s also a statement of humility. You don’t make a vow to fall asleep. You don’t make a vow to blink or breathe.

When we make a vow to treat our partner in a certain way, to uphold a particular standard in our relationship, we are implicitly acknowledging that we are likely to fail to uphold that standard sometimes. Otherwise, we would not bother to make a commitment.

Beautiful things happen in life when we are able to acknowledge both a vision (a sense of what we would absolutely love to create in life) and our current reality (an honest and open assessment of where we are at right in this moment). Your vows don’t need to be 100% happy, head-in-the-clouds positive statements, they can include acknowledgements that life isn’t perfect, that we aren’t perfect, that lots of things in life can be difficult and painful and dysfunctional. Likewise, your vows don’t need to be all about how tough things are or how much effort and work a relationship takes: relationships are full of joy, and getting married is inherently an optimistic act. It’s good to keep a balance of acceptance that things aren’t always great, but that we as humans are always aiming at the best we can be.

Your vows can emerge quite easily and naturally if you take the time to really sink into an understanding and awareness of your journey together as a couple.

The following questions are intended to guide you through the vow writing process. Many are related or similar, aiming at the same thing from a slightly different perspective. So if you don’t understand a question or if it doesn’t quite hit home with you, just move on to the next one and don’t worry about it.

Take some time to think about why you decided to get married in the first place:

• What does marriage mean to me?
• What do I want to tell the world about what this relationship means to me?

Take some time to think about what defines your relationship and what it’s like:

• What have I learnt about relationships through my experience in this one?
• Where have we come from together?
• Where and how did our journey together begin and how have things changed up until this moment?
• What kind of relationship are we creating?

Take some time to think about what you’re intending for the future:

• What are my intentions for the future of this marriage?
• What do I want us to create together?
• How do I want to show up for myself and my partner in this new marriage?

Now write a few promises or vows. You might find it easier to write your vows if you start with the words “I promise…” or “My vow to you is…”

Remember to ‘write drunk and edit sober’, which means you should always write as much as you can as though everything that pops into your head is absolutely brilliant and worth writing down. You can always edit with a more critical eye later.