Writing Wedding Vows–Check Your Communication Skills

I have asked you to begin writing your personal vows together in shared conversation where each of you talk about the dream you have for your individual lives and the dream you both have for your marriage or partnership but what this really is, is an exercise in communication.

You are going to find out if you really are on the same page, so to speak. This means that you both are going to question what it is you think you heard your partner say.

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Writing Wedding Vows-Lining up Your Sight With Your Vision

When writing your own personal and unique wedding or commitment vows, what you are doing is lining up your sight with your vision. You are going to intentionally begin seeing with new eyes.

Sight is the mechanics of seeing what is out in front of you and taking it in and making judgments based on that information.

Vision is the dream you have for your life together created first in your imagination and then seen it through your eyes.

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Wedding Vows-Setting Up Your Emotional Bank Account

When you begin writing your wedding or commitment vows you are actually setting up your emotional bank account against which everything you do as a couple will either be a deposit or a withdrawal.

The balance in your account will be a huge determining factor on how intimate, easy and fun your relationship is.

The promises you write into your vows are the guidelines that you can use to keep the currency flowing into instead of flowing out.

I want you to write your vows in such a way that you are depositing emotional dollars into your accounts on a daily basis. That way when there are some challenges that arise you will have the emotional capital to draw on.

If you wrote your vows as a result of outlining the dream you each have for your life and the life of your marriage, then wrote down what it is you are going to do to keep the dream alive, you have set up the parameters of your account.

By reading those vows every day, following the 10 Commandments of Marriage, and remembering you are both in it for the long haul, you set up automatic deposits.

“Every experience we have with our spouse, be it positive or negative, affects the love and balance of our relationship, says Willard F. Harley, writing in his popular book “Love Bank”. He says, we are either making deposits or withdrawals in our love bank account each day. . . Should negative feelings and bad habits dominate in a couple’s relationship, the account can be seriously overdrawn. The couple can begin to hate each other and the relationship goes into a serious deficit.”

He identifies the four most destructive habits:

1. Nagging-Nagging includes persistent faultfinding. As one comedian quips,”Women always marry a man and hope he’ll change. Men always marry a woman and hope she’ll never change.”
2. Angry Outbursts-Outbursts of anger often takes the form of shouting, put-downs, criticism, or sarcastic name-calling or attempts to punish partners because they have done something that displeases.
3. Criticism-Constant criticism of the partner is the strongest predictor of separation and divorce.
4. Irritating habits and annoying behaviors- In spite of the fact that a woman is motivated by love to change and improve her partner, her mate might perceive it not as love but as rejection and manipulation.

I think that you can take all the habits and roll them into one thing, and that’s not following commandment #2, Honoring each other.

If you are reading your vows every day and reading them together at least once a week, this is the opportunity to bring up habits and actions that each of you find annoying.

By making deposits into your emotional bank account, then these discussions can be entered into and concluded in a positive way, which automatically puts more emotional dollars into your account.

YOUR RELATIONSHIP DOES NOT HAVE TO BE DIFFICULT OR HARD IF YOU ATTEND TO THE LITTLE THINGS AND CONTINUE TO PUT EMOTIONAL DOLLARS INTO YOUR ACCOUNT.

Pick up your FREE copy of the 10 Commandments of Marriage, put them in an in-your-face place, read them occasionally, practice #10 over and over and over and over again: Lighten up and laugh often!

If you only follow this one practice, your emotional bank account will be so full you’ll have to start giving some of your dividends away. People will line up to receive them. Then you have dividends coming from everyplace.

You will be rich beyond measure!

So begin writing your wedding vows with the idea that they are your banking rules. Then consciously continue making deposits.

You can download a totally free copy of the 10 Commandments of Marriage by following this link. They are totally free because they are my gift to you. 10 Commandments

Love, light and laughter,

Rev. Linda, The Wedding Vow Coach

Helping couples write down the dream and then live it!

Rev. Linda has an innovative and revolutionary philosophy about the importance of writing your own personal wedding or commitment vows. It will change the way you think of vows, your relationship, and the ease with which you can do this thing called ‘marriage.’ Read more: www.WeddingVowsandCeremonies.com

Writing Wedding Vows-Heading off the Infidelity Problem Before It Happens

Lately I am hearing all sorts of news about the problems with new marriages. This last item was about infidelity. It’s estimated that within the first year anywhere from 20%-50% of couples will have been unfaithful to their partners. The explanation is that this is a cry for help because of intimacy issues! It forces conversation and help.

The best time to talk about infidelity is not after it happens but before it happens, when you are sitting down and in the process of writing your wedding vows. That’s why I put together my innovative and unique perspective around writing wedding or commitment vows.

BECAUSE I WANT YOU TO HAVE EVERY CHANCE POSSIBLE TO HAVE A HAPPY, PASSIONATE AND INTIMATE RELATIONSHIP.

IT DOESN’T JUST HAPPEN.

A STRONG INTIMATE MARRIAGE HAS TO BE PLANNED FOR!

It begins by having those intimate talks BEFORE, not after there are problems.

When you know what it is you are working for, have a vision and goals, you have something out in front of you that you can direct your energies to and gather your activities and actions around.

By casually repeating vows you haven’t written yourself, or writing vows by yourself with no conversation, you are squandering the most important and energetic time you will ever have in your life!

If you don’t sit down and consciously and specifically get clear about what it is you want for yourself and for your marriage you have no rudder, no sails, and no wind!

Your dream or vision creates the goals. Those goals are the rudder. The sails are the actions you take to work towards and accomplish those goals and the wind is the passion and intimacy that grows and expands and gets stronger and stronger.

Sit down together and talk about the life you want to create together. Talk about careers, and children, sex and money, family, houses, cars, vacations, philanthropy, etc.

Talk about it NOW! Not later when there are so many problems that some of them cannot be overcome.

You will have the best chance for happiness if you know what makes you happy and you make plans on how to keep that happiness, intimacy, love and passion alive.You think that because you are infused with energy and passion now it will last all on its own. It may.

But most likely it won’t because there is too much competition for your time and energy these days. You’ve got to craft a dream, a vision, a set of life goals for yourselves, then write your vows promising what you will do to keep that dream alive.

Then keep reading those vows every day.

You CAN have a happy and long life together. But you’ve got to PLAN for it! You begin by writing your wedding or commitment vows TOGETHER IN SHARED CONVERSATION WHERE YOU WRITE DOWN THE DREAM YOU HAVE FOR YOUR LIFE TOGETHER!

Then follow the 10 Commandments of Marriage, which mainly is about doing little things every day to keep it all alive and thriving.

I have a totally free copy of the 10 Commandments of Marrriage for you. Totally free means that you will not even have to leave your Email address. Because it’s my gift to you! 10 Commandments

Love, light and laughter,

Rev. Linda Bardes

The Wedding Vow Coach

Helping couples write down the dream and then live it!

I have an innovative and unique philosophy around writing vows. You can read more about it here: www.WeddingVowsandCeremonies.com

Wedding Vows-10 Commandments of Marriage

An important aspect of my innovative and unique philosophy around writing wedding or commitment vows is that you have got to find a way to keep those vows alive and thriving right from the beginning.

Because I believe if you attend to the little things right from the start your marriage or partnership does not have to be hard. You will have attended to things as they come up, settled your differences, and moved on.

One way to keep your marriage or partnership thriving and intimate is to keep the dream you have for your marriage alive and in front of you.

Ten ways to do that is by following the 10 Commandments of Marriage. I wrote those commandments about 2 1/2 years ago for a wedding ceremony I officiated at.

1. Honor yourself: When you hold yourself high with integrity and self respect and never compromise your values you can trust each other absolutely. It’s the basis for everything else that defines your life and your marriage.

2. Honor each other: Do not hesitate to see more in each other than what is presented at face value. Look deep. People tend to live up to our expectations of them.

3. Have powerful dreams and goals–for yourself, each other, and the marriage: You need dreams to keep you truly alive and vital. They help you create passion; for life and for each other.

4. Read your vows every day: Sometimes you read your vows by yourself. At least once a week read them together. This keeps the dream alive and in front of you and gives you a wonderful opportunity for conversation.

5. Say “Thank you” and “I Love You” every day: Say ‘I Love You’ to each other every day; find a way to show appreciation to people you love and people who give you service. This also includes clerks, salespeople, wait staff, people who hold doors open, people who let you in traffic, etc. “Thank you,’ is Universal currency that pays BIG dividends.

6. Do little things for each other: Do not wait to be asked. Anticipate opportunities to show your partner that you are thinking of their well-being. This is a fabulous intimacy building strategy.

7. Never go to bed angry with each other: Because talking it out will save you time, energy and mistakes the next day.

8. Listen to each other: What you give your attention to grows. It doesn’t matter if it’s a plant, a bank account, your marriage, or your children.

9. Focus the solution and not the problem: Look at the problem only long enough to understand it. Then focus on the solution. When you focus on the solution, ideas and opportunities will present themselves in unusual and magical ways.

10. Lighten up and laugh often–especially at yourself!


You can download a beautiful frameable copy of this with graphics at www.WeddingVowsandCeremonies.com This is totally free. That means that you will not even have to leave your Email address because this is my gift to you!

Love, light and laughter,

Rev. Linda Bardes

The Wedding Vow Coach

Helping couples write down the dream and then live it!

Writing Wedding Vows-Liberate Your Possibilities

Do you have any idea of the possibilities that you will liberate and set free when you write your own wedding or commitment vows and do it with passion, power and purpose?

Writing your own personal vows gives you the opportunity of a lifetime to create a blueprint, a vision, a dream, of the life that you have for yourself and for your marriage or partnership.

That possibility and potential exists because, when you have talked intimately and purposefully about your life together, you create a powerful pull that acts like a magnet and begins to draw to you everything you would ever need to live the life of your dreams. This includes the people, things, opportunities, experiences, and money!

That pull is compounded, multiplied and exponentially increased by all the activity around you.

That means that all the factors that go into your wedding, the time and emotion around the planning–the caterer, the cake maker, the wedding clothes people, your friends and family, your wedding vows, etc.–all combine to create an energy that is unlike anything that will ever come around again in your lifetime. It’s as though the whole world is on your side.

Everyone wants you to succeed:

They are putting out positive thoughts. (That’s a tsunami of good will, energy and motion.)

They are helping you to dream a big dream.

They want to be part of your success.

(That energetic time exists every time you get married but decreases with each subsequent event. I want you to take advantage of that energy no matter whether this is your first, your second or your third event.)

That creative energy is out in front of you already going to work on your behalf.

Trust me on that. If you step into that flow and consciously stay in it, you can create miracles, intimacy, beauty and purpose that will keep your marriage and partnership intimate and alive.

I want you to create a powerful river of energy so strong by writing your own wedding or commitment vows that you will be carried along in it easily.

OK, I’m going to keep saying this over and over and over and over until you get it:

Write your wedding or commitment vows TOGETHER after you have talked about the dream you have for your life together and written it down.

Your vows are the promises you make to each other telling each other just what you will do to ‘keep the dream alive.’

Get that river flowing.

You do that by imagining and talking about how your life will look like in 1 year, 5 years, 10 years.

Find every opportunity to incorporate elements.

If you have any problems with getting to the emotions, the colors, the excitement of what you are trying to imagine, find a picture in a magazine that you are attracted to and discuss what it is about that picture that makes you come alive and excites you. Write it down.

I do not want to lie to you and say that you will never have any situations in your life that need attention.

What I am saying is that if the river of your marriage and partnership is flowing fast and strong enough your relationship will flow easily around those rocks, slowing down only enough for you to look at and attend to the situation. Then it will pick up speed and get going again.

A stream or river that doesn’t flow very fast stops or circles around the rocks and sometimes there is as much current going backward as forward.

I want you to have the best chance in the entire world . . . in the entire universe.

Because the entire world and universe in on your side. When you realize that you consciously take steps to keep it that way.

Write your own personal wedding or commitment vows.

Talk about the dream you have for your life together and get passionate about it!

Share that dream with others at your wedding or ceremony by reciting and pledging your vows.

Then keep that dream alive.

Your job is to keep enough water in the river, get it moving with passion, power and possibilities, then let it flow all by itself.

Get a dream and swim in it . . .

. . . splash in it,

. . . float in it,

. . . find new ways to play in it!

You can download your totally FREE copy of the 10 Commandments of Marriage as my gift to you. I recently redid it with graphics so it is a beautiful document that you can frame. You can download it FREE here. Pass it on!

Love, light and laughter,

Rev. Linda, The Wedding Vow Coach

Helping couples to write down the dream and then live it.

I have an unusual and innovative and totally revolutionary philosophy and method and of writing wedding vows that create powerful marriages and partnerships and keep then going and going and going. www.WeddingVowsandCeremonies.com

Love Ya!

Life Vows-There’s a Pony in the Pile

You sat down together and talked about your life together; you finished writing your personal wedding or commitment vows; you’ve read or recited them to each other at your ceremony; and now the honeymoon is over.

A shit-uation has arisen in your relationship that threatens to undermine your happiness.

Reality has set in. Except that I teach you to never accept reality. Only use what you are experiencing to grow into the dream you have for your lives. In order to get to the dream sometimes you have to shovel a pile.

This situation is pure manure. Pure gold.

And what does manure do?

IT FERTILIZES!

IT GROWS THINGS!

IT IS HIGHLY VALUABLE!

Organic gardeners prizes manure because it’s natural and organic. You pay dearly for organic food!

And your situation is a natural and organic element in your relationship. When you reach for something bigger than you know how to do shit-uations will come up.

It’s what you do with those shit-uations that counts. Because if you have dreamed a big dream when writing your vows and embedded that dream into your vows, then opportunities will arise to take you to the next level.

In other words, THERE’S A PILE WITH A PONY IN THERE SOMEWHERE!

Here’s the teaching story behind this idea:

A small boy who lived on a farm that had lots of cows wanted a pony for Christmas. Christmas morning came and went and there was no pony anywhere near the tree or the front door. Then the young boy disappeared and when he didn’t show up for dinner his mom went looking for him.

She found him in the barn shoveling a huge pile of manure. When she asked him what he was doing he replied, “With all this manure there’s got to be a pony in there somewhere!”

I want you to learn from every situation that shows up in your life. It’s a pile in disguise with a pony (gift) hidden in it.

I want you to master every situation by taking advantage of every ‘opportunity’ . . . which is another word for ’shit-uation.’

There are four questions to ask yourself here:

* How does this ’situation’ serve us/me?
* How can we/I learn from this?
* How to we/I use this to create a better life and stay true to our/my vows?
* What’s the bigger picture here that this is forcing us/me to look at?

You outlined your dream by writing meaningful wedding vows and creating a vision for what you want your life to be like.

Now you have an opportunity to realize how and when, and where you went off course and correct it quickly.

You’ll know you went off course because you can feel it. You’re angry, sad, feel let down, lonely, etc.

Tell yourself that you will recognize when you are off course. Then make a decision to correct it. Do not let it go for even one day.

Commandment #7 is “Never go to bed angry.” Those are powerful words you want to live by.

Resolve your differences before you go to bed or you’ll ’sleep on your differences.’

Not a good thing to do!

Remember, I have three main principles to follow when it comes to vows.

1. Write your vows as a result of meaningful shared conversation where you get very clear about the dream you each have for your life together and write that down. (Your vows are the promises that you make to each other stating what you will do to keep that dream alive.)
2. Read those vows every day.
3. Practice the 10 Commandments of Marriage.

There IS a gift in every shit-uation. And just like a present, you want to unwrap it quickly to find what is hidden inside.

Because, like the pile in a barn, IT WILL START TO SMELL IMMEDIATELY!

When you get to the pile before it multiplies you can shovel it easily and quickly and get on with ‘living the dream.’

You can find out more about my innovative and life-changing philosophy and about my Ebook, THE SECRET LIFE OF VOWS-How to Write Vows That Create Powerful Marriages, at www.WeddingVowsandCeremonies.com

Love, light and laughter,

Rev. Linda Bardes

The Wedding Vow and LifeVow Coach

Helping couples write down the dream and then live it!

PS: Be sure to check out the Wedding Vow blog. You can automatically know when there are new postings on either or both of the blogs by clicking on the RSS feeds! Follow the above link.

Love you!