The vows we make

As I write this, I am a few days away from getting married.

In the weeks and days leading up to this time, I couldn’t help but think about my twenty-one year old self who, a lifetime ago, was also preparing for a wedding. 

In truth, I don’t really remember very much about what she was feeling at that time, which makes sense: I don’t think I was connected enough to myself to truly know what I was feeling.

I was blind to the ways that I was co-dependent. A pleaser, yet armored. Not fully capable of being present with myself or another person.

But I do remember a belief my younger self held (at least subconsciously) in the days before my first marriage: “Once I’m married I’ll never have to feel unloved or alone again!” 

If you’ve lived a bit more life than my twenty-one year old self had, you know how dead wrong she was in that thinking. 

And it would make sense to you why, one week shy of our second anniversary, my equally young husband and I were divorced.

So much of what I do in my day-to-day work twenty years later has to do with teaching people what I so wish I had known in my early twenties. 

I know the internal pain and the external damage I caused when I so desperately wanted to do better in my relationships and I quite literally and simply didn’t know how.

I don’t want that experience for anyone.

That’s not to say that I have it all figured out. No doubt my sixty-something self would have some pearls of wisdom for my forty-two year old self if she could be here today.

But at the risk of sounding like a know-it-all twenty-one year old, I don’t need my older self’s wisdom today in order to know that I’ll be ok.

I trust myself now, and I know the promises I need to make to myself before I can make promises to the man I love.

I vow to be honest with myself and others, even when it’s hard.

I vow to ask for help with the places I lack self-awareness rather than pretending I don’t have them.

I vow to be vulnerable, knowing that I will protect myself from anyone who would seek to take advantage of my vulnerability. 

I vow to be kind to myself even when I feel I least deserve it because that’s when I’ll need it most.

Whether or not you’re about to enter into a big life change, are there vows you want to make to yourself?

What promises would hold you to being trustworthy to yourself?

What commitments can you make with yourself that would help you to show up for the people you love in a way that you don’t have reservations about?

Here’s to your heart’s promises.

Want help sticking to your vows to yourself? Start Yours Truly today.