Without words, without even understanding, lovers find each other.
The moment of finding is always a surprise, like meeting an old friend never before known.
Lao Tzu
One of my favorite business-related books is David Whyte’s, The Three Marriages: Reimagining Work, Self and Relationship. It’s a hard-to-classify book – part practical / part philosophical / part poetic. I found it to be both heartening and challenging. I’ve spoken about in my monthly business newsletter and reference it now – here on my wedding blog – because of the following excerpt:
A friend of mine met her future husband by arriving je-lagged in Los Angeles from London, determined to do nothing but go home, shower and sleep.
She called a friend to come and pick her up, misdialed the number and got an ex-boyfriend who was very surprised to hear from her but very excited about a theater event for which he was setting off at that moment.
He insisted she come with him. My friend ignored the invitation, said thank you but no thank you and went home.
Twenty minutes after she got in the door, the bell rang, and her ex- boyfriend turned up and with great good humor insisted it wasn’t about starting their relationship again; he asked her to get her things on and come.
Tired but beautifully dressed in a subtle green robe that her husband still remembers to this day, she walked into the reception line at the event and fell in love with a man she had never seen before who turned to watch her walking past, with whom she now has two children andwith whom she has just celebrated her twentieth wedding anniversary.
One tiny conscious “no” on the surface could have closed off that path into her future marriage and parenthood forever.
You have to bow before the mystery of life and love!
So often, when I ask a couple how they met, they tell me a “I almost didn’t go. . .” kind of tale. I’m an utter sucker for this kind of story!
Over and over I am struck by how different a couple’s life would be if they had not each said “yes” to that random invite.
Your vows are many “things” –
In their essence, though, your vows are a vow to saying “Yes!” – together – to the myriad invitations life offers you.
And you vow to honor those wild yeses because you each have vowed to be on the other side of that YES!
i knew you
before
i met you.
i’ve known you my whole life.
Nayyirah Waheed
Are you thinking of writing personal vows to each other?
If so, I invite you to check out my book –
How to Write Your Vows: Giving Voice to What Is Deep Within
