Your Love Story
When I read articles about making a wedding unique and personal, most of them tend to emphasize the externals like colors, venues, apparel, flowers, food, music, lighting, décor, and more. And while there is nothing wrong with creating a memorable and unique wedding experience for you and your guests through something like a great meal, a key piece of the day is often overlooked: THE CEREMONY.
Of course, sometimes a couple may not have a lot of choices regarding the elements of their wedding ceremony due to religious, cultural, or family traditions. But if your wedding officiant is a Life-Cycle Celebrant® like me, your choices for customizing and personalizing your ceremony are very nearly boundless.
One of the key ways to personalize a wedding ceremony is for the officiant to tell your story as a couple: how you fell in love, what you love about each other, why you want to make this life commitment to each other, and anything else that you believe is key to who you are as a couple. This is the heart of your wedding day! This is what you have invited your families and friends to celebrate. And it is one of my favorite things about being a Celebrant: learning a couple’s unique love story and helping them to celebrate that story with the most important people in their lives.
Sometimes when first asking a couple about their story they will claim that there isn’t much to tell. They are under the mistaken assumption that if there is not a lot of excitement or drama in their story, it is not of interest to others. But each time I hear a couple’s story, I find there is plenty of amazement to be had in learning about how two people discovered the beautiful souls in each other. Based on hundreds of wedding ceremonies I have officiated, I would bet that most of your guests will feel the same.
There are common elements to many love stories, like the feeling that these two people can be themselves with each other, the sense of feeling at home with each other, and the joy of deciding to be together. And there are unique elements like how the couple met, first date stories, and hopes for the future.
In many cases, the more personal your wedding ceremony, the more your guests will feel like they have been given the opportunity to truly celebrate what makes your marriage uniquely yours. And isn’t that what you have invited them there to do?