It's Your Party
- Tuesday, May 31 2011 @ 09:23 am
- Contributed by: Jet
- Views: 1,505
Recently a good portion of the world watched as a Prince walked down the aisle with his new bride. Even if you had no interest in royalty or weddings, there’s a good chance you know some random detail about the events, their courtship, or the after-party.
It got me thinking about weddings. In general, the planning of a wedding is incredibly stressful. I can’t tell you how many brides I’ve known who planned a wedding that wasn’t what they really wanted because “the family would be disappointed” or “it’s what’s expected.” If you were to listen to these stressed-out brides, there’s nothing everyone loves more than a super-traditional wedding.
I recently did a survey of all the people in a room and asked them if they’d ever been to a wedding they enjoyed, and what they liked about it. The “fun” and “awesome” weddings were all different: surprise weddings, destination weddings, elopements, themed weddings. Most importantly, they fit the couple getting married. Those traditional weddings? They were called “stuffy” and “a dime-a-dozen.” Even though these couples are tearing themselves apart to plan a party that “meets expectations,” people seem to enjoy the ones where the couple is relaxed and doing what they want to do.
So too is it in the world of dating and relationships. Too often, stress in a relationship comes not from incompatibility, but from frustration about meeting expectations. “We should be engaged by now,” someone might think, or, “this girl isn’t the sort of girl my mother will like.” Instead of looking at someone and appreciating who they are, we tend to look at the boxes that don’t quite fit around our partner or our relationship. Very few things are worse for a partnership than comparing it against the relationships of others.
As you go on dates and enter into new relationships, don’t think about what you should be doing or how you should be feeling. Instead, remember that you’re two unique people, forming a brand-new combination. At the end of the day, the party is for the two of you, not anyone else.
It got me thinking about weddings. In general, the planning of a wedding is incredibly stressful. I can’t tell you how many brides I’ve known who planned a wedding that wasn’t what they really wanted because “the family would be disappointed” or “it’s what’s expected.” If you were to listen to these stressed-out brides, there’s nothing everyone loves more than a super-traditional wedding.
I recently did a survey of all the people in a room and asked them if they’d ever been to a wedding they enjoyed, and what they liked about it. The “fun” and “awesome” weddings were all different: surprise weddings, destination weddings, elopements, themed weddings. Most importantly, they fit the couple getting married. Those traditional weddings? They were called “stuffy” and “a dime-a-dozen.” Even though these couples are tearing themselves apart to plan a party that “meets expectations,” people seem to enjoy the ones where the couple is relaxed and doing what they want to do.
So too is it in the world of dating and relationships. Too often, stress in a relationship comes not from incompatibility, but from frustration about meeting expectations. “We should be engaged by now,” someone might think, or, “this girl isn’t the sort of girl my mother will like.” Instead of looking at someone and appreciating who they are, we tend to look at the boxes that don’t quite fit around our partner or our relationship. Very few things are worse for a partnership than comparing it against the relationships of others.
As you go on dates and enter into new relationships, don’t think about what you should be doing or how you should be feeling. Instead, remember that you’re two unique people, forming a brand-new combination. At the end of the day, the party is for the two of you, not anyone else.
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