Wedding Guest Vows

This tip is one of the most significant wedding gifts you can give to a bride and groom; it's a gift that will truly keep giving and giving, it's about supporting everyone concerned in having mutually satisfying supportive relationships. However, it only works if the bride and groom have included a Fidelity Agreement in their vows.

Overview:

The Wedding Guest Vow supports open, honest, and responsible communication. It presumes that you, a relative/friend/guest of one or both wedding partners, are willing to accept responsibility for the effects of your leadership-communication skills. It’s a given that all concerned agree that all communications, verbal, non verbal, and psychic have an effect.

Print, sign, and hand the bride and groom their own copy of the following Wedding Guest Vow (you may reword it).

Wedding Guest Vow:

You have my word that I am available for clearing and problem-solving throughout your relationship. In return I'm asking you to agree to call me, or another wedding guest, the first time an upset is not resolved through to mutual satisfaction within 24 hours. This includes calling me the first time you have the thought about cheating* or divorcing. I do not want to hear from someone else that you have cheated or divorced.

By accepting this vow you are agreeing to be supported in communicating problems responsibly, from cause as opposed to from blame. Most importantly, you are agreeing to not use fear as a reason for not confiding with me (fear is the reason many use as an excuse as to why they put up with abuse). The way to disappear fear is to share it with me the very first time you experience it; to not share it is tantamount to accumulating reasons for a divorce.

If I am unable to assist in resolving a dispute or dissatisfaction between you and your spouse, to include unacknowledged** verbal, non verbal/psychic abuse, I will call another guest and together we will intervene through to mutual satisfaction.

You have my word that if I experience anything that does not feel good or right between the two of you, directly or from another, I will communicate it verbally to the both of you. I will not withhold from either of you any judgments or any rumors I may hear.

I will ask anyone who communicates negatively about you from whom they heard it. If they refuse to divulge the name of their source I will ask them if they’d be willing to tell you to your face what they told me; I’ll also remind them that you’re going to want to know the source. If they say they won’t tell you I’ll tell them that I will be telling you what they are passing around.

This Wedding Guest Vow does not mean that you must stay married, only that you will have discussed thoughts about divorce with me or another guest prior to effecting a separation/divorce. It does however mean that if you decide to divorce that you will do so amicably, supportively, and with love.

Do we have an agreement? You may copy/print any portion of this tip providing you include the source, "Kerry (a.k.a. Dear Gabby)"

With aloha,

Gabby

* Read Creating a marriage vow that precludes cheating.

** Unacknowledged: When you communicate abusively it's your responsibility to acknowledge that you know that it was abusive. If you didn't hear yourself having communicated abusively, then you will eventually set it up for your partner to remind you, to give you feedback. If your partner says, "That doesn't feel good" and you don't communicate, "I get that that was abusive," it indicates that you are in denial. The test for abuse is always the recipient's experience; someone stuck in abuse most always is in denial and will argue or get angry when the recipient communicates, "That didn't feel good." Invariably the abuser will blame the recipient for starting the specific abuse in question.

Conversely, if through your leadership-communication skills, you set it up (create space, grant permission) for your partner to communicate abusively and you don't insist that he/she acknowledge the abuse then you are beginning to accumulate reasons for a divorce. To let an abuse slide, to go unacknowledged, reveals that you are masterminding a divorce.