by Victoria Tiegert

Created on: September 22, 2010

When we meet that special someone and fall in love, it seems that we would be willing to move heaven and earth, if only it would bring a smile to that beautiful or handsome face. As time goes on, however, things get just a little bit different. We now would do almost anything, but there begin to come certain things that we feel those old pangs of self-centeredness about. We might still do the things that our loved one would want us to, but it isn't with quite the same thrill that it was in that initial phase.

By the time that we are ready to get engaged and then married, we have probably learned quite a bit about the difference between being in love and actually loving another person. We probably even feel that we have it all down pat, but after the honeymoon is over and real life sets in, we realize quickly that there were many things we didn't have the slightest clue about. Dating someone, being engaged and planning a wedding together, and then setting up house is much easier than learning to live with another person. You are now going to learn things that you never did before, or even if you knew about them, you felt certain that they weren't really going to be as challenging as they are day after day.

This is where those all-important marriage vows come in and are more relevant than you might have understood that they would be when you were repeating them after the officiator of the wedding ceremony. The wedding vows aren't just eloquent phrases filled with nice words, they are promises that are made between the two of you before both God and man. They should be taken very seriously and you should get a copy of them to take home with you so that you can look back on them when the rough times come, as they surely will.

The vows that we take on our wedding day are traditionally to love, honor, and cherish one another. They are not to be accepted during the good times only, but the worst of times, as well. They are in sickness and in health, for richer or for poorer, until death do you part. With divorce rates as high as they are today, this certainly seems to have lost some of the seriousness and sanctity that it once had. These vows are still relevant because they are the first clue that a couple is given about real life, real marriage, and real love. If they aren't taken as promises that aren't to be broken, however, you will be left with vows broken, but even more importantly, hearts broken.

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