As a Marriage Celebrant, I have performed hundreds of weddings. Literally hundreds of them! And all those glorious weddings have taught me many lessons but the one thing it has taught me above all others, and it is the one thing that I wish all couples everywhere knew, is this…
Your wedding ceremony is a direct reflection of what you invest into it… Want an amazing wedding ceremony? Then give your celebrant great info! It really is that simple… The more you invest in your wedding ceremony, the better it will be…
Sure, any celebrant should be able to create a lovely moment in time… But I can guarantee you that it will be that much more amazing, if you throw that generic wedding waffle out the window and make your ceremony about you… Gosh darn it!
TIP 1. INVEST…
So, you have invested your $’s into a brilliant celebrant who gets your vision and is excited to work with you to create an amazing wedding ceremony experience… But it doesn’t stop there…
Because if you want a ceremony where your guests come up to you afterwards and ask how you know your celebrant (because they have concluded that we must be long lost besties), then my experience tells me you have got to spill the goss on your journey to this point.
On your wedding day, I can guarantee you that I will be there giving it my absolute all, but I can also promise you that it is so going to be so much better if I am there sharing your stories, speaking your words and holding a mirror up to the extraordinary love that has brought you to this moment.
I tell all my prospective couples that my ultimate goal is for your wedding ceremony to feel and sound like the two of you (because how can we possibly get it wrong if it does both of these things). But here is the kicker… I can tell exactly how amazing your wedding ceremony is going to be after reading your questionnaire responses for the first time.
So, I am asking you to inspire me, to get me excited, get me saying “nawww” out loud and get me laughing. If you do this, your ceremony is going to write itself and it is going to be all sorts of amazing!
What I am not asking you to do is slave over it (that’s my job) but I am asking you to care about your ceremony. To take a trip down memory lane with me and reminisce over some of the moments that have led you here. If you do that you can trust me to bring your relationship to life, when it counts the most.
TIP 2. TOGETHER EVEN WHEN YOU ARE APART
As marriage celebrants we all have different ways of engaging with our clients to elicit the very finest information. My preferred method is through questionnaires.
I love questionnaires because they allow you to do them, when you are feeling it most. They also allow you to really consider your responses, ensuring that your celebrant is working with your best answer not your first answer.
I request all my couples to complete two questionnaires. The first is a ‘ceremony planning questionnaire’ which elicits information about the structure of your wedding ceremony. This one I want you to do together, so that we can make sure that you are both on the same page. It provides you with an opportunity to really hash out your wedding ceremony vision. On the same page? This one will be a breeze… Got slightly different visions? Well, gosh darn I am glad we worked that out now, not halfway through your wedding ceremony! If that’s the case then, this questionnaire is perfect for blending your ideas together into one combined vision.
Next up is your ‘love story questionnaire’, this questionnaire is specifically designed to elicit the ‘content’ of your wedding ceremony. And personally, I love it when couples fill these out separately!
But I didn’t start out doing it this way… What I found time after time was that one person completed the bulk of the questionnaire and then the other would come along and add the odd titbit here and there. Inevitably this led to me asking a whole bunch of extra questions because… Firstly, it lacked the level of detail that an epic wedding ceremony deserves; Secondly, it often resulted in a lopsided feeling ceremony.
These days, I choose to send out 2 copies of the content questionnaire and it has been an absolute game changer! Doing it this way provides me with an abundance of fun facts and memories that I can weave into the finest narrative. It also provides a beautiful balanced wedding ceremony that has your two voices equally weaved through it.
But the best bit…. It means there are some hidden surprises waiting for you in your wedding ceremony. I often look over mid ceremony and see a couple touched by the fact that the other remembers a moment that they had long forgotten. And on more than one occasion I have heard them say “I didn’t know you feel that way”… And it makes my little celebrant heart do a happy dance!
TIP 3. THE GOLDILOCKS ZONE
Answering your questionnaires doesn’t have to take eons, in fact it shouldn’t!
But there is definitely a sweet spot…
You see, if your answers are too brief, they leave me wanting for more… Equally if your answers are too long, I am left to wade through in search of all the best bits. But there is another option…
In astronomy, the ‘Goldilocks Zone’ refers to the habitable zone around a star where it is not too hot or too cold…. It is just right!
When it comes to your questionnaires this is equally true. There is a sweet spot right in the middle, that is not too short and not too long but is just right.
Let’s break it down with some examples…
Question: Tell me the story of how you meet…
Too short…
“We met on Tinder. It was February or March 2019. I thought she looked nice. We met in person a couple of weeks later. As they say the rest is history”.
Just right…
“We met on Tinder. Ha! That’s not embarrassing, is it? I saw her and I am not going to lie, I thought I didn’t stand a chance, but a man can dream. So, I swiped right and low and behold, so did she! We messaged for a few weeks before I worked up the nerve to ask her out. We went to Three Monkeys Café. I still remember she had ordered this crazy arse drink, called a Hokey Pokey Smoothie and when it came, I had total drink envy. Ha! But the thing I remember most was that she looked even better in real life and she was funny, really funny. I didn’t want that date to end so I asked her out again for the next night”.
Question: Tell me the story of your proposal/engagement…
Too short…
“It was 2020. We went away for a weekend. We went to lunch at this place by the water. Afterwards, I asked and she said yes”.
Just right…
“It was the 10th of October 2020. I had been wanting to take her away for ages, but I knew she would be on to me, so her birthday was the perfect excuse. I rented this little cottage that we ended up calling the Love Shack. I didn’t exactly know when I was going to do it, so I had the ring with me the whole time. I swear it was burning a hole in my pocket! There were so many moments that I was so close but something always got in the way. We found this nice restaurant to go to for her birthday. It was right on the water and we ordered a seafood platter for two. Something we had never done but always wanted to. After lunch we went for a walk along the water and we found this really pretty spot. I looked around and we were all alone. I thought it was now or never. So, I dropped to one knee, the only problem was the whole speech I had prepared flew out of my head. All I can remember saying was “will you marry me?”. She just started crying (happy tears I hope) and eventually I had to ask “so is that a yes then?”. She said “yes” and we hugged and cried happy tears”.
I hope by now you can see that it is the little details that bring a story to life. Both examples are based on the same fictional events. One sticks to the basic facts and while they may be true, they are not very inspiring. The other is the story of a moment in time in all its wonder that is worth celebrating. Just like the little details bring a story to life, they also bring your wedding ceremony to life as well.
Lastly, just remember if in doubt, when it comes to your questionnaire answers, more is always… Well, more! Trust me, I want to write you an AMAZING wedding ceremony, that has you feeling all the feels. That you look back on and can't help but smile… I just need your help to do it!