Marriage Prep Beyond the Checklist: 4 Soulful Tools for Deeper Connection During Your Engagement6/11/2025 Wedding planning is event planning, but getting married is master's level personal growth and development. Most couples spend months obsessing over centerpieces, comparing vendors, and perfecting their timeline. They'll debate napkin colors for hours but never discuss their conflict styles. They'll hire three different photographers but never explore how they each express love. Here's the truth: your wedding day will be beautiful regardless of whether you choose eucalyptus or baby's breath. But your marriage? That requires intentional preparation that goes far beyond any checklist. By the end of this post, you'll know the four tools to making your wedding planning process a marriage preparation process, so that you can get married consciously and intentionally. Why Most Couples Get Marriage Prep Completely WrongThe wedding industry has trained us to focus on the performance rather than the partnership. We're taught to plan an event, not a life together. But what if your engagement period could be the most transformative season of personal growth you've ever experienced? What if, instead of just planning a party, you could use this sacred time to:
This is what conscious marriage preparation looks like. And it starts with four powerful tools that will transform your entire approach to getting married.  Tool 1: Create Your Relationship GPS with Intention Setting The Pin on Your Marriage Map Intention setting creates a "pin on the map" for your journey (whatever ot may be). It defines your aspirational outcome and articulates the specific actions you'll take to get there. When you set an intention for your wedding planning process, you're deciding the experience you want to create (what do you want to FEEL) and then mapping out the actions that will lead to that experience. Everything else becomes a matter of commitment and follow-through. Your Daily Anchor Practically, your intention becomes an anchor that keeps you on course toward your vision. Here's how to use it:
You can set intentions for multiple areas:
An example of a wedding planning intention could be “As a conscious partner, it is my sincere intention to use our wedding planning process as an exercise in teamwork, so that I can feel connected with my partner throughout this process.”  Tool 2: Activate Your Growth Radar with Journaling The Science of Intentional Focus Regular journaling creates a powerful transformation in what you're able to see and experience. When you consistently focus on specific values and intentions, you activate your reticular activating system (RAS)—your brain's filtering mechanism that determines what you notice in the world around you. For engaged couples, this means centering your attention on the qualities and experiences you want to grow in your relationship. By focusing on what you want to bloom, you're directing your limited resources—time, energy, bandwidth—toward your relationship priorities. Beyond Random Reflection Here's how it works: Let’s say you set an intention to center teamwork throughout your wedding planning. Every morning you journal about your intention to bring it into awareness. Your brain, activated starts noticing opportunities for teamwork everywhere. Some decision making process, that maybe you’d be inclined to just let your partner deal with alone, (“I don’t even know what charger plates are?!”) will inevitably pop up and because you used your journal to center your intention, you may see this opportunity for what it is, a chance to connect with your beloved The Season Journals Engagement Journal takes daily journaling even further, and provides the perfect framework for this intentional focus, with prompts designed specifically for couples navigating the engagement season. This intentional journaling practice transforms wedding planning from a stressful checklist into a journey of deeper connection and shared vision-casting.  Tool 3: Decode Your Relationship Dynamic with SYMBIS Understanding the Human Underneath the Behaviors Marriage preparation assessment tools like SYMBIS help couples understand themselves in the context of their relationship. As a certified SYMBIS facilitator, I've seen how powerful these insights can be forengaged couples. The assessment reveals crucial information about: Your Conflict Styles: How you each respond when tensions arise, helping you see past behaviors to the human underneath. When you understand that your partner's withdrawal during conflict isn't rejection but their natural coping style, you can respond with compassion instead of escalation. Love Expression Patterns: The specific ways you each naturally show and receive love, creating a roadmap for connection that goes beyond the basic love languages. Sexual Relationship Expectations: Your desires around frequency, initiation, and intimacy—conversations that are straightforward now but will be invaluable to navigate over the decades of marriage ahead. From Insight to Practical Skills This isn't just about gaining knowledge—it's about developing practical relationship skills. The more you understand what makes up your partner and how they show up in relationships, the more you can connect with the human underneath their behaviors. Equally important, the more you understand about yourself and how you show up, the more likely you'll be to take ownership when your behaviors are the problem and make movement toward personal growth and mastery of how you show up in your marriage. Think of it as learning the unique fabric of your relationship—understanding which threads run in the same direction and which move in contrast, all working together to create something beautiful.  Tool 4: Write Vows That Actually Transform Your Marriage Beyond Pretty Words Most wedding vows fall into two categories: traditional religious frameworks or modern performative speeches. Intentional vow writing is different—it's a process of identifying and declaring your deepest commitments. Intentional vows incorporate four essential elements:
The How to Vow Framework My How to Vow framework walks couples through a specific process: visualization, organization, warming up for the big day, and how to shine during your ceremony. This isn't about writing pretty words—it's about creating a declaration that will anchor your marriage for decades. Interested in learning more about my How to Vow Framework - get on the waitlist and I’ll let you know as soon as my course gets released!  The Magic of Conscious Marriage Preparation
Let me tell you about Jasmine and Aladdin (not their real names, but you get the picture). When they first came to me, they already knew they wanted to be intentional about their wedding planning process. They weren't just planning an event—they were preparing for a life together. They used the How to Vow framework to infuse their personal vows with intention and purpose. They incorporated meaningful rituals into their ceremony. They completed a deep-dive marriage preparation program that included SYMBIS-style assessment and coaching. The result? Their ceremony was, in their words, "super duper magical." Everyone present—including me—was fully there in that moment. The presence felt… more present. I can’t describe it but to say, it was intense. As an empathic person, it is a skillset of mine to tune into the energetics of a space, and as an officiant, I use that skill all the time to “create space” for my couples to get married in a really conscious and connected way. At this particular elopement, I didn’t need to create anything, these two brought the vibes with them because this all meant more to them than just a performance. This is what becomes possible when you use your engagement season for what it can be: one of the most intentional periods of relationship growth you'll ever experience. Your Conscious Marriage Journey Starts Now Wedding planning will happen whether you're intentional about it or not. Vendors will be hired, flowers will be chosen, and guests will be invited. But marriage preparation? That's a choice. You can spend your engagement checking items off a list, or you can use this sacred time to build the foundation for a lifetime of conscious partnership. The four tools we've explored—intention setting, regular journaling practice, relationship assessment, and intentional vow writing—will transform your entire approach to getting married. They'll help you step into your wedding day not as performers putting on a show, but as two humans making the most important commitment of their lives with full awareness and intentional presence. Ready to begin? Download my free Engaged Couple's Guide to Intention Setting right now and take the first step toward a truly conscious marriage. Your future selves will thank you. Your marriage deserves more than a beautiful party. It deserves intentional preparation, conscious commitment, and tools that will serve you for the rest of your lives together. The question isn't whether you'll plan a wedding—it's whether you'll prepare for a marriage. Choose consciousness. Choose intention. Choose each other, fully and completely. What's one intention you want to set for your engagement season? Share in the comments below—I'd love to celebrate this sacred time with you.
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What if I told you that your wedding ceremony isn't just a beautiful checkpoint between "getting ready" and "let's party"? What if it's actually a sacred threshold — a portal where you step into becoming who you're meant to be together? Most couples spend months planning the perfect flowers, the perfect dress, the perfect playlist. But here's what I've learned after a decade of crafting ceremonies: the couples who approach their wedding as a transformational portal rather than just a pretty event experience something entirely different. There's a depth of presence, a magic in their connection, an energy that you can actually feel. By the end of this post, you'll understand how to approach your ceremony as the sacred threshold it's meant to be — and why this shift in perspective could be the most important wedding planning decision you make.  The Space Between: Understanding Ceremony as a Portal When I say your ceremony is a portal, I mean it's that liminal, in-between space where you pause. It's timeless. It's an opportunity for presence — standing consciously in the doorway between simply being partnered and being married. But here's the deeper truth: through a ceremony created with great intention, there's an opportunity for transformation. You get to step into your idealized version of yourselves by committing to that vision right alongside your beloved, who will help you become everything you've declared you want to be. This isn't just about changing your legal status. This is about choosing who you become. I believe we are spiritual beings having a human experience, and marriage is one of life's greatest classrooms. Every experience comes to teach us exactly what we need to know for what's coming next. When we approach ceremony with this consciousness — embracing the unknowns, the quest, the journey of lessons that marriage will bring — something magical happens. The Couples Who Get It (And What Makes Them Different) I've worked with couples across the spectrum, and I can tell you: there's a palpable difference between those who see their ceremony as a portal and those who just want to "get through it to get to the party." The couples who embrace the portal approach have this deeper presence. Their eye contact during the ceremony is different. Their emotions are fuller. They're completely there — mind, body, and spirit engaged in the ritual of becoming married. These are couples who understand that relationships are containers for growth, and by getting married, they're selecting the partner they want to do that growth with. They identify as conscious, committed, and co-creative. They're excited about the opportunity to build a life together, not just throw a beautiful party.  Moving Beyond the Wedding Planning Hamster Wheel Here's what happens to most engaged couples: they get caught in the go-go-go of planning decisions that have nothing to do with actually getting married. Do we want uplighting? What about the cocktail napkins? Should we do a cell phone announcement? All those details matter for your event, but they're not the questions that matter for your marriage. What I invite couples to do is step off the hamster wheel and ask the deeper questions:
When couples slow down to explore these questions, something shifts. They start saying things like, "We never thought about some of this stuff, and it was really great to sit down and talk about our life together." That's where the magic lives. The Three Places to Infuse Intention Into Your Ceremony Whether you're working with an officiant who customizes everything or you're limited in what you can change, there are three key areas where intention makes the biggest difference: 1. Your Marriage Intention Statement Even if it's never read aloud, create an anchoring statement for your marriage. This becomes your North Star — the vision you're stepping into together. Ask yourselves: What energy do we want to create? What are we declaring about our future together? 2. Your Unity Ritual (If You Choose One) Here's permission to skip the unity candle if it doesn't resonate. I'd rather see no unity ritual than one that's just checking a box. But if you do choose one, be super intentional about what it represents and why it reflects who you are as a couple. 3. Your Vows This is the most accessible place for every couple to go deep. Instead of generic promises, get honest about:
These aren't just pretty words for your guests to "aww" over. These are the declarations that will hold you accountable to who you said you wanted to become.  The Transformation Happens in the Process Here's what most people miss: the ceremony is just the culmination. The real transformation happens in the process of creating it. When you slow down to identify your shared values, your vision for the future, and what you need to promise each other to create that reality — that's when you step into the portal. The ceremony itself creates the present-moment awareness where you declare these intentions in your fully embodied state, with witnesses to hold you accountable. This is why ritual has existed throughout history. All the symbols, the candles, the rings, the words we speak — they're designed to bring you into present-moment awareness of what's happening and make it special. That specialness engages your mind, body, and spirit in the act of transformation. Are You Ready for Portal-Level Ceremony Planning? Not every couple is called to this depth of work, and that's perfectly okay. But if you're reading this and thinking, "Yes, this is exactly what I want," then you might be ready for a different kind of ceremony planning. You're ready if:
 Your Invitation to Go Deeper Marriage is one of life's greatest adventures, and your ceremony is the conscious moment you step through the doorway together. You don't have to approach it like everyone else. You don't have to settle for surface-level pretty words and generic promises. You can create something as authentic and intentional as your love story. If this resonates with you — if you want to approach your ceremony and your marriage with this level of consciousness and intention — I'd love to continue this conversation. Join my community of conscious couples who are planning marriages, not just weddings. I share insights, tools, and guidance for approaching every aspect of your wedding planning (and your marriage) with intention. Because your ceremony is a portal. The question is: what kind of transformation are you ready to step into? Ready to make your ceremony count? Follow me on Instagram @afa.weddings for weekly insights on intentional wedding planning and conscious marriage preparation. Because the couples who plan with intention don't just have beautiful weddings — they build extraordinary marriages. |
Amy F. AuroreCoffee Drinker. Virgo. Cat Lady. Lover of Love. Archives
June 2025
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