I wanted to do something a little different today. Instead of posting about trends or colors or ideas, I wanted to take a second to talk about when those things become overwhelming. I’ve worn a lot of different hats in this industry: planner, blogger, bride, guest, bridesmaid, and plain old wedding enthusiast. Each of these has offered me a little perspective on what happens to a bride when she is in the throws of wedding planning, and often times, she is experiencing some sort of anxiety about the actual planning process. While this has always existed, I believe in the current age of things, it is becoming compounded.
Between blogs, Pinterest, magazines, and TV, there is an endless supply of wedding input. I call it input, because in the end, what you create for your wedding will be your very own individual output. For most, this will be a compilation of things they loved from here and there, as well as their own original ideas. This input can be super helpful, bringing ideas to brides that they may not have come into contact with otherwise, and it’s why I love doing what I do. On the flip side, it can become detrimental when it becomes a form of “noise”-just static, distracting, and pulling in tangental directions. I have noticed this manifesting itself in two ways: having too many options and not being able to decide or bring them together into a cohesive event, or a fear of disappointing others.
Chances are, your tastes can vary some, and your wedding inspiration doesn’t all fit into a neat little package. That’s entirely okay if you are able to evaluate what should stay and what should go in order to create the day you’re envisioning. I’m not talking about having a theme, or only having a color palette with two distinct colors. I’m all for your wedding being an expression of you, even if it appears a little random, but it also needs to make some amount of sense. The trouble can lie in committing to something when, if you allow it, new ideas are going to pop up in front of you every day, up until the big day, and you’re going to love them and want to include them.
This hoarding of wedding ideas can also present problems because in some cases it’s a collaborative experience. Whether you’ve enlisted your mom, sister, or friends to help you plan, or you’re just sharing ideas with friends and strangers on Pinterest, there is additional input in the form of the opinions on all the input you’re already getting. Overwhelming, much?
This can manifest itself in a couple ways. For one, there is the fact that all of your friends, even those that are not planning actual weddings are looking at weddings on Pinterest. Everyone (or at least nearly every marrying-age female) is paying attention to current trends, new ideas (if such a thing exists in wedding world), and the next best thing. This creates some degree of expectation from wedding guests, whether we like it or not. Then there is the fact that they can comment, either in person or virtually, on the ideas you haven’t even put into production yet, so if you’re sold on something but someone says something negative about it, it might cause you to think twice. Then there are the opinions of family you don’t want to offend, the opinions of family that may even be helping to pay for the wedding and thus feel they have more say, and the opinions of “they”-that group of people we create in our heads when we are worrying about what others think. All of that to say, the more people added to the equation, the more difficult it can become to weed through it all.
But the process CAN be joyful, and fun. It is supposed to be! Yes, because you’re planning the biggest party you will ever throw, but more importantly, because you’re planning the celebration of the commitment you’re making to the person you love most in the world. That fact should help guide your steps and hopefully help some of the “noise” fall away…that and stepping away from the computer, calling your vendors and committing to a decision when it settles and feels good and not looking back!
I wanted to leave you with a few quotes that are applicable to all of life, but wedding planning as well.
