Breaking a vow

I try not to break promises but have done so in the past. I feel an immense sense of regret in those cases -- either for breaking the promise or for making it in the first place -- and a responsibility to see to it that it never happens again.

It will colour the rest of your life if you let it.

If you vowed to stick with the guy through thick and thin, then he cheats on you and you leave him, you're breaking your vow to him... does that colour the rest of your life?

This is one of the reasons I think vows are stupid. No offense. The only vow I'll ever take is to never take another vow.

If you want to promise something you can't promise (future), go ahead, but you don't know what's coming down the pipe, so you really can't speak to that. You really can't promise anything except to be true to yourself... and even that is sometimes debatable.

A vow is a promise, and promises are broken all the time because people and circumstances change over time.

When you're in your twenties, it's easy to make a vow to another person because you're young and in love, and you think that it will always be that way.
Age and life experiences change people and you discover that a lifetime really is a long period of time (hopefully) and you don't necessarily need to stick with a decision you made so many years earlier. It is possible to change your mind.

On these couple threads that spawned this one, people have stated over and over how one partner needs to think of the other partner above all - that once a vow is made you can no longer put yourself first.
I don't agree with that.
Besides the children that you brought into this world, your next obligation is to yourself. You came into this world alone, and you will leave this world alone. It's your life, and it's the only one you'll ever get.

jmo

Chai, I tell you why I thought it was very convenient of you to first be
so unsympathetic with adulterers and at the same time having done so
yourself.

You were in an unhappy marriage and were susceptible to someone
else's advances. You found your now husband in him, and now you two
are very happy together.

It is not difficult to remain faithful to your husband when you truly love
him in a reciprocal manner, and you lead a satisfied marriage.

It is the ones who lead unhappy marriages, are starved for whatever
they're missing in their marriage, those are the ones who will cave into
temptation more readily as any other group. To stand your ground,
and resist temptation is far more harder for those people as the ones
who are happily married.

You see the difference?

Very well said.

CJ - as is yours above. :wink:

There's a difference between 'thinking of your partner above all' and 'not deceiving your partner.' In fact, the latter puts you (your integrity as a person) above everything else - including the hurt that you know you will cause your partner. If someone truly thought of their partner above all, they wouldn't be cheating in the first place.

I do agree with your point that everyone deserves happiness, for themselves, outside even of children. My point all along has been that you have to stay on this side of honorable. My beef is with this crop of posters who are cheating has been their casual, self-centric attitude towards it.

Well, I just consider them young, confused, and looking to strangers for validation.
But I agree with you....sometimes the posts are so outrageous that I have an attack of the sarcasims and can't keep my fingers off the keyboard.

I do too _Hw_, but I think chai's question is more along the lines of, "but what if you don't stay on the honorable side of honorable?" Then what? How does that affect who you are and how you approach the rest of your life and the decisions you make?

Re: Breaking a vow


Breaking a vow means different things to different people. (As we've seen on here - some see no problem in breaking a promise if they change their mind. Others would rather walk through fire than go back on their word.)

It sounds to me like you had strong convictions, experienced a series of events that for whatever reason caused you to alter those convictions - and later made the realization of it all. Recognizing that you "moved your bar" is a sign of good character and I applaud you for owning your mistake and getting back to your principles. Many won't.

How does the knowledge you broke a solemn vow color the remaining years you live? I think you forgive yourself and learn from the life-mistake. Do not let the mistake define you, but remember the impact it had and use that knowledge to prevent it from happening again. It may also be a tool that you can use to help someone else facing the same dilemma. Like the old cliche says - turn the negative into several positives.

Yup, did get that, JPB. I was just responding to part of Happycat's post.

As to Chai's question, I think of the couple of solemn promises I've made thus far, I've broken one and that was ending my previous marriage. Hmmm...is divorce is a broken vow? Not sorry about it. And yes, it colors my life - but I think that's a whole separate discussion - and not one intended in this thread.

IMO, marriage vows are reciprocal....

If your spouse cheats on you....HE has broken the vow, and it no longer exists.

A vow in marriage is between 2 people. If one breaks it, it's gone.

If you vow to protect your child, and break it, then you can say YOU broke your own vow.
If a vow is between 2 or more people, if someone breaks it, the entire vow is gone. Now, the remaining people may choose to make a new vow amongst those remaining, but since one person is gone, it's not the same vow.

Same as in the case when your spouse beats you.

He/she vowed to cherish you. You don't beat someone you cherish...the vow is broken you you are free to move on.

hmmm, well this is your thread, chai, so I guess you get to define the terms however you like, but that isn't how I see a vow.



Vows are a solemn pledge. In wedding ceremonies, each party typically makes a vow to the other, pledging a certain set of behaviors. But I don't see the duality of it where one person breaking the vows lets the other off the hook for their pledge.

Having said that, and having myself gone through a divorce of my own initiative, I think wedding vows are more symbolic than literal. Breaking my vow of 'til death do us part' did not send me into lifelong therapy (or even short term therapy) nor did it prevent me from repeating those same vows a few years later. That doesn't mean that I left one marriage on a lark or entered the next one lightly. But it isn't the formality of stating a vow that ties me to a relationship.

I take a vow that is part of a ritual with a grain of salt. I take a vow from a personal perspective much more seriously. Such as, I vow never to drive drunk, or I vow to be honest in my dealings with others. I will do my damnedest to keep any personal vow (oath) that I make to another individual be it personal or ritualistic, but I'm not going to beat myself up forever if I'm occasionally unable to live up to the high standards I set for myself.

In truth, marriage vows were only one type of vow I was thinking of. A vow to me in a contract or agreement taken to the highest level. There are, IMO very very few things in life I would take a vow on. Like the one in your definition, about joining a religious order, where it is your intent to remain the rest of your life.

I think vows "feel" symbolic rather than real, because, well, no one expects me to keep a promise Forever, do they?

Well....as a matter of fact, I do. Because making a vow is so much stronger than a mere contract.

To lesson the promise to the form of contract....let's say you go into business with one or two other people. Signed contracts and all. One of the partners gets caught embezzling funds....the contract is broken...you and you and the 3rd partner would obviously take him to court. However, if this person broke the contract, is he still entitled to receiving the benefits of the business? No.

The remaining 2 partners would have to void that contract, since it was broken, and write up a new one between themselves, since the terms will change.

If you were the only other partner, you wouldn't keep paying the embezzler half the profits, would you?

You could keep the business, or sell it, or walk away. The contract no longer exists.

I will admit that during a marriage, the language sounds more symbolic because no one that I know of has written a marriage vow that says...."I vow to be your partner, unless the time comes when you beat the crap out of me."

We probably should, but that would just ruin the effect.

However, just like a contract, if one party breaks a vow, the vow, just like the contract, doesn't exist.

Using your example of drinking an driving....you alone made that vow. Anyone else in the car can get sloppy drunk.

You can make a vow TO someone or WITH someone. When 2 parties make a vow WITH each other, it's gone when one of them breaks it.

I believe in a marriage you do not make a vow TO someone...you make it with them.

Just like when someone says "the minister married us." No he didn't, or if he did ya'll would be commiting polygamy.

You marry each other, and someone like a minister or judge officiates, and witness the 2 of you doing it.



In my case, I suppose if you want to get technical, my marriage vows were broken by my husband long before I was unfaithful...He didn't take care of me in serious sickness, he certainly didn't honor me. But, if I looked at it that way, it would feel like passing the buck. Neither one of us was good for the other, that's for sure.

I certainly don't walk around with an albatros around my neck over it. But, it does effect what I did when I decided to make the same vows to someone else.

Also, it has made me much more careful in promising anything of consequence to someone. If someone asks me something for something important, or friendship, or confidentiality, I consider it much more seriously than before, and if I agree, it's a lot more important that my word be kept.

musing....there is such a thing as being released from your vows also you know. However, that is really something not to be taken lightly.

BM

"An earnest promise to perform a specified act or behave in a certain manner..."

I like this wording. An earnest promise. Something that you intend to keep with whatever you are made of. There are times, however, when no matter how earnest your intent, circumstances dictate that life take another path. I agree with most of what you've said, chai. I don't enter into vows or promises lightly and I also expect to keep a promise Forever. There are consequences in making promises and consequences in breaking them. There are times even when one vow prevents the keeping of another. We each have to make tough decisions sometimes and we each live with the consequences of those decisions.

This question is one of the reasons I didn't get married at 23.

I take promises and vows seriously. More so broken ones.

Most of them are empty. So I have opted for fewer.
Empty in the sense that, just because you earnestly believe and feel them, there is no way to accurately predict whether you will be able to keep them. It's tentative.

Up until recently, it's not a responsibility (taking a vow from another as serious as marriage) I would have felt comfortable holding.

A child or young person goes in often with an earnest desire to believe them, and to be hurt when they are broken. It's so much worse because they are still wanting to believe that the other person can make it happen if they really want to.

You get a little older and start seeing how fragile and changeable and complex human beings are.
So a vow can be held differently. If that makes sense.

It is not all or bust. You go in knowing full well, and understanding, and being personally responsible if it goes wrong or changes. It can happen.

That is how I would like to take marriage vows, when I take them now. Eyes wide open, heart ready for anything. Truth on the table.

I always respected the man I almost married, as he didn't make promises or use words lightly.
If he couldn't do it 100%, he said so.
If he could but was choosing otherwise, he said so.

When he asked to marry me, and Princess Mushy wanted to hear that he would love me forever, he told me he couldn't say that. He could only say he loved me fully then and wanted to do what it took to love me as long as he was able to choose.

That is a good memory. And a good memory that I at least had the balls to tell the truth when my time came.

I didn't marry him. I still wanted to believe in forever, not accept mortality and all that comes with it.

Fool, me! But it all worked out as it should have. Imagine if I had lied about what I was willing to do. Respect is just the biggest thing, in my books, even above this rest.

Really interesting thread, Chai.

Very insightful post, mushy, I completely agree.