29 | Wedding Wisdom: 3 Life-Changing Lessons From My Magical Day

In this episode, I’m bringing you behind the scenes of one of the most magical (and windy) days of my life: my wedding day. But this isn’t about dresses, décor or Pinterest boards. It’s about the unexpected life lessons that changed everything.

From reading my vows first, to chucking my veil mid-ceremony, to letting go of the “vision board” and trusting something greater—I’m sharing 3 life lessons that have nothing to do with weddings, and everything to do with how you live, lead, and rewrite the rulebook on your own damn terms.

If you’ve ever felt stuck in “shoulds,” waiting for permission, or scared to trust what you can’t see—this one’s for you.

We talk:

• Why the words “supposed to” are silently running your life
• How to become your own permission slip
• The overlooked strategy of energetic trust (and why it’s actually the thing that will change your life)

This episode is a love letter to the rule-breakers, the high achievers ready to do life differently, and the women who crave a little more freedom, a little more magic, and a whole lot more trust.

Stay bold, stay balanced, and I'll see you next time.

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Transcript

0:00:00 - (A): Foreign.

0:00:05 - (Carly): Welcome to Coffee with Carly, your weekly wake up call to a happier, healthier life. I'm your host, Carly Shade, and I'm here to uncover how good life can get. Hello, hello, hello. Welcome back everyone to another episode of Coffee with Carly. I'm feeling pretty high on life. I've got a little adrenaline running through my drains veins. I also happened to get a med spa IV this morning with my husband as a little. We didn't go on a honeymoon so we just decided to take the morning and go get some hydration via iv.

0:00:51 - (Carly): So I'm like feeling all the feels. So if there's too many, too much energy coming through the microphone, I will not apologize. But that is why, because in case you missed what I just said, I have a husband now.

0:01:03 - (A): Okay.

0:01:04 - (Carly): Your girl just got married this Saturday, so still just like coming down from all of it. Today's Friday, so not even a week still. Definitely like high on vibes, energy, love all of that. And it truly was the most magical weekend ever. It's one of those things where like you just have, you never got married before, right? So I have nothing to compare it to and I had no expectation again. Cause I'm like, I have no idea what this is gonna be like, but everyone is right. It's one of the most special days of your life. It flies by and just when I reflect back on it, like I love everyone that was there and it was just such a special weekend. And so as this week, you know, like I said, we didn't have a honeymoon, we hopped right back into work. But good thing I love what I do.

0:01:51 - (Carly): And so I got to reflect really on this weekend. And I realized like, there was a lot of things in our wedding, the whole kind of day that were pretty unconventional. And as I reflected, I was able to really identify a few core themes that came through in our episode or in our wedding. And so today's episode we're focusing on those three core themes that came through in my wedding. And it was rules, permission and trust.

0:02:18 - (Carly): Okay. Three things that will change your life and three topics that I work most on when I with my clients.

0:02:25 - (A): Right.

0:02:25 - (Carly): It really, those three things really do summarize some of the big picture work that I do. And if you are new here, welcome. If this is your first time tuning into my world, welcome. I'm Carly Shade and I am a health and empowerment coach for women.

0:02:42 - (A): Right.

0:02:42 - (Carly): So part of what I do is offering one to one coaching for women who want more out of life.

0:02:48 - (A): Right.

0:02:48 - (Carly): I coach them into their potential.

0:02:50 - (A): Right.

0:02:50 - (Carly): They are ready to just feel alive again, to get their spark back, to live a really damn good story. And so whether it's quitting their jobs to pursue their passion, building massive success without burning out right, doing things the feminine way, or just simply experiencing more joy and peace in their day, it all comes back to the self. And it also comes back to these three core themes that we're going to talk about today.

0:03:19 - (Carly): And so if you are interested in learning more about the work that I do. So I will be having a group program coming down the pipeline very soon. But if you were interested in kind of that high level, high touch support with my one to one mentorship, it's in three, six or nine month containers and you can book a free consultation call with me, you can shoot me a dm. I love just sending voice notes and Instagram, we can make it super casual or if you're ready, there's an application all on my website.

0:03:47 - (Carly): So all of this is in the show notes as well. But wanted to touch base and remind all of you. You know, if you are loving the podcast, if you're ready to kind of make a change life, hit me up, let's chat. But with all of that, let's get back to my wedding and the three themes that kind of came through as I reflected on the unconventional things that we did. So before I dive into that, I want to paint the picture of where this entire weekend took place. So I live in Washington and we of course, if you guys have been following on my journey, you know my love of the ocean. Matt, my husband, shares the same love of the ocean. And so we were contemplating like how can we bas get married in the water without getting married in the water.

0:04:32 - (Carly): And there is this amazing resort up in Blaine, Washington. So it's about five miles south of the Canadian border and the entire resort takes place on this peninsula. They call it a spit, but it's just one road that dead ends right into the resort. And it is surrounded by water. It is beautiful. So it's right on the Puget Sound and there's just. You're looking across the water and actually there's Canada, there's boats going by, there's waves crashing. It's beautiful. And so the ceremony took place on a pier. Okay, there's a boat harbor, but it's on a pier. So we are like out suspended above the water. It's beautiful.

0:05:10 - (Carly): And the weather cooperated perfectly. It didn't rain. It was end of September in Washington. So it was a little, little dicey, little risky and the weather during photos before the ceremony was, like, sun peeking through. The water was so calm. It was gorgeous. And then, of course, during the ceremony, a massive, like, front of wind came through, and it was cold and it was white cap waves, and, like, wind was blowing everywhere. And it was my favorite thing in the entire world.

0:05:42 - (Carly): I love the elements. When wind is like that and you're looking at the ocean and you're hearing it crash on the pier, like pylons, that's when I feel alive. And it's like, oh, there's. There's an, like, another presence here, right? And we always like to say it was Pachamama blessing our ceremony. So just imagine that, right? Wind is gusting everywhere. So I want you to. To have that kind of scene in your head as I talk about some of the unconventional things that I did consciously and, you know, unknowingly at our wedding and the three lessons that I want to pull out for all of you from this wedding.

0:06:21 - (Carly): So the first lesson is that there are no rules, okay? And what we learned that is because first I read my vows first. Okay? Apparently, that's not the right order. Apparently the guy goes first usually. And not only that, but when I did share my vows, they were very long, right? It actually felt like our vows made up most of the ceremony, which we loved. We also know that I love to creative write and storytell, but, you know, when you Google, like, how to write your vows, they talk about how you're supposed to choose a moment or a story when you knew you'd marry them, right? When you're like, oh, my God, this is the moment that I'm going to spend the rest of my life with this man.

0:06:58 - (Carly): Well, the story that I chose was a story where it was the moment where Matt and I decided to move out. It was kind of my decision, but Matt respected it and kind of understood it. We had been together about three years, and I chose to move out. There was just something in me where I needed space, I needed to live alone. I. I needed to kind of. I needed to grow. And we stayed together, but we split up. We moved back out. He lived in an apartment. I lived in my own apartment. And we stayed together while living separately for a whole year.

0:07:31 - (Carly): And to most people, one, they thought that was the end of us, right? We were going to break up. That was, you know, slippery slope. You start there, and then all of a sudden you separate. And also a lot of people, yes, it was a very hard time for both of us. But I also. I consider it the most beautiful part of our relationship and our story, right? And it was the moment that Matt gave me what I needed to grow freedom, space, trust, to become the person that I needed to become for me and for him.

0:08:00 - (Carly): And so, yeah, I chose something that some people would consider dark and scary and tough and chose that as the pivotal moment of our love in vows. And then lastly, I apparently kissed Matt before they even said, you may kiss the bride. And obviously, I'm the bride. So those were. That was just kind of lesson number one, right? I was reflecting back on the ceremony and just what people had shared with me after.

0:08:27 - (Carly): After experiencing it, and they. They just really talked about those things that they notice about what I had said in my vows and just kind of, you know, me willing and wanting to go first and kissing him and sharing vows and all those things. And so number one lesson for you guys today is that there are no rules. We just often forget that, like, the word supposed to. The words supposed to are such a integral, ingrained part of our vocabulary and our lives, and we never stop to ask, like, whose rule is this?

0:09:03 - (Carly): Like, I don't even know who made that up, that the man's supposed to go first. Like, yes, maybe that's just tradition and it's got carried on, but it's okay to kind of pause and be like, does this really matter? And can we change it?

0:09:15 - (A): Right?

0:09:15 - (Carly): And especially my clients and you guys listening, right? There's a lot of women who. High achievers. Most of the time, they're the ones who are really good at following rules, right? They've kind of succeeded because they've played everyone else's game, right? Or maybe you're the person who, like, follows a recipe to a T. But I love cooking because it's so much more forgiving. It's so much more flexible, right? Baking is rigid. There's a science behind that.

0:09:42 - (Carly): But when you're just cooking, you know, you're making a jar of pesto, and you don't have those ridiculously expensive pine nuts. Well, great. How about we substitute and throw in some walnuts in there? Guess what? It tastes just as delicious. But a lot of us are just really stuck following the recipe, right? Following the rules that we've just been told. Following the shoulds, the supposed tos, instead of realizing you can throw some walnuts in there and it tastes just as good. Okay? There's so many substitutions in life, but we're kind of afraid to find out what happens. What happens if I read my vows first? What happens if I Share what others might consider a dark part of your story. Right?

0:10:24 - (Carly): Who says that I can't do that? And look what happened. It actually ended up being one of the most beautiful parts of our wedding. Everyone came up to us after and was like, your vows were incredible.

0:10:38 - (A): Right?

0:10:38 - (Carly): Who says that I can't go first or kiss my man first? Is there police that's going to come out and arrest us?

0:10:44 - (A): Right.

0:10:44 - (Carly): Is there someone who's going to come shame us? Personal growth often comes from unlearning the supposed to's, the shoulds, and the rules that we've been following. So with lesson number one, my challenge to you is just to check in with yourself, whether it's every day, every week, every month. Like, if you're about to do something, maybe stop and ask, like, is this true?

0:11:11 - (A): Right.

0:11:12 - (Carly): And what will happen if I choose to do something different? Can I surprise myself? And how I show up?

0:11:18 - (A): Right.

0:11:18 - (Carly): We can start small, break little rules here and there, choose walnuts instead of pine nuts, and see how the recipe turns out. You know, it doesn't always have to be so big, but start to find little moments in your life where it's like, is this a rule that I've been following? And can I be bad?

0:11:34 - (A): Right?

0:11:35 - (Carly): Can I be a rule breaker? Try it and just see what happens. Okay? Because there are no rules. You, most of your life, have been following someone else's rulebook. And the beautiful thing of being an autonomous human being is that you get to write your own. Okay, Lesson number one. So lesson number two, I want to remind you all of the paint the. The picture that I painted, okay? The wind is howling. The water is white capping, right? We're looking out, and there's seagulls flying above us. You know, some of the audience thought that, like, they were gonna poop on us, but there's also where it's like a seagull looks like it's not moving. It's just kind of suspended in air because the, like, gusting so hard.

0:12:19 - (Carly): And so also the wind was at my back and the. My hair, like, I had kind of some strands down framing my face, and they were just blowing, like, crisscross right over my face. I looked like the girl from Rings. Like, it was just all over. And so not only was it annoying me, but I also knew that every single photo would have had my hair in my face just, again, looking, like, not how I wanted to look. Okay? And so we switched in the middle of the ceremony. Our officiant's just doing his thing, and I Just like, look at Matt and he gets it and we just switch sides.

0:12:54 - (Carly): No biggie. I take like my dress has a long kind of train and I just like kicked it behind me, moved over and we went on with our lives. We went on with the ceremony like nothing happened. So here we are at lesson number two, permission. No one is going to give you the permission that you are looking for except yourself, okay? We had a day of coordinator and she helped us with the timing for most of the day, right? Reminding us where to meet, when to start walking, what to do, right? Like gathering up everybody.

0:13:29 - (Carly): But the minute that my dad and I started walking down that aisle, it was just us, right? And then when my dad sat down, it was just Matt and I. She wasn't able to walk down that aisle with us, right? She left it to be our ceremony. We didn't even have our wedding party stand up there besides us and the maid of honor. And how many people would have just sucked it up, right? Dealt with the wind, dealt with the hair in their face, but then later chosen to be upset at how the photos turned out?

0:14:03 - (Carly): How many people would wait for their officiant, for their day of coordinator, for somebody else in the audience to whisper like, hey, it's okay to switch sides, right? Also, the wind was gusting, the hair was in my face and my veil, it was this beautiful, like very delicate veil and it was whipping in the wind. It definitely made for epic photos, but it was ripping at my head and my hair and like pulling me sideways.

0:14:29 - (Carly): So within a two, like one or two minutes, I just again mid ceremony, reached back, grabbed my veil veil, pulled it out and just kind of chucked it behind me. And I knew that someone would pick it up, right? How many other people would have waited for somebody else to come and tell you, hey, you can take off your veil. Hey, it's okay to switch sides, right? Our life is the same. Many of you are listening, and this really does tie into lesson number one. Many of you are listening.

0:14:57 - (Carly): The high achievers, the high performers, the athletes. You've gotten the good grades. You know how to follow the rules, listen and be told what to do by our teachers, by society, even by our friends. But we've lost the ability to give ourselves our own instruction. Your life is your ceremony and your day of coordinator cannot walk down the aisle with you, right? And I think that that's why, especially like in our 20s, our early 30s, we've all attended school, right? We've all grown up in this.

0:15:29 - (Carly): Raise your hand if you want to Go to the bathroom, told what to do, how to study, how to get the good grade. But life's not the same. And so then all of a sudden, we're out here and. And there is nobody to tell us what to do, or we do keep telling what society has told us to do. Get the house, buy the job, get married, sorry, get the job, buy the house, you know, blah, blah, blah. Do all those things.

0:15:49 - (Carly): Find a good career, stay in it for 30 years. But it's your ceremony, it's your life. And so the next step to, like, a new chapter to this life that feels awesome is realizing you have to give yourself permission. You have to write your own permission slip. Especially if you want to do something a little unconventional in life, something that not everyone does, something that's a little crazy. Like, if you're waiting for someone else to give you the okay, you're going to be waiting forever.

0:16:22 - (Carly): There were so many moments during my ceremony where I just. I rolled with the punches, right? I couldn't control the wind, the outcome, what my veil was going to do, the fact that it got stuck not once, not twice, but three times, like, on my walk down the aisle with, like, it got stuck on splinters and grates on the pier and all these things, but I couldn't control that. But what I could control is myself, the tone of it, laughing through it, smiling, having fun, talking to the audience.

0:16:53 - (Carly): And most of the time, I wasn't really consciously doing this. I was just doing it, right? I was able to have fun at my ceremony, and so effortless. Oh, my God. Effortlessly take charge. Because I've been building this muscle for the last couple years, right from the moment that I chose to leave my job and embark on this new adventure as an entrepreneur, as a business owner, or just simply coming back home to myself.

0:17:22 - (Carly): I've been leading myself. I've been giving myself permission. I gave myself permission to start this podcast, right? And now I've done it so much that I just have bigger muscles, so it's a little bit easier. I remember that it's my ceremony, and I can absolutely control it in whatever way I want, right? Some of the most successful people in life move fast because they don't doubt their decisions, right?

0:17:48 - (Carly): But also, I'd be lying if I said I got here on my own, especially in the beginning. If we've never done it, if we've never given ourselves permission to be big, to be brave, then it can be hard at first, for sure, right? And that's why mentorship and coaching and the Right. Support or community. And surrounding yourself with the right people can be so powerful. That alone can change your life. Finding someone who can help give you permission, especially in those early days, or who isn't going to tell you that your dreams or your plans are too big, too crazy, too audacious, too big and scary and just there's never going to work.

0:18:38 - (A): Right.

0:18:38 - (Carly): Find someone who is going to support you in your bigness, and eventually you will start to be able to do this for yourself. But it's okay if you can't do it on your own. In the beginning, I couldn't.

0:18:54 - (A): Right?

0:18:54 - (Carly): That's why sometimes people hire personal trainers, you know, and then maybe you go see them for a year, and then all of a sudden, hey, I feel confident, right? I know how to do this exercise correctly. I know what exercises to even do. I'm gonna go try being in the gym on my own, you know, for the next couple months, and see how I do.

0:19:13 - (A): Right?

0:19:13 - (Carly): Like, that's why people have coaches. That's how I learned soccer. I didn't know how to use foot skills till I had a coach. Sometimes we don't know how to give permission to ourselves because we haven't done it our whole lives. So, again, that's why the mentorship, the coaching, the right community can really be so powerful. Okay, so the second lesson from my wedding is permission. Go give it to yourself.

0:19:35 - (Carly): Stop waiting for someone else to give it to you. But if you are struggling, go find someone who can support you in building that muscle until you're able to do it on your own. Okay? And so now the third lesson. Okay, Again, as I reflect on the details of the wedding, we talked a lot about the ceremony, but I want to share with you guys just, like, this whole vision. So we really did not have a cohesive vision, right? When the vendors. When you start hiring your vendors, they're like, what flowers do you want? And what's your vision and what's the vibe? And we really didn't know how to answer that, except knowing, like, we knew what colors our wedding party was going to wear, kind of.

0:20:16 - (Carly): We knew what Matt was going to wear, and we knew what the groomsman was going to wear, which was all black. And then as far as my bridesmaids, I was like, here's a color scheme. Choose some color within the same family. Pick your own dress. I'm not going to tell you what looks beautiful on you. You can do that yourself. We knew we wanted candles, and we knew that we wanted seasonal flowers, and we picked, you know, the special songs like First Dance and all that. But otherwise I didn't really like have this big vision, right? There wasn't like a.

0:20:45 - (Carly): I couldn't find anything on Pinterest that was like, that's what I want, right? It was kind of, here's a rough idea. But beyond that, I don't really know. I trusted my vendors and guess what? It ended up being better than I could have ever imagined. Like just perfect and beautiful. I didn't know what my flowers were going to look like till I walked in. Like the bouquet, everything, the vibe that the DJ and the MC brought was perfect.

0:21:17 - (Carly): It's because I trusted the vendors and I let go.

0:21:22 - (A): Right?

0:21:22 - (Carly): I wasn't so obsessed with. I want it to look like this Pinterest and this Pinterest and this Pinterest. And so what if your dreams can be the same, right? If you are someone that maybe struggles with a vision board, that's okay. Because what if it turns out even better than you could have imagined? What if you can't find a Pinterest board for it because it doesn't exist yet, right? What if your dreams, right, can't just be fit into a nice little Pinterest board box?

0:21:55 - (Carly): What if they're better than that, right? But when you cling so hard to your plans, if you cling so hard to the how you're going to get to your goal, you are actually limiting your potential, okay? And the laws of quantum physics, right? Because we're not just talking physical, we're talking energetics. The law of quantum physics says that there's three planes that we get to play in in life. And so your vision board, it only exists on the physical material plane, right? That's why you're kind of limited in your selections.

0:22:30 - (Carly): But trust, lesson number three is an energy. It's part of the unseen. And this part of this quantum field that we're talking about, right? An energy is one of the most underlooked strategies for changing your life. So this third lesson is trust. Trust that you are co creating with an unseen energy. Trust that the universe, God, Pachamama, whatever higher power you believe in has bigger plans for you.

0:23:05 - (Carly): And since trust is an energy, it's unseen, it's felt. Then we're playing in the quantum field. We're in this different, this plane, right? And that's where things get to be fun. We've left the logical plane of a physical, materialistic vision board and now we get to be a little delusional, right? This other plane is when we can think Talk and plan less and trust more. That's when we get the results that don't make sense because we're not limiting ourselves to just what can be seen, okay?

0:23:42 - (Carly): That's when life gets to be better than you could have imagined because you're willing to let go trust and not cling to the very picture that you see on your vision board. So, yes, lesson one. You need to give yourself permission to be the artist in your own life, right, to control your ceremony. But do not forget that you are also co creating with forces unseen. Trust that there are plans happening behind the scenes that don't make sense.

0:24:14 - (Carly): Trust that it might feel look, sound a little delusional, but that means you're onto something and you are co creating, right? Trust your vendors, trust the co creation. And it can really actually be quite comforting that it's not just all up to you. And that's when you get to enjoy the mystery of things. I had no idea what my wedding was going to look like until I walked through that tent. And it was better than I could have ever imagined.

0:24:43 - (Carly): You know, and so people always tell you the come down from your wedding is, is very real and it is true, especially when you're just kind of hopping right back into life. You know, we delayed our honeymoon and so we're just kind of backed into reality. But I feel so fortunate that I love my work and my work gets to reflect on my wedding, right. Getting to record this episode just brought me back to that day.

0:25:04 - (Carly): So thank you for listening. Thank you for letting me relive was truly one of the most magical days of my life because I remembered there are no rules. I was the permission that I needed and I trusted. And so if you are someone who is ready for a change, right, you're just like, you've maybe had a taste, right? A lot of my clients, like, they, they know that life can be crazy and magical and beautiful and feel alive, right? Like those years where I was first guiding in Southeast Asia, right?

0:25:40 - (Carly): Just like awe, inspired by everything and just rapidly growing and excelling. And then just somewhere on the way, I got lost. I lost my spark, right? And I didn't really know what I needed, but I know I needed change. And so if that is you, if that is someone where you're just like, I don't know what's next, but I know it's not this. Let's talk about my private mentorship where we work on the very lessons we talked about today.

0:26:09 - (Carly): There are no rules. Don't forget to check in with yourself and ask is this true? I'm supposed to do this, but does that mean I actually have to do this?

0:26:18 - (A): Right?

0:26:19 - (Carly): And what will happen if I don't do it? You are the permission that you're looking for. I know that you have big delusional dreams like I do, right? And if you are new to that self permission thing, go seek out people who are living the way you want and ask them for support. And for the love of God, please don't ask people for advice if they are not living the way that you want to. Okay? And then remember, trust.

0:26:44 - (Carly): Trust that things could actually turn out better than you could have imagined. That you maybe don't have all the answers and that maybe the reason that you can't find your vision on the Pinterest board is because it doesn't even exist yet. Remain committed, but unattached and know that you are co creating in the quantum plane of life. So if you like what you hear, please don't forget to Rate Subscribe Share this with Episode With a Friend. It means the world to me. Just maybe it was last week, two weeks ago we hit the 2000 downloads mark, which is insane.

0:27:22 - (Carly): I launched this podcast January 15th of 2025. 2025. Sorry. And. And we're already at over 2000 downloads so your guys's support means the world to me. Rate Share like all of that and I just want to thank you guys for listening. Of course we will do episodes every two weeks now and if you do want to hear more, kind of get reminders when episodes drop or just get more of these digestible daily tips. I do also have the Weekly Brew, which is an email newsletter subscription of course. Again, all the links are in the show notes so be sure to sign up for that.

0:27:58 - (Carly): And I want to give a special shout out to my husband Mat for always being part of my inspiration for some of these lessons in these episodes. So thank you again for listening. I love you all. And remember, like a good cup of coffee, stay bold, stay balanced and I will see you next time.