5 Reasons NOT to Compare Your Wedding to Other People's

From trolling the internet for wedding inspiration to reading wedding blogs to going to various friends' weddings, there certainly are a number of ways for you to see and experience ALL the possibilities for your nuptials. In some ways, this is great — you'll get tons of ideas! But in other ways, this can also be overwhelming and even cause you to question some of your own big day decisions. If you feel yourself playing the comparison game, here are five reasons to stop that nonsense, stat!

These days, it’s easy to get wrapped up in all of the wedding “shoulds” — like, you should have a photo booth or all of your reception tables should have flower arrangements or you should give out-of-town guests a welcome bag. The truth is, all your wedding needs is for you to get married. The rest is just stuff. Very pretty stuff, in many cases, but you don’t need to do it all or have it all to make your day amazing.

Maybe you went to a pal’s nuptials and she and her now-husband gave every guest an elaborate, super cute parting gift. How nice of them! If you and your partner were planning to nix favors altogether, don’t let their decision dictate your celebration. Favors simply aren’t important to everyone and you should spend your time and funds towards things that truly matter to the two of you.

Everyone has a budget and no matter what size it is there is always the feeling that you could have done more. But, as the phrase goes, less is actually more when it comes to weddings — after all, it’s not how much cash you throw down but how the event feels for you and for your guests. You can have a beautiful black tie wedding that costs a fortune but feels stuffy. Or, you can have a backyard BBQ at which all of your nearest and dearest dance their hearts out well into the night. Remember: you just can’t buy fun.

A number of blogs and websites showcase gorgeous weddings that aren’t really weddings at all but are actually styled shoots done up to look like weddings. For some of these, even just one tablescape mock-up can cost thousands of dollars (yes, seriously). So it’s unrealistic to think that you can recreate some of the looks you see online at your own wedding. Get inspired, find things you like, but don’t feel like you need to live up to every photo you see online or in the magazines.

This is truly the most important reason not to play the comparison game. Your wedding is an exciting, happy occasion and constantly beating yourself up for not feeling like it meets some arbitrary benchmark just doesn’t feel good. Your wedding doesn’t need to be blog-worthy. It simply doesn’t. It just needs to represent you and your partner and the love you have for each other.