It's all lies.

There is a fairly common format for a riddle in which you are faced with two people, one who always tells the truth, and another who always lies, but you don't know which is which. (warning: riddle spoiler ahead!) You are then required to determine the answer to some question by asking only one of them only one question. The solution is always to ask "what would the other guy say that the answer is?" Thereby guaranteeing that the answer is false and you can then assume that the opposite is true. Lies are a tricky thing, which will lead to all sorts of logical problems. Take this statement for example, "This statement is false." Or "Everything I say is a lie." If those statements are true, then they are false, which renders them true again.

I'm not sure what any of that has to do with the rest of this post. We know that we're surrounded by people who lie. I'm most curious about Broken covenants though. If I promise that I will love my husband forever, then five years later find that I can't (or maybe won't) love him, does that make my original promise a lie?

It would seem that in the given situation I would have two choices, acting so that my original statement becomes a lie, or acting so that my original statement remains a truth. So if I'm the sort of person that values honesty, then I will do everything I can to make what I said true. If I'm not the sort of person who values honesty then I won't mind my original promise becoming a lie. If that is true than that makes the dynamics about covenant making much more different that it seems.

Normally when one makes a promise of that sort they think about their desires to do whatever it is they're promising to do. When people get married they are thinking about their spouse, wondering if that is the sort of person they would like to be married to for their whole life.

Perhaps when we make promises we should be focused more on ourselves, and the seriousness that we give to our word of honor. It's less about whether or not my spouse is lovable, and is more about whether or not I'm the kind of person who will make myself stick to it even when it's not nice anymore. It's not about whether or not the guy loves you, it's about him being the type of person to keep his promises.

We all know that in the Temple ceremony we make covenants. I was suprised that at the beginning of the ceremony we're told that we can choose to leave now rather than make the covenenants that will be asked of us. I thought it was silly to say that at the beginning, because we didn't even know what the covenants were. At that moment you are essentially agreeing to make and keep all of the covenants without even knowing what they are, and what they will entail. I stayed because I had faith that I wouldn't be asked to do anything unreasonable or crazy (and I was right, just for the record). But at that moment I should have been searching my soul, asking myself "Am I the sort of person that will keep my promises no matter what?"