This weekend was lovely. My husband was home (a treat because he travels a lot). We had time together as a family, invited friends over to enjoy the beach and I was delighted by a surprise visit with my best friend from college who hadn’t been to California since our wedding ten years ago. It was exactly what I needed.

At 10pm last night I realized it was Monday and I hadn’t written a post. I started to think I’d stay up late and get it done, despite being ready for sleep. I felt this pressure to keep my word – Mantra Monday has MONDAY in its name for Pete’s sake. For about a minute I beat myself up for not being more on top of things or for not having written a post earlier in the weekend, even though I always wait for the mantra to come to me instead of scheduling them out before hand.

Then I shrugged my shoulders and said, “Oops”.

“Oops” is a ridiculous word. I mean, really. Just look at it: 0-0-p-s. Oops. It’s like a bunch of letters doing pratfalls in a red clown nose.

I don’t use it lightly. It’s not what I would say if I hurt someone deeply, or made a mistake that negatively impacted lives. But the world won’t end because this gets published on Tuesday instead of Monday and if you visited yesterday and were disappointed, I hope you’ll forgive me.

“Oops” brings a lightness, a sense of playfulness to the imperfection of being human. It lets us off the hook, lets us know it’s okay to make mistakes.

It even makes me giggle sometimes. Like I’m 7 again. I don’t know about you, but I could use a little more childlike playfulness in my often-too-serious, adult life.

So “oops” will be my mantra this week. When things don’t go according to plan, when I overcook my egg at breakfast, when the cat vomits up his lunch, when my daughter takes twenty minutes to get ready for bed I will say “oops”, shrug my shoulders and remember that in the big picture, these things don’t matter. They’re certainly nothing to get frustrated about.

Normally I’m very familiar with the mantras I post. We’ve become good friends and I keep them close. This week is an experiment. I have no idea how helpful it will be, but I’m willing to try. At the end of it I might have to shrug my shoulders (oops) because it didn’t work at all. But as I sit with a four day week and all that wants to get done, the lightness that “oops” brings feels good already.

You have permission to “oops” along with me this week. Please let me know how it goes.