This Sunday morning, with my coffee and my dog-on-lap, I’m thinking about mistakes.

I’ve made a few. And if you’re of a certain age, I know you have, too. What I think is this: they don’t matter. Truly, they don’t. What happens in life is that we live around our mistakes like sand in an oyster. The trick is to transform the sand into a pearl.

Learn from mistakes.

Grow around them.

Maybe even write about them.

Share a couple of life lessons with your best friend or your kids.

Then this: forgive yourself for not knowing better. (Or for knowing better but not doing better). And move on.

I read Liz Gilbert’s new novel, City of Girls, and came across this important line.

It’s true.

If you need it, here’s a quick encouragement: carry on. When your mind gets stuck on your one big mistake, remember this: it’s likely that you are the only person thinking about it right now. You are choosing to relive it, and you can choose to stop.

The weekend is the perfect time to refocus on all the good things you’ve got. Remember what it’s like to feel lucky? It’s a better feeling than remorse over things we can’t change.

Today I’m signing off with a hot cup of coffee and two things that make me lucky. On my kitchen table, magnolia grandiflora from an Australian tree in winter. So lucky! I wish you could smell the scent: like sweet candy, spicy verbena, tart lemon, citrus-honey.

And for pet-people, a sweet little puppy-on-lap…she smells like vanilla pet shampoo. Hard to blog with a dog on your lap, but it’s possible.

Enjoy your Sunday, everyone. Have some fun today — you deserve it.

Love Catherine x