It's a great idea, being in four places at once and being able to do what you want whilst simultaneously putting in a day at the office and looking after the children. In the film Multiplicity, the main character, Doug, experiments in cloning. He believes that having several copies of himself will make his life easier. Before long there are four Dougs, all suited to the various aspects of Doug's life. One is an expert in housework and looking after the children; one takes his place at work; one turns out to be completely useless and sits in the garage eating, which leaves the original Doug with time on his hands to do whatever he chooses. To begin with it all goes well and each clone is able to cover for the other when there's a problem, but eventually the characters get into a muddle and life becomes more complicated for Doug than when there was just one of him.

Back in the real world, the trouble is that there is only one of us. As working parents we just can't be in more than one place at once. And the commonest result? Guilt. Guilt that we're not there for our children when we should be, not there for our partners when we feel we should be, not there for our employer. In fact, not really there for anyone - sometimes not even ourselves.
So is there anything that can be done? We think so. It may not be possible (or even desirable) to eradicate the feelings of guilt completely, but there are ways that you can feel better about certain work-life situations.

1. Ask Yourself Why You Feel Guilty

Often we talk about guilt as a kind of nebulous thing - we don't really know why we feel it, we just know that we do. In actual fact there are two kinds of guilt: legitimate and illegitimate.
To illustrate this, imagine yourself driving home one night. As you whizz along, a police car pulls out behind you. You're not speeding; you're driving with due care and attention; and all your lights are working. In fact you're doing nothing wrong. You still feel guilty. That's illegitimate guilt. It's part of the human psyche, but often totally irrational.
Legitimate guilt, on the other hand, speaks for itself. Speeding, careless driving, defective lights and so on. You've done something wrong and there's no getting away from it.
The problem in our work life balance is that our feelings of guilt become confused. We feel guilty about things we have no control over as well as those we do.
So if you can honestly analyse why you feel guilty about a particular situation, you may find yourself reassured that it really was a set of circumstances which couldn't be avoided. This can be incredibly liberating.
On the other hand, if you decide that the guilt you feel is entirely legitimate and justified, it should motivate you to do something about it.

2. Learn from your Mistakes

An obvious statement, maybe, but worth saying nevertheless.
There's a famous quote, the essence of which is that good decisions are born of wisdom, but wisdom itself comes mostly as a result of bad decisions. In today's culture, however, it's easy to beat ourselves up about errors of judgement, or our selfish actions, a long time after the event. It's much better to adopt an attitude which views even big mistakes as potential 'springboards' to getting things right next time. Life is one big learning curve - even if there's legitimate guilt, it's still provides an opportunity to learn from it and move on.

3. Turn It Into Something Positive

Use your guilt to motivate you to do something about the situation. If your work has been taking you away from your family for more time than you know is healthy, use the guilt you feel to resolve to do something about it. With most forms of legitimate guilt, it is normally pretty clear what needs to be done to make amends (even though it may mean swallowing your pride to do it). Ask for forgiveness from the people you need to and think about ways that you can avoid a similar situation occurring again.
Even with illegitimate guilt, it's a good idea to think about whether, over time, there is anything you can change to lessen the chances of similar problems rearing their heads.

4. Start Again

Remind yourself that no-one's perfect and, even when you think you've blown it big time, there's often a way back. Remember that, if they can see that you're doing your best for you and for them, children are generally very forgiving. So accept forgiveness from those you need to and move on. Tomorrow's another day.