Recently, I sat in the back of an elementary school classroom in southeast London, on a Saturday morning. As I watched a group of beginner guitar players, including Isak, my five year old grandson, I frantically scribbled down the teacher's fingering for the intro chords of "Uptown Funk."

At the end of class, my mind raced to a question I have occasionally considered over the years: "Did I sacrifice experiences such as this with my own children, because of devotion to my career, and would I do it differently a second time around?"

The answer to the first question is a resounding YES; of course I missed many activities while I was at work. There were countless episodes with my children in which I was not present.

What I was feeling, however, in that South London classroom, was the unfamiliar pang of remorse and a sense that I might have made some poor trade offs.

For this discussion, we should start with a basic definition of "trade off" as an exchange of one desirable thing for another. For example: If I play more bridge, I will play less piano; if the town uses tax revenues for a new sports field it can't rebuild the library; if Jason takes the higher paying job in Seattle, he will see his family in Boston much less. These are trade offs.

However, focusing on a struggle between competing forces, particularly career and family, emphasizes non-compatibility rather than acknowledging that life is a constant stream of choices, priorities and realignments. Without intention, this over-simplifies the multiple strands of each individual's journey into battling pursuits.

In fact, it's the misconception about trade offs that contributes heavily to our sense of guilt. Either we suffer because we believe we have traded off our time with children in favor of our careers or that we shirk our work responsibilities in favor of family time.

Generations ago, lines were more clearly defined and society's norms so deeply ingrained that guilt rarely applied to our roles in parenting, a verb yet to be invented. Career and family were never incompatible or "trade off" paths for fathers, who missed most "kid" activities during working hours.

However, in recent years, the concept of two-parent involvement in children's daily lives has become an expected staple of modern life. Rather than getting credit for appearing at a Little League game before it ends, many dads feel guilty if they do not arrive before the fourth inning

For women, the views on a combined career/children path have evolved over my lifetime from nearly impossible, to unlikely, to the current "complicated" status. We may have altered the conversation about women as leaders in the workplace, but we have a long way to go toward addressing the issue of guilt that many of us might feel.