This week, we released our biggest, oldest, most well-known Working Mother Research Institute initiative – the 2012 Working Mother 100 Best Companies.

I was reading the top articles on Business Insider this morning about controlling your own destiny, closing sales, and avoiding failure.

Mulligan

Rewind and Try Again

What it is:  Golf slang for a do-over.  It's rewinding to the point at which things went south.

Why it's Important:  It takes time to change old habits.  Communicating with powerful influence vs. forceful control means you'll need a graceful way start over when old habits sneak in.

Returning to work - especially after staying home to raise kids - comes with all sorts of additional presents:

1. Guilty about the decision and the kids and doing well, and the list goes on

2. Lack of confidence about ability to "get up to speed" and be the careerist you once were

3. Questions about whether you can balance work and home life

Battling our inner demons is bad enough without fearing judgment from others...other WOMEN.

It's so easy to get lost in the hustle and bustle of everyday life. Laundry, dishes, homework. Meetings, presentations, business trips. Bath, books, bed. Lather, rinse, repeat. We can get so caught up in our to-do list, that we forget what life is really about. Too often, we sacrifice what matters most for what matters least.

Going back to work ain't easy.  To make doubly, ultra sure we don't miss anything, women tend to list EVERYTHING that needs to be accomplished.

And I mean EVERYTHING.

The problem with listing EVERYTHING, is that you constantly feel like you are falling short.  As a result, your confidence wanes, you feel guilty, and your work-life balance seems out of whack.

You wonder if you will ever get it right.

I am writing this blog from an airplane 38,000 feet above the ground. I left my house at 4:45 am to make a 6:00 am flight to the west coast for a business meeting. As usual, I am exhausted and overwhelmed but also excited to present my thinking to a potential client and hopefully win some new business for the agency. It really is just like any other business trip.

Not.

There is a new trend sweeping America - compassion.  And I mean compassion in terms of careers, not just "Paying it Forward" (which is also wonderful).  Americans seek fulfillment - a sense of completeness above career happiness.

Career fulfillment.

Maybe it’s all the hormones surging through my uber pregnant body. Maybe it’s all the recent media attention about working mothers.  Maybe it’s my own experiences of late juggling work and family.  Whatever the reason or reasons, I can’t shake the need to cast a spotlight on the obvious misimpression surrounding the ongoing discussion, and at times debate, about working mothers and their ability to effectively balance a career and a family and the inevitable question…Can they have it all? 

How do you define career?  For some, career equals a full-time job, at an office.  For others, career equals a part-time job outside - no cubicles required.  For others, the level of income and rewards received defines career.