At our last I-WiL Networking Lunch of the academic year, we heard from Anna Comet, a professional mountain runner and former alpine skiing champion. Her journey includes a serious injury at age 18 that cut short her Olympic career, a bout of depression, and a slow recovery that led her to become a global leader in trail running. When she became a mother for the first time, she decided—together with her husband—that neither of them would give up their professional goals for the other: they would make the necessary adjustments, but they wouldn’t have to choose. Her best results came after her first child was born. With her second child, at age 41, the recovery was tougher, and this spring she decided to withdraw from the Marathon des Sables—one of the world’s most demanding races—because her body and her training weren’t where they needed to be.

Reflection: How to Let Go Gracefully, Guilt as a Social Construction Rather Than a Fact, and What We Teach Without Words

There are at least three ideas worth exploring further beyond Anna’s personal account.

The first has to do with the nature of the compromises. Ana didn’t say she never had to compromise; she said she learned to decide what to compromise on and when. It’s a distinction we often overlook: not every compromise is a failure, and not every instance of “pressing forward at all costs” is a sign of strength. There’s a substantial difference between making good decisions—based on information, with time to consider them, and without making “cold” decisions, as her coach recommended—and simply holding on out of inertia or fear of what others will say.

The second idea is that the guilt we feel when dividing our time among projects is not an objective measure of what we “should” feel, but rather a symptom of continuing to think in terms of work-life balance —as two competing forces—rather than integration. During the discussion, in response to a question about emotional management, Anna described an internal “battle” she experiences every time she has to choose between working out and spending time with her children. That battle exists, in large part, because we continue to view both aspects of our lives as separate, compartmentalized spheres competing for the same time, rather than as distinct expressions of a single life, each with its own meaning. When the framework is integration, the question shifts from “Which of the two am I betraying right now?” to “How does this specific moment serve the life project I’m building, as a whole?” It doesn’t eliminate the practical difficulty of being in two places at once, but it does radically change the emotional burden of doing so.

The third idea—perhaps the most subtle—is the one Anna mentioned almost in passing: her children don’t do what she tells them to do; they do what they see her doing. There is something profoundly true in that about how we raise our children: we don’t pass on values through instruction, but through consistency between what we say and what we do in front of those who are watching us. Pursuing one’s own career, in that sense, is not a selfish act in the face of family—it is, in fact, one of the most honest ways to bring one’s life together.