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If achieving a “work-life balance” were easy, there wouldn’t be so many articles and advice books on the subject. But what does it mean to achieve a “balanced life?”

When you are able to maintain balance, you don’t feel as if your life is overwhelmed by any one task. You’re not spending so much time working that you don’t know what your non-work self is like, and you’re not constantly stressed by an unmanageable to-do list. You feel that you are actually living, rather than just rushing through the days.

Here are some suggestions on how to bring your life more into balance.

Prioritize sleep, exercise, and eating
When many responsibilities all call for our attention, it becomes easy for us to allow some of our most basic and healthful needs to be downplayed. Proper sleep and exercise help ensure our bodies are operating at full capacity, and they leave us feeling more relaxed as we live out each day. Pay attention to your body’s needs and rhythms, and honor them as best you can.

Prioritizing eating and the food you choose does not necessarily mean that you have to spend more money on food, or even force yourself to eat more healthily. It does mean being mindful of what and when you are eating. If you know you spend four out of five work lunches wolfing down something at your desk, allow yourself the freedom of a planned lunch out. And if you’re going to eat ten Oreos in a row one afternoon, make sure you enjoy them.

Identify and rethink your coping behaviors
If you’re very stressed, chances are you’re using something - maybe shopping, alcohol, or those Oreos - to help you feel better. While coping mechanisms are understandable human traits, you may want to think about alternative healthy activities that would allow you to relax without potentially draining your budget or leaving you feeling poorly.

Maintaining balance in your life means being aware of the things that stress you and attempting to change them or cope with them before you feel compelled to resort to behavior that will be counterproductive to your well-being. Instead of spending money, for instance, focus on another activity you enjoy. Instead of drinking or eating more than you will enjoy in order to relieve your stress, take the time to figure out why you would want to do those things in the first place.

Schedule time for quiet
Whether it’s prayer, meditation, yoga, writing in a journal, or just sitting and paying attention to your breath, having a few protected minutes of quiet in your day can be healing and revitalizing. Invest this time in a restful activity — watching TV, checking Facebook, or playing video games may not work as well for helping you feel more balanced.

Figure out what you can let go of
If you are simply trying to cram too much into 24 hours, you may need to cut some activities out of your packed schedule. It may not be obvious at first what you need to drop. Some experts recommend tracking your time; others, tracking your moods. Has one of your friends turned into an emotional vampire? Is that side project that once seemed so exciting now exhausting? Is your Saturday night out leaving you feeling bleak on Sunday? An honest appraisal of the events and relationships in your life may help you prioritize and potentially change some of them for the better.

Assess the “work” part of the work-life balance
Keep in mind that taking steps like these to improve your work-life balance may not go far enough to mitigate the negative effects of a job that is simply not suited to your personality, no matter how much that job pays. If you can’t leave a job that you find awful immediately, then make yourself a promise that at a definite date in the future - three months, six months, a year from now - you will re-evaluate your options. Write down your escape plan, as if you were formalizing a contract with yourself. If you find you have trouble clearly evaluating all the pieces of your life, you might want to consult a therapist, spiritual leader, or trusted friend to help you talk it all out.

Whether you “live to work” or “work to live,” you can always strive to streamline your life and make all its pieces work together more smoothly. Balance is an important goal for being happy with the things you have to do, as well as the things you want to do - and may help you deal with the difference between the two.

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Do you like to keep a journal as a record of your life experiences to help you remember and catalog the fleeting thoughts of daily life? How would you feel about sharing those thoughts or observations with others?

If this interests you, you might wish to start your own online blog, which is like a journal that you compose in cyberspace.

A blog can be a place to share your expertise or interests, collect your thoughts, or even market a business. Read on for reasons why creating a blog might be for you.

What will your blog be about?
If you decide to start a personal blog, the sky’s the limit in terms of what you can write about. In keeping with the old axiom to “write what you know,” sharing information or insights about your everyday experiences is a great way to start blogging. Linking your observations to facts and information that can educate and entertain others is a bonus that will likely keep readers coming back.

Whether you choose to write a food blog, a travel blog, a political blog or one about garden gnomes, you may very well find an appreciative audience interested in what you have to say.

For business sites, of course, blog topics should relate to the product or service being promoted.

Which blogging site will you choose?
There are a number of different interfaces you can use for your blog.

Blogger, now a Google property, was one of the first blogging sites. Tumblr has a simple, yet sophisticated format, and Posterous makes setting up a blog quick and easy. WordPress themes allow for a very smooth, professional look.

LiveJournal, as the name implies, has a more personal than professional approach. Like a MySpace for the blogging world, LiveJournal’s focus is on community and groups gathered around shared interests. Its options allow users to make their journal as private or public as they like. Diary.com is a similar option that also lets you sync with task, calendar and social media applications.

A live journal…and more
Blogging began as a way to expand a personal Web presence by talking to friends and strangers about what you love - or hate - in a ‘dear diary’ style. With a blog, you can get personal in a timely way, updating it whenever you want. You can create an online journal that just might become “appointment reading” for friends and fans.

Fame can be achieved through blogging. In 2003, a frustrated temp, Julie Powell, decided to cook the 524 French recipes in Julia Child’s book “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” in the span of one year - and blog about the experience, at the same time. Her Julie/Julia Project project gained a large following and was adapted into a 2009 major motion picture, called “Julie & Julia” - the first time a blog had been brought to the big screen.

Powell’s blog ultimately had a dual purpose: it was both a personal expression and a professional outlet for her as a writer. This is common: a popular blog may take the form of a professional (or intentionally unprofessional) observation about a person’s experience in his industry or a citizen-journalist’s update on a particular subject.

Though the blog - and its new media cousins, Facebook and Twitter - have institutionalized the habit of sharing personal information with scores of complete strangers, the most-read posts of today are either truly informative or else very funny, offering readers tips, insight or humor that they can’t get anywhere else. And as businesses make blogging a part of their marketing plans, it seems everyone is bidding for the most eyes.

Perhaps you don’t care about publicity; you may just have something to say and don’t really care how many others will read it. Either way, if it’s time for you to blog, there are more ways to do it quickly and easily than ever before.

Like a pen-and-paper journal, a blog is the perfect venue for stream-of-consciousness creative writing and sharing about any number of topics - for all to read and share. Choose your blog host, your topic, and your style - the only limits are the time and energy you find to post what you have to say!

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Posting your resume online can assist you in your job search by making your unique qualifications known to thousands of employers who scour the Web for job candidates. But simply posting an online resume won’t get you hired. Find out how to leverage your online resume to help you find the job you’re looking for with these tips.

Why should you have an online resume?
Online resumes are fantastic job search tools because they’re efficient. Just think how long it would take for you to mail a copy of your resume to every potential employer - the time and expense would be staggering!

But with an online version at the ready, you can distribute your resume to hundreds or even thousands of potential employers and networking contacts quickly - and that’s an important advantage. In a job search, speed counts.

Online resumes are also convenient. Let’s say that you start your job search by informing all of your friends and contacts that you’re on the lookout for a new job. That’s a great beginning-of-job-search strategy, but your friends aren’t going to carry around paper copies of your resume with them everywhere they go. If a friend has a contact with a potential position for you, however, that friend can easily share the link to your online resume with a potential employer. Online resumes really can help your contacts help you.

Online resume tips
Once you realize how important it is to have an online resume, it’s good to know how to make your resume stand out in a crowd. Start by making sure that your online resume is filled with strong keywords. If you post a resume to a large job board like CareerBuilder.com or Monster.com, you should know that employers search for candidates on these sites by scanning resumes for keywords, specific search terms that illustrate the qualities and skills employers want. If you want to work as a software engineer, for instance, then a few good keywords to include in your online resume might be:

• Master’s degree
• Linux
• Software design
• Algorithms
• Network security

These terms are good keywords because they are specific to a software engineer’s job. Remember that employers will be looking for different keywords applicable to skills required in their industries. If you have created a well-crafted resume, the right keywords should be there.

Keep in mind that you can do more with an online resume than simply post it on job boards. You can attach the link to e-mails for quick responses to job inquiries or for dispersal among networking contacts. (If the print version of your resume has fancy formatting, you may need to convert your resume to plain text format so it is easily readable when copied and pasted into an e-mail.)

Remember to keep your online resume current. You should always keep your current resume online so that it accurately reflects the breadth of your skills and achievements. Certain job board sites also push newly-updated resumes to the top of the heap for employer searches - another reason why keeping your current resume online is a plus.

Get the most mileage out of your online resume
In addition to keeping your resume current, you can help make your online resume work for you by maintaining active status on social networking Web sites where you post your resume. Each time you update resume information on one of these sites or interact with other uses in some way, the site informs all of your contacts that you’re active. LinkedIn, for example, does this via a weekly newsletter; Facebook uses a live feed. If a former coworker repeatedly sees your name in her weekly LinkedIn newsletter, for instance, she’s more likely to think of you when she hears of a job opportunity. In this way, networking sites like LinkedIn, Plaxo, or Facebook keep working for you even when you are not actively job searching.

An online resume really can be a tremendous asset to a job seeker. Follow some basic guidelines to keep your resume current and well-written, and you may dramatically increase your chances of finding employment.

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Adjusting to a new apartment kitchen takes time. Before you crank up the oven or fire up the stovetop, take a look at our tips to help you avoid some common cooking mistakes - and perhaps save your dinner, if meal preparation goes badly.

Avoid a major malfunction

Major appliance malfunction, that is. When you move to a new apartment, your cooking techniques may need to be revised to make them work with your kitchen. Cooking with a new stove or oven may take some getting used to: if you had a gas stove in the past and are switching to electric, for instance, it could take longer for your burners and oven to heat up.

On the flip side, if you are going from electric to gas, you may find yourself burning or overcooking your meals. Before you invite everyone over for dinner, do a few test runs to get comfortable with your new appliances.

The same rule goes for your refrigerator and freezer. Keep an eye on the temperature so you don’t end up with frozen milk for breakfast or half-thawed ice cream for dessert. You should also get an oven thermometer to get an idea of how hot your oven runs; with that information, you can adjust your recipes as necessary to get the results you are used to achieving.

While everyone loves home cooking, no one wants to have to evacuate their home just because they tried a new recipe. Be aware that the smoke alarms in your new apartment might be closer to the kitchen or more sensitive than your previous ones. The fan for your range may also function differently. Before you fire things up, know how to open your windows quickly in order to air out your apartment in case things get smoky.

Shop for new stock

When you move into a new apartment, the first things you might stock up on are decorative items, furniture and linens. While you are shopping, don’t forget one of the most important rooms in your apartment - the kitchen. Now is a great time to toss your old dried herbs and replace them with fresh containers. Did you know most herbs only stay flavorful for one year? The same goes for other dry goods like flour, sugar, salt and baking powder. Invest in a fresh batch of baking supplies to make sure your cakes and cookies come out perfectly. You might also want to replace old pots, pans and bakeware. Over time they can get worn or warped and won’t heat evenly, so refresh your recipes with a new set of tools. You might be surprised to find everything tasting better!

Make a back-up plan

Even if you test your new cooking equipment, buy fresh supplies, and read your recipes thoroughly, there is always a chance that you’ll have a meal mishap. Your best strategy is to be prepared with a backup plan. Make sure you have easy-to-prepare foods on hand to serve guests or your family at the last minute. Stock your freezer with pizzas, mini-quiches and vegetables. Pack your pantry with instant mashed potatoes, spaghetti sauce and macaroni and cheese. You might spend a little extra and buy gourmet pre-packaged products, so your guests will be impressed with your recipe rescue skills.

Apartment cooking can be really fun, if you are prepared. Be aware of common cooking mistakes, so you can avoid them in your own kitchen. Soon, you’ll be on your way to preparing the best meals you can and making the most of your apartment kitchen.