The Four-Dimension Energy Audit
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 6
- Confidence
- —
The core model of Simon's book. Energy is a life force — mana in Maori culture, chi in Chinese culture, the force in Star Wars — that we under-access, and elevating it requires working four dimensions: physical, mental, emotional and spiritual. Society optimises only the physical because it's visible; the other three are neglected precisely because they're invisible. Spiritual energy is alignment between the work you do and who you are. Emotional energy is how you respond to the external world and relate to yourself and others. Mental energy is the ability to focus and access creativity. The audit is diagnostic first — you cannot change what you're not aware of — then reduces to a single high-leverage lever inside your control, with a time attached.
Origin
Extracted from Deep Dive with Ali Abdaal
How to run it
- 1
Learn the four dimensions
Physical: sleep, rest, movement, food. Mental: ability to focus and access creativity. Emotional: how you respond to what happens and how you relate to yourself and others. Spiritual: whether your work is aligned to who you are and expresses your strengths.
- 2
Score what gives and what drains
Go dimension by dimension and name what is giving you energy and what is draining it. Simon's rule: there is no self-development without self-awareness, because you can't change what you're not aware of.
Pro tip Low spiritual energy shows up as Monday-morning tension — feeling trapped, or skills lying dormant.
- 3
Check the three you've been ignoring
Assume the physical dimension is already over-indexed. The mental, emotional and spiritual gaps are the ones most likely to be unexamined because they're invisible.
- 4
Pick the single highest-leverage item
Of everything surfaced, ask which one item, if given attention, would have the greatest impact on all the other areas.
- 5
Filter it through 'what is in your control'
If the biggest lever is unchangeable right now — Ali's answer was making his job feel aligned, blocked for two years — Simon's next question is simply: so what is in your control that you can do.
Pro tip This reliably surfaces sleep, food and phone habits, which are usually available immediately.
- 6
Attach a time and a check-in
Ask when you will begin. Ali's answer was sleeping at ten tonight instead of scrolling Twitter in bed, with Simon closing on a follow-up to hear how much energy he had on waking.
Watch out An audit without a named start time is just a list of things you now feel bad about.
In the wild
Ali runs himself through the four dimensions in character. Spiritual: low, because there's tension between what he believes his strengths are — learning and teaching — and being an admin monkey. Physical: poor, not enough sleep, McDonald's drive-through on the way home. Mental: focus is fine. Emotional: responds to people reasonably well. Simon confirms awareness is the right starting point, then asks which single item would have the greatest knock-on effect. Ali names the job, which is locked for two years. Simon redirects: what is in your control? Ali lands on sleep — bed at ten rather than an hour of Twitter.
→ A commitment to sleep at 10pm that same night, with a follow-up to report the energy difference.
Simon defines the spiritual dimension by its two poles. High spiritual energy is doing something aligned to who you are, expressing your strengths, and being in flow most of the time. Low spiritual energy is doing work that isn't the work you want to do, which creates an internal tension. He points to the recognisable version of it: going into work on a Monday morning and feeling trapped, or feeling that skills which have lain dormant inside you for a long time still have no outlet. The tension is the diagnostic signal.
→ Gives an otherwise abstract dimension a concrete, testable symptom people can self-check against.
Common mistakes
Optimising only the physical dimension
Sleep, food and movement are the visible levers, so they absorb all the attention. Simon's point is that the mental, emotional and spiritual dimensions get neglected because they're invisible, not because they matter less.
Choosing a lever you can't move
Naming a fix that's blocked for two years produces a non-starter and kills momentum. The question 'what is in your control' is what converts the audit into action.
Working on everything at once
Simon explicitly narrows to one item — the one with the greatest impact on all the other areas — rather than launching four simultaneous improvement projects.
From the transcript
“it requires us to look at four dimensions physical mental emotional and spiritual”
“we we can't have self-development without self-awareness because you can't change what you're not aware of”
“if you were to pick just one of the things that you shared with me which one of those things that if you were to…”
From the episode
Life Coach: Why Your Energy Drives Your Success In Life - Simon Alexander Ong
Simon Alexander Ong