How to Track & Manage Your Energy to Avoid Burnout

First Published: July 27, 2026 | Last Updated: July 27, 2026

The gist: Learn how to track your energy so you can start using energy management to avoid burnout.

“Manage your energy” is a go-to piece of advice for neurodivergent and chronically ill humans. But so much of the advice ends there, and doesn’t actually tell you HOW.

It frustrated me when I first started learning about energy management.

Blog posts would say things like “do your most draining work during your most high energy hours,” as if all of those things are obvious.

But how was I supposed to know what my most draining work was, or when my highest energy hours were?! They never really explained those parts.

Well, I had to figure it out on my own, and don’t think you should have to do the same.

The answer is energy tracking.

In order to actually manage your energy, you have to know your own personal energy patterns work. And to know that, you’re probably gonna have to track it.

Especially if you’re dealing with a condition that can come with poor interoception and emotional awareness, or are desensitized to pain and other bodily sensations.

So let’s go over everything you need to know to start tracking your energy.

table of contents

Why track & manage your energy?

If you’re not yet convinced it’s worth it to try tracking and managing your energy, here are a few things that might persuade you:

Learning to pause throughout the day and check in with your body and brain is a great way to start adding more mindfulness to your day-to-day routine, which has numerous physical and mental health benefits.
If you have poor interoception or emotional awareness, a practice of intentionally checking in with yourself throughout the day can help improve it, along with general self-awareness.
You’ll better understand your body’s natural energy patterns and rhythms.
You’ll better understand how different situations and activities impact those natural patterns.

As an example, let’s go back to the situation in the intro.

Before I started tracking my energy, I didn’t really know how much energy different things took or when my peak hours were.

Based on other generic productivity advice about things like deep work, I assumed my job’s deep work was writing, so that must be my most draining work. And people talked about how “we” have the most energy in the morning, so I guessed I should write in the morning. So for years, that’s what I did.

But through tracking my energy, I realized that was all wrong.

Sure, writing is deep work, but as an AuDHD introvert, things like meetings and phone calls were actually more draining. Plus, I had the most creative energy in the mid-afternoon or late at night, not in the morning.

What to track to mange your energy

So, what are you actually supposed to track? Great question, since it’s not like just tracking your smartwatch’s step count or other easily measurable things.

And really, you can track anything that you think will be helpful for understanding and managing your energy. It can be as simple or detailed as you want, although I recommend starting simple and adding any complexity over time.

Here are some of the common options, in order of ease and simplicity:

Level 1 (simplest and easiest): just keeping a basic log of written notes about your energy throughout the day, like bullet journal rapid logging or interstitial journaling.
Level 2: adding a quantitative datapoint by rating your energy, for example on a scale of 1-5 or 1-10.
Level 3: adding more dimensions to your data by tracking contributing factors, things that could impact your energy rating. For example, also rating your productivity or mood, noting what type of energy you’ve used, or tracking what activities you did during that tracking period.

Of course, you don’t even have to add complexity over time if the basics is enough for you to feel like you really understand your energy.

Where to track your energy

Just like with what to track, the answer here is pretty much wherever you want. When it comes to systems, the best place to keep it is wherever you’ll use it.

That said, there are a few basic categories of options:

A paper tracker: a piece of scrap paper, a dedicated notebook, a spread in your bullet journal, the hourly spreads in planners like the Hobonichi Techo, etc.
A basic digital tracker: using a tracker in a general purpose digital tool, like your notes app, a spreadsheet, or Notion database.
A dedicated tracker app: there are also dedicated apps for tracking and planning around your energy, although honestly I haven’t found one I can recommend yet.