Let Go of the Outcome
Read on kevferrell.com
Welcome to Rewire | Reboot, a weekly newsletter where I share reflections from my ongoing personal growth journey and provide tested ideas, frameworks, tools and practices to help you create the life you want.
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Mindset - Idea I'm Exploring
Focusing on the process over the outcome
If you’ve done your annual review and identified what you want to start, stop and continue, you’re already ahead of most people.
Now comes the part that matters most: turning awareness into an actionable plan.
The flaw with traditional goal setting, and why New Year’s resolutions often fall off early, is that people usually set goals as desired outcomes they want to achieve.
- “Lose 20 pounds.”
- “Make more money.”
- ”Read more books.”
But goals as outcomes alone don’t work well because you don’t control the outcome. Not completely.
What you do control is the process. The journey. What you can do next.
When you focus on stacking up the smaller steps, the daily actions, those compound into achieving the big things. Those who consistently win long-term are the ones who stay obsessed with the inputs - not the outputs - especially when results are slow and life gets hard.
If you want to set goals that stick, here are some rules that may help.
1. Don’t try to change too much at once
Ambition is great. Overhaul is usually a trap.
If you try to fix everything at once, you’ll likely end up doing nothing consistently. Start small and build as you go.
Focus on just 1-3 goals to start. Enough to create real momentum without being too much to manage. It could be one personal goal and one professional goal.
2. Start with the person you want to become
Build your goals around the person that you want to be - your identity - not just a specific outcome you want to achieve.
Instead of: “I want to lose 20 pounds.”
Try: “I’m becoming someone who exercises everyday and eats healthy.”
Identity gives you something to practice daily, not just a milestone to chase.
3. Use outcomes as direction, not obsession
Don’t get me wrong, outcomes are useful. They’re the compass. They’re the “why.”
But they’re a terrible daily focus because they’re usually farther off in the distance and you don’t fully control them.
Action is up to us. Outcome isn’t.
So yes - set the target, but don’t live there.
4. Build process goals you can execute and track
This is the real game changer: identify the daily habits that you want to make - and the ones you want to break - that will compound into the desired future outcome.
For each goal, ask yourself:
- What does progress look like today?
- What’s the smallest action that moves this forward?
- What can I track without overthinking it?
Examples:
- “Lose 20 pounds” → Move every day. Schedule it in your calendar. Set your daily minimum - your floor - as discussed in this previous issue.
- “Make more money” → Spend 10 minutes per day on learning
- “Read more books” → Read for at least 5 minutes per day
Track these daily.
5. Add measurable milestones
I like to set 30-day, 90-day, and annual targets for each goal. Goals need to be measurable and you need to have checkpoints along the way to know if you’re on the right track. Breaking down the larger goals into smaller checkpoints makes the next marker easier to see than the finish line.
But I spend most of my attention on the daily actions that make those targets inevitable over time.
Milestones are for calibration. Inputs are for transformation.
6. Expect and plan for obstacles
There will be days you don’t feel like it. Weeks where the reward is invisible. Stretches where life throws friction at everything.
As part of setting your goals, try to foresee what obstacles might get in the way and then devise a plan to overcome them.
You won’t cover all the possibilities, though. Things will happen that you don’t foresee. That’s not failure. That’s part of life.
Your job is to keep showing up. Keep doing the work. It’s about consistency not perfection. If you miss a day, don't beat yourself up about it. Just don’t miss two days in a row. Get back on track and move on.
7. Do the work. Let go of the outcome.
This is what it boils down to in the simplest terms.
You do the work. You don’t own the results - not completely.
Obsessing over results wastes energy and teaches you the wrong lesson: that effort only matters if you win.
The less attached you are to the outcome the more free you become to execute daily.
Focus on the process vs. the outcomes.
Who you want to be - your identity - vs. the milestone you want to achieve.
The daily actions vs. the final destination.
Focus on what is immediately in front of you.
The joy isn't in achieving the final outcome, but in all the small wins along the way.
Body - Health & Longevity
Alcohol - Damage Control
Many of us, likely myself included, will indulge in some alcoholic beverages as part of New Year’s celebrations. While there is no protocol or “biohack” that can fully offset alcohol’s negative effects, there are steps you can take to reduce or mitigate the damage - and the hangover.
Most hangover symptoms are a result of dehydration, electrolyte loss, inflammation and poor sleep. Here are some tips to address these issues before, during and after alcohol consumption.
1. Hydration and electrolyte replacement
- Hydrate before, during and after drinking
- Include electrolytes - especially sodium, potassium and magnesium. Water alone isn’t enough. My favourite electrolyte formula is LMNT. I take it regularly to support daily hydration, but it’s also good for helping to mitigate the effects of alcohol.
- Coconut water is another good alternative to plain water
2. Eat before drinking
- Drinking on an empty stomach increases blood alcohol concentration and metabolic stress
- Eating a solid meal - especially one that is high in protein and fats - slows alcohol absorption and reduces blood sugar swings
3. Sugar makes it worse
- Sugar-heavy drinks and low-quality alcohol increase inflammation
- Avoid high-sugar cocktails or mixers
- Clear alcohol that is more distilled and contains less additives is better
4. Support detox and antioxidants
- Alcohol increases oxidative stress and depletes protective nutrients
-
Replacing these nutrients will help:
- Magnesium
- B-complex vitamins
- Vitamin C
- Zinc
-
If you really want to go the extra mile you could add these:
- Milk thistle to support the liver’s detoxification process. I use this Liver Flush formula by Omega Alpha.
- Liposomal glutathione or N-acetyl cysteine (glutathione precursor). Glutathione is a potent antioxidant that helps detoxify harmful substances and is significantly reduced by alcohol consumption.
5. Protect sleep
- Alcohol significantly impacts sleep quality, which is a big factor in causing hangover symptoms
- The earlier in the evening (before sleep) you stop drinking the better so your body can process and eliminate more of the alcohol
- Plan for more sleep than usual if possible
- Hydration and supplementation discussed above before bed will help support sleep as well
6. The morning after
- Continue with hydration, electrolytes and more of the support nutrients. I listed my morning hydration cocktail in the first issue of this newsletter.
- Caffeine will help clear the cobwebs
- Exercise and/or sauna - sweating and getting the blood flowing will help with recovery
- Cold exposure - a cold plunge or cold shower will boost endorphins and dopamine
Bottom Line
The most effective “protocol” is still avoidance or moderation. Lower amounts, slower pace and earlier cutoffs will do more than any counterattack.
Toolkit - Something I'm Using
Core Values Exercise
I’m not a fan of making New Year’s resolutions. I prefer to set intentions - things I will strive to do, not do and keep doing. Because I align these intentions with the goals I set, they often form many of the daily habits I identify and track to lead me to success.
One other tool I have found useful in identifying what’s important to me and ensuring full alignment with my intentions, goals and daily actions is the core values exercise.
It involves choosing all values that resonate, grouping similar ones into 3-5 categories that make sense to you and choosing the one from each category that best represents each group. You then add a verb to each to make them actionable and rank them in priority. Here’s an example of how it works.
Recommended - Read
The 5 Types of Wealth
If you’re interested in considering another approach for determining what's important to you, I love the way Sahil Bloom challenges the narrow definition of success that normally equates wealth solely with money and offers a broader framework for building a truly rich life based on The 5 Types of Wealth - Time, Social, Mental, Physical and Financial. It’s a powerful reminder to define success on your own terms and design daily actions that support the life you actually want to live.
A good starting point is taking Sahil’s wealth score quiz. When I took the quiz in 2024 I learned I'm least wealthy in the social category. So improving my social wealth became a focus for me in 2025. Something I am still working on.
I also discovered that my values-based goals all naturally lined up with those 5 wealth categories, which affirmed for me that I'm focusing on the right things.
Inspiration - Quote
Two of my favourite quotes from the former baddest man on the planet, Mike Tyson.
“Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.”
Life will punch you in the face. Being resilient in the face of adversity is a key to success.
"Discipline is doing what you hate to do, but nonetheless doing it like you love it."
Showing up and doing the work every day when others aren’t puts you ahead. Learn to love the process.
Weekly Challenge
Try Something New
Try setting intentions this year, rather than resolutions, based on the things you’ve identified that you’d like to start, stop and continue doing.
Or to try a new starting point - complete the core values exercise.
Let me know how it goes - just reply to this email.
Reader's Corner
Want More?
There’s a lot covered in this issue - intentions, values, goal setting, habits and process.
If you’re unsure where to start or want help translating this into something practical for you, feel free to reach out - just reply to this email.
And if you’d like a copy of my goal setting template or my daily habit tracker, just email me and I’ll share it with you.
Ask Me Anything
Have a question about something in this issue? An experience you'd like to share? A topic you'd like me to cover or dive deeper into in a future newsletter or article? Reply to this email and let me know.
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Happy New Year,
Kevin
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