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Write a Letter to Your Future Self

futureme.org

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71–80 of 111 posts

Re: Write a Letter to Your Future Self

#71

Post by divbzero »

jmartrican wrote: post #64
SoullessSilent wrote: post #7

My letter never came. :( I spent ages writing it and describing my feelings and what I planned for my future. I had detailed my improvement plan for 10 years. Randomly I remembered this service and was disappointed since I didn't receive the email.

Maybe this service can just be replaced by a journal. Or email the letter now and put it in folders with names like "do_not_open_till_2040".

Another alternative, if you use a digital calendar consistently, is to create a calendar event in the future and write the letter to your future self in the event notes.

Re: Write a Letter to Your Future Self

#72

Post by class3shock »

doakes wrote: post #57

After a 4-week backpacking trip (via NOLS), you're given the opportunity to write a letter to yourself that they would send to you in the future (can't remember how long, maybe a year). After 4 weeks of living out of a backpack in the Alaskan mountains, your perspective changes. They knew this and wanted you to give yourself a reminder of that perspective after it has faded back to the complexities of normal life. Yo…

Unrelated but how did you like the experience? I've been thinking about trying to carve some significant time out for myself to do something outside of work like a NOLS trip, hike the Appalachian Trail, etc.

Re: Write a Letter to Your Future Self

#73

Post by andirk »

One of my favorite websites!

I do similar with just THOUGHTS. I send my future self a thought, often a question, and I get the answer albeit vague and difficult to decipher. Then when that time eventually comes, I answer my past self because at that moment I am receiving the past question. I know this sounds weird but that's fine. I'm not able to get any answers past ~10 years from now which is kind of unsettling, but I guess we can't live forever.

Re: Write a Letter to Your Future Self

#74

Post by divbzero »

ssgodderidge wrote: post #3

The most interesting aspect of this is the public anonymous letters [1] [1]: https://www.futureme.org/letters/public

I love the older letters that have time travelled “about 17 years”, “over 18 years”, or “over 19 years”.

Apparently, this service has survived since 2003. I hope it will continue to exist decades from now.

Re: Write a Letter to Your Future Self

#76

Post by andirk »

divbzero wrote: post #70

Is there an analogous service that sends out letters if you go missing or pass away?

There's a "Dead Man's Switch" that gets triggered in the absence of you fulfilling some action to keep it from triggering. Once you for whatever reason cannot suppress the trigger, the switch is activated and whatever actions from it are performed, like send a letter to a bunch of people detailing some secret thing. Purpose is so your adversaries are constantly in check and can't destroy you. An example is that I was hoping infamous island owner Jeffery Epstein would have one that would reveal all the wrongdoings of the many elites in the event of him being captured or dying. To my knowledge, no such switch though. And also people don't seem to care much about powerful people doing gross things.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_man%27s_switch

Re: Write a Letter to Your Future Self

#77

Post by ale42 »

anon25783 wrote: post #12
ale42 wrote: post #9

How can you know that you'll have the same e-mail address in 20 years?

Some people have had the same email address longer than that.

Of course, and one of my e-mails also exists since almost 25 years. But (unless I own my own domain, as someone suggested, and don't fail renewing it), it's hard to predict what will happen in such a long timespan. Not quite, but a bit like betting that I'll still be living at the same street address.

Re: Write a Letter to Your Future Self

#78

Post by runamuck »

ClaraForm wrote: post #52
runamuck wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you post these letters online? This fascinates me!

No promises but maybe. At 16 my family was breaking down so it's all a bit too personal. I'll see if some are worth sharing publicly. If I do I'll respond back here again to let you know.

I love it, thanks!

Re: Write a Letter to Your Future Self

#79

Post by h9n »

I address my journals to my future biographers. I also maintain a Spotify playlist for my biopic's soundtrack. And I leave digital footprints for ingestion by future AI models.

A while of doing this has shaped my thinking generally. The tone moves along the serious-not-serious spectrum. I can speculate wildly and grandiosely about my plans and ideas from a just joshing or just in case perspective, and then reconsider them seriously.

Hello everyone!

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