Write a Letter to Your Future Self

Excellent idea. I found the UX after clicking send too tedious, so instead i went to gmail and hit schedule send for 2029

Don't use GMail. Google mines all of your communications - for advertising and other commercial activities of its partners; and also makes those communications accessible and searchable by some branches of the US federal government, and perhaps other parties.

There are less-privacy-invading alternatives - both paid and gratis - which you should consider. I'd particularly suggest trying options that are not based in the US, the UK or Canada.

(The harder part is avoiding conversing with people who use GMail, but the more of us leave it, the more that can be realized.)

I've been writing to Future Me every birthday since I was 17. I'm now 32. In my very first letter written at age 17 and addressed to the college version of myself, I urged myself to resist peer pressure, keep making art, and maintain my innocent nature.

As the years went on, the letters alternated between despair and hope. The letter writer turned into a pothead, then an alcoholic, then an alcoholic pothead who couldn't make art anymore.

Many of the letters described long, meandering walks through New York City through eyes that didn't feel part of reality, in a body that was always outside of the circle.

After years of ache for love, a relationship blossomed, then spoiled; an anticipated marriage never materialized, and then the whole thing collapsed died. The letter writer fell very ill, left the city, then started all over in a small town.

I got my last letter a year ago. That person seems a lot closer to the person who wrote that very first letter. That person makes art again. Spends most of their time in nature. Is back in college studying something entirely new. The pothead and the alcoholic and all the toxic relationships are long gone. The slate feels washed clean.

There is a sense of innocence returned. Joy, excitement, hope for the future. Gratitude for the all wisdom accumulated between that first letter and the most recent.

Curious about this as well. And this might be a dumb question, but the NOLS trips have age ranges, with the top group being 23 and older. Do NOLS trips lean younger / would someone in their 30s feel out of place?

> This derisks the possibility that the "future you service" goes under, taking your cherished letters with it.

I’d say it replaces it with a different set of risks (new phone, cloud service goes under, you start using a new account, etc). It’s a hard problem to solve over long time periods.