We all have times when we wonder what our lives will be like in the future. Will it be a success? Will we be physically healthy? What will our relationships with others be like?
A letter to your future self can help you to clarify the things that are really important in your life. It helps you to identify what you need to focus on to be truly successful and what steps you need to take in your pursuit of happiness.
In this letter to my future, I write to my 50-year-old self (that’s projecting 12 years into the future).
Dear Future Self,
I hope this letter finds you at peace with yourself and the world around you. Finding peace in a world full of turmoil is no easy task. I’m hoping that the world of the 50 me is more at peace than the one that the 38-year-old me finds himself in, but I’m not very hopeful.
I know, though, that, you can still find peace within yourself despite what’s going on externally. Have you been looking inwardly to fine-tune the qualities that really matter in your journey to inner peace?
Right now I’m very much a work in progress and I know you are too. But I’m working on being better. How’s it working out?
Have you come to appreciate that your true value has nothing to do with the size of your bank account or the material things you surround yourself with? Real happiness results from developing such qualities as humility, generosity, thankfulness, empathy, compassion, and courage.
How’s the humility going? That quality is a real challenge in the ‘me first’ world of 2022, so I can only imagine how much more challenging it is for you. Yet of all of the inner qualities, that is the one I hope you come the closest to mastering.
Of course, I want you to be financially successful, to have nice things, and to be free of the fear of financial strife. But none of those things matter if you’ve turned into a proud, self-centered person.
Humility will prevent you from bragging about yourself. More importantly, it will help you avoid viewing yourself as better than others. Your humility will promote peace, it will help you to forgive others and it will permit you to learn from other people.
Are you content?
I hope so.
If I’d written a letter to myself 12 years ago, it would have been heavily geared towards external things – the accumulation of wealth and social status. Now, at the age of 38, I’ve learned that contentment comes from the realization that happiness and contentment don’t come from what you have – it comes from who you are.
Do you put people before things?
Do you value loving relationships over material possessions? I know you’re a work-a-holic. Getting a better work-life balance is a challenge I’m working on right now. I need to cut back on my work hours and spend more time with my family.
How has that worked out?
Are you buying out the time for your wife and two daughters and showing them every day that you love and appreciate them by your actions and attitudes? I hope so.
Let’s talk now about the physical you.
Remember when you were a kid? You used to look in the mirror and project forward, imagining your future self looking back at you. You had two of them – the you at 35 and the you at 50. Back then you were wrapped up in bodybuilding, so the 35-year-old you looked like your favorite competitor of the mid-90s, Kevin Levrone. That hasn’t quite worked out, but I’m still pretty content with how my body has turned out so far.
As a kid, though, my 50-year-old image was a big question mark. I’d seen a lot of bodybuilders who looked great at 35, yet had gone to the pack by 50. Would I end up overweight and over the hill physically when I reached the half-century?
That was the great unknown?
So, how about it?
Have you been able to maintain your workout schedule? Right now, at 38, I’m hitting the gym four days per week, with a mix of strength training and high-intensity interval training (HIIT). My goal is to maintain the strength and muscle size that I built in my 20s and early 30s and to keep my body fat level down below 15 percent.
I’ve worked hard physically to get in the shape I’m in, old guy. In doing so, I’ve set up a physical foundation for you to continue with. Are you maintaining the discipline to keep training with the same focus and intensity that you used to? Of course, you need to modify some things to account for the extra dozen years but that doesn’t mean you can’t still bring it every time you hit the gym.
Are you finding it a challenge to buy out the time for your workouts? So, am I? The kids are teenagers now, so my schedule is pretty tight running them all over town. In a dozen years, though, they’ll be out on their own and it’ll be just you and Shelley.
You’ll still have your challenges time-wise, so how about setting up a home gym? Maybe you’ve already done so. If not, why not go out and buy a pair of adjustable dumbbells and a quality double-pulley cable machine. With those two pieces of equipment, you’ll have everything you need to maintain the body that I’m passing on to you.
How’s your diet?
Have you gained mastery over your taste buds? If you can do that, you can master anything. Right now, I’m experimenting with intermittent fasting. I think it may be the key to avoiding that image of an overweight and unfit 50 me that I dreaded when I was a kid. Have you been able to maintain the intermittent fasting habit? I hope so.
Don’t forget the cardio, too. I know that it’s not your favorite thing to do but it will help to offset the age-related slowdown of your metabolism. I’ve started walking 3-4 times per week with Shelley for an hour at a time. As well as helping us burn calories, it’s also a great opportunity for us to communicate.
Talking about communicating, are you and Shelley still doing it? Communication is the lifeblood of any relationship and without it, a marriage will become stale. Don’t allow that to happen to us.
Are you working on keeping the marriage strong? Have you learned to listen to what she says and to discern what she really feels? Do you now appreciate that it’s not a weakness to reveal your feelings? Do you ensure that your love for each other grows by the many small things you do for each other every day – the thoughtful act, the unexpected hug, the warm smile, and the kind comment?
Do you have a grieving friend and don’t know how to help? Why not write a letter? Check out our letter to a grieving friend for ideas on what to say.
Are you still finding time to meditate every morning? I’ve found that doing so has helped me to quiet my mind, plan my day and keep my life in perspective. It has also allowed me to make a connection with my spiritual needs. Please don’t neglect that side of your life.
Let’s now talk about your secular work. Right now, I’m in a state of transition. I’ve recently taken the courageous step of throwing in the security blanket of a salary as a school teacher and struck out on my own as a freelance writer. That has allowed me to make money on my own terms and to work from home. I’m currently looking into online tutoring as a supplement to my writing business.
It is my hope that by the time you read this, the freelance writing business will be firmly established. I don’t want to make millions from it, but I do envision that it will provide me and my wife with the freedom to live the life we please.
I envision that there will be ups and downs in the business over the next dozen years. But, please, hang in there. Keep doing the little things every day to build the business. Send out five cold calls daily, make every word you write sincere, heartfelt, and pure, and consistently give your clients more than they expect.
Finally, are you taking the time to enjoy what you have achieved? You’ve built a wonderful life for yourself and your family. Take the time to pause and smell the roses. Enjoy the finer things in life, such as the occasional glass of champagne, a romantic dinner, or an overseas holiday.
To be honest, I have no idea how this letter will find you. Life may have intervened in ways that we can’t even imagine. You may be up or you may be down. Personal tragedy, world events, and unexpected health problems may have impacted you. At the end of the day, though, so long as you’re able to read this, you’ve still got your mind. Use it to be the best you that you can possibly be, remember that, at the end of the day, it’s not what we have or even what we do, but the way we make other people feel, that really matters.
Your 38-year-old self.
If you enjoyed this letter, check out a letter to my big brother.