There’s a person I want to introduce to you who is not present and cannot be. You cannot even know them, even if I wanted to bring them to you. There’s an unbridgeable gap between them and us, and it’s not space. It’s time.
The past is gone, and if you don’t keep traces of it, it might disappear. The present is the only time we can reasonably conceive. It’s now. It’s me and you reading these words, precisely at this moment. This is now.
But what about the future? The future does not exist. If it’s very close to us, it’s fast to become the present, and then it flies away towards the past. If it is farther away in time, it becomes an unknowable land in an unknown territory, immersed in the foggy skies of uncertainty. What you are doing in the present is to be there. You are preparing today for your journey towards the future.
How will it be your future? How will the world be? And you, what about you?
How will your future self be?
Oracles and crystal balls are to be found in books, not in this world, so you cannot have any certainty about your future self. But, here’s the thing, if you focus on that aethereal persona, philosophy and psychology say that you have a higher chance to connect with them.
Thinking about you but in the future facilitates a better connection with yourself. Something similar to relating to another physical person.
Will you save today for your pension if you try to imagine yourself at 90?
Will you smoke today, knowing what happens to your body when you maltreat it?
Will you invest more in authentic, long-term relationships today if you can picture yourself alone in 30 years?
That’s the power of thinking to your future self. You’re extending your life to another dimension. You have the chance not to predict but to influence your future positively. You can become a more conscious person, more open to thinking about your present behaviors’ future consequences.
Writing to your future self is a beautiful way to have a dialogue spanning time and space dimensions. You can time travel and send your current thoughts to the future. And when you reach that place, you will have the unique pleasure of talking to your past self in a weird and illuminating conversation.
You are a living being constrained by, at least, four dimensions: the ones of time and space. Use tangible artifacts to travel not only through space but also through time by sending messages back and forth to your past, present, and future self.
Start today if you’ve never done it.
Start to care more about yourself by loving your future self. Your current choices are determining who you will be in the future. You can change your future by acting today. Rather than focusing on an abstract person in an intangible setting, think about you, but in the future. Think about your future self.
