A Letter to the Future You

A few months ago, I came across this note from Henrik Karlsson on my Substack feed:

Intrigued by the idea, I decided to try it out.

I used Gmail's Schedule Emails feature to write a quarterly check-in email scheduled to be delivered back to my inbox at the end of the year.

On the morning of 31st December, 2025, I received an email from myself with a few goals that my past self had expected me to have achieved by the year's end:

Going through this email was a fun time capsule experience, and while I haven't achieved all the goals I had expected to by the year's end, I realised I had made substantial progress in the right direction.

But what's the point of this charade?

First, this was a fun experiment that I had put into motion a few months ago, completely forgot about it, and was delighted to see the email arrive.

Second, in our relentless chase to complete tasks, chores and goals, we often forget to check in with ourselves on whether we are still moving along the right track and where we have come so far.

This pre-committed quarterly check-in helps us assess our progress and realign ourselves with the big picture when needed.

By the end of this week, I'll draft another such email to the future me and schedule it for March 31st this year with some moonshot goals that I know I won't probably meet, but will make significant progress in the process.

I know you'll have goals and milestones of your own that you want to achieve this year.

Why don't you try this tiny experiment yourself?

It takes a few minutes to draft and schedule this quarterly check-in email, and you'll likely feel this letter has arrived just when you needed a familiar voice to guide you to the right direction.

There's no template to follow. Write whatever you expect your future self to have achieved in 3-month's time.

Try it out.