Four Notes to My Future Self Before I Forget Them
A few reminders about life before success, comfort, and routine make me forget them.
Lately, I’ve been thinking less about success and more about preservation.
Not financial preservation.
Personal preservation.
I sometimes wonder which parts of myself will survive the next ten years.
Whether I will remain open-minded. Whether I will still feel curious about the world. Whether I will still want adventure. Whether I will slowly become more rigid, more cynical, more emotionally distant, without even noticing it happening.
Modern adulthood has a strange way of narrowing people.
Routines become indefinite. Responsibilities are expanding. Work takes more mental space than it used to. Conversations become more practical.
People who once felt spontaneous and curious slowly become predictable versions of themselves, repeating the same weeks over and over again until years disappear almost accidentally.
I don’t want that to happen to me.
Not because stability is bad. In a lot of ways, I want that. I want peace. I want a home that feels calm. I want a family someday.
I want enough financial security that life does not constantly feel uncertain.
But I also do not want to wake up one day feeling finished.
So these are a few notes to my future self.
Not lessons. Not rules.
Just reminders of the kind of person I hope you still are.
1. Do Not Become Emotionally Rigid
I think one of my biggest fears is becoming emotionally rigid.
The kind of person who feels like he already knows enough about life. Someone who stops being curious. Stops trying new things. Stops changing.
Not necessarily unhappy. Just closed off.
There’s a Dutch word I keep thinking about: burgerlijk.
Not in the literal sense. More in the emotional sense. A life that slowly becomes too predictable. Too careful. Too small.
I never want to become the kind of person who loses interest in the world.
I want to keep learning new things. I want to keep traveling. I want to keep feeling slightly uncomfortable sometimes. I want to stay flexible in the way I think about people and life.
Because I think people rarely become cynical overnight.
It happens slowly.
People become tired. Then practical. Then repetitive. Then emotionally distant from the version of themselves they used to be.
And eventually, they stop looking for anything outside of routine.
Maybe that’s why traveling and hiking affect me the way they do.
Every time I’m somewhere unfamiliar, especially in the mountains, I feel mentally awake again. The world suddenly feels bigger than my routines, deadlines, and small daily worries.
I think everyone needs something that reminds them life is still larger than the version they’ve reduced it to.
Growing older is inevitable.
Becoming emotionally closed off is not.
2. Do Not Spend Your Entire Life Waiting
I understand why people postpone happiness.
Modern life almost trains you to do it.
Work hard now. Enjoy life later. Save now. Relax later.
And honestly, I get it. I want stability too.
I want a bigger house someday. I want enough financial peace to build a family without constantly stressing about money. I want life to feel calm instead of uncertain.
But I also think there’s a danger in constantly living for the next stage of life.
Because the future keeps moving.
Once you reach one goal, another immediately replaces it. More money. More stability. More progress. Another thing you need before you can finally relax.
And before you realize it, years disappear in preparation. Some of my favorite memories are not big achievements at all.
They’re simple things:
Going to the cinema with my girlfriend.
Getting coffee together.
Traveling somewhere new.
Walking through a city at night with no real plan.
Those moments never feel important enough while they’re happening.
But later, they become the memories you miss most.
Recently, I saw TikTok videos of FIFA 14 and FIFA 15 pack openings and squad builders. Suddenly, I remembered buying FIFA during a family holiday in France with my parents and sister.
At the time, it felt completely normal.
Now I realize that moment is already more than 10 years old.
That honestly scared me a little.
Not in a dramatic way. Just in the realization that life moves much faster than you think it does while you’re inside of it.
I don’t want to spend my entire life waiting for some future version of happiness.
I want to notice life while it’s still happening.
3. Protect Your Relationships From Your Ambition
I like working.
I genuinely enjoy programming, building projects, designing software, solving problems, and getting things done. There’s something satisfying about creating something that did not exist before.
But I also know how easily work can consume people.
Ambitious people.
Modern culture almost encourages unhealthy relationships with work. Being busy is seen as impressive. Productivity becomes part of your identity. People slowly start measuring their worth through output.
And the dangerous thing is that work never really ends.
There’s always another project. Another opportunity. Another thing to improve.
I think one of my biggest fears is becoming successful professionally but emotionally absent in my personal life.
I never want my girlfriend or future children to feel like work always gets the best version of me, while they get whatever energy remains afterward.
Because I’ve seen how easily people disappear into their careers.
Not physically.
Their personality slowly becomes work. Their mood depends on productivity. Their attention is always somewhere else.
I don’t want success to cost me softness.
I don’t want ambition to make me emotionally unavailable.
At the end of life, relationships will matter more than most achievements ever will.
I hope I never forget that.
4. Never Lose Your Ability to Feel Wonder
I think nostalgia is really just the realization that certain moments mattered more than you understood at the time.
When I was younger, time felt endless.
Vacations felt huge. Summers felt slow. Years actually felt like years.
Now entire periods of life disappear frighteningly fast.
And because of that, I think one of the most important things to protect is the ability to truly notice life while it’s happening.
Modern life constantly destroys attention.
Phones. Notifications. Algorithms. Short-form content. Constant stimulation.
People consume experiences faster than they actually process them.
Sometimes I worry we’re slowly losing our ability to feel genuine awe about ordinary things.
Traveling always reminds me of this.
Especially mountains.
There’s something about standing somewhere quiet and enormous that resets your perspective for a while. You start paying attention again.
To the weather.
To silence.
To conversations.
To your own thoughts.
You feel present in a way normal life often doesn’t allow.
I hope you never lose that feeling.
I hope you never become too distracted or too “grown up” to still feel deeply moved by ordinary moments.
Because I think the quality of life is largely shaped by attention.
A distracted life can still look successful from the outside.
But internally, it can feel strangely empty.
So please keep noticing things.
Keep traveling, keep looking around, and keep feeling wonder when you encounter something beautiful.
And don’t let adulthood convince you that curiosity belongs only to younger people.
Final Thoughts
I don’t think there’s a perfect formula for a good life. Most people are improvising far more than they admit.
But I do think there are parts of ourselves worth protecting as we get older. Curiosity. Warmth. Adventure. Attention. Softness. Wonder.
Those things disappear quietly if neglected for too long.
So maybe adulthood is not just about building a successful life. Maybe it’s also about making sure success does not slowly turn you into someone you no longer recognize.
And if you ever read this years from now, I hope you still feel open to the world.
I hope you still travel. I hope you still laugh easily. I hope work has not consumed your personality. I hope life still surprises you sometimes.
Most of all, I hope you never become emotionally finished.