Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Now It's your turn.
If you decide to screw with your future self, I'd love to hear about it. Commenting is open to the public and you don't need a Blogspot account so feel free to leave a comment about what you've left for your future self to discover. Be sure to check out the links in the sidebar over there on the right. It contains resources to help you contact your future, and gadgets to generate random codes, or secret messages in binary. Now go, there's no time like the present to screw with your future self.
It begins.
I've just sent my future self an email.
Subject: The life of a baboon
Body:
The cake has been burnt
The store is made of litter
What does shovel mean
aGVo
I'm set to receive it on April the 13th of 2011. How will I react when I get it? Will I remember sending it? Will I find some hidden meaning that I don't see now? Possibly I'll just think it's spam and ignore it. The mystery is what makes this so fun.
Subject: The life of a baboon
Body:
The cake has been burnt
The store is made of litter
What does shovel mean
aGVo
I'm set to receive it on April the 13th of 2011. How will I react when I get it? Will I remember sending it? Will I find some hidden meaning that I don't see now? Possibly I'll just think it's spam and ignore it. The mystery is what makes this so fun.
Have I had this idea before?
Whenever I rummage through my desk I end up finding scraps of paper with numbers or words on them. Fairly quickly I figure out they're answers to a puzzle in a video game, but maybe in those instances I'm the future me that's having a retroactive joke played on him.
How do I do it?
Back on that last post where I said "Look no further than the title of this blog." I actually meant "Look much farther than the title of this blog.” In fact, you should be looking as far as this post you are currently reading. Since you can't open a back and forth channel of communication between past and future you, your best option is to mess with yourself. How does one do this?
1. Unexplainable Codes: Write a series of numbers or letters on a piece of paper. Throw in some dashes to give it some kind of structure. Something like, 33-4n58y-65-rt-11. Once you have your fake code written out, stash it some place you rarely look, like the bottom of your sock drawer or under your mattress. The next time future you is tidying up or moving furniture he'll find your fake code and be baffled as to what it could possibly mean. An old password for a long forgotten website account? A video game cheat code? The self destruct code for a top secret Russian submarine? Future you will never know. Unless he remembers.
2. False Stories: Using http://www.futureme.org/ send an email to your future self. How you get his address is up to you. Fill the email with strange but plausible lies. Mention loving a band that you never liked. Talk about a best friend that never existed. Anything that will make future you confused as to why he doesn't remember these things.
3. Nonsense: Fill a piece of paper with incoherent rambling and hide it somewhere. "Why would I write something like this?" future you will ask himself as he reads it.
4. Whatever you want: Present you knows future you better than I do. Do whatever you think would bug him most.
When doing this remember that it's all in good fun. Only do this if you think future you can take a joke. There's no sense in Retroactively pissing yourself off.
1. Unexplainable Codes: Write a series of numbers or letters on a piece of paper. Throw in some dashes to give it some kind of structure. Something like, 33-4n58y-65-rt-11. Once you have your fake code written out, stash it some place you rarely look, like the bottom of your sock drawer or under your mattress. The next time future you is tidying up or moving furniture he'll find your fake code and be baffled as to what it could possibly mean. An old password for a long forgotten website account? A video game cheat code? The self destruct code for a top secret Russian submarine? Future you will never know. Unless he remembers.
2. False Stories: Using http://www.futureme.org/ send an email to your future self. How you get his address is up to you. Fill the email with strange but plausible lies. Mention loving a band that you never liked. Talk about a best friend that never existed. Anything that will make future you confused as to why he doesn't remember these things.
3. Nonsense: Fill a piece of paper with incoherent rambling and hide it somewhere. "Why would I write something like this?" future you will ask himself as he reads it.
4. Whatever you want: Present you knows future you better than I do. Do whatever you think would bug him most.
When doing this remember that it's all in good fun. Only do this if you think future you can take a joke. There's no sense in Retroactively pissing yourself off.
Talking with your future.
How do you feel about your future self? What do you think about the person that you will become in 5 or 10 years? The answer is: you don't. You have no concrete way of knowing who you will become and how you will change. You can work towards your goals and try to shape your personality to its ideal form as you go along, but this does not account for the influence of the world. Every second that goes by and every decision made in the universe shapes your being in ways you have no control over. However, as your current self you have an advantage over your future self. Due to the linear nature of time, you can communicate with your future self. The problem is that he won't be able to communicate back to you, so there's nothing you can learn from your future self. Likewise, trying you educate your future self can be futile, as he already knows everything you do! So what is the best course of action? For that look no further than the title of this blog.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)