How to create your dream life (The Three-Year Vision)

“To make better decisions today that create happier tomorrows, we need to find ways to close the gap between our current and future selves.” — Hal Hershfield

Why it works

Hal Hershfield (pictured) is a Professor of Marketing, Behavioral Decision Making, and Psychology at UCLA’s Anderson School of Management. After completing his PhD in psychology at Stanford, he became one of the world’s leading researchers on the power of our future self. His work has been published in top academic journals and featured in the New York Times, Harvard Business Review, and the Wall Street Journal. In 2023, he released his groundbreaking book Your Future Self: How to Make Tomorrow Better Today.

At the heart of Hershfield’s research lies a simple insight: the more connected we feel to our future selves, the better choices we make today. He found that people who felt greater psychological connectedness to their future selves saved more for retirement, exercised more, and were less likely to make unethical choices that could harm their relationships. The implication is clear: the stronger your bond with your future self, the more naturally and effortlessly you’ll make the right choices each day.

One of the most powerful ways to strengthen that bond is surprisingly simple, and it only takes 30 minutes: writing a letter to yourself from your future self. Hershfield’s research shows that this creates vividness by making your desired future feel real, tangible, and emotionally close. We’ve experienced this firsthand—and seen it with many of our coaching clients: writing such a letter creates a natural “pull” toward the future vision it lays out, reducing the need for constant willpower to keep “pushing” forward.

How to do it

Set aside 30 minutes and open a blank note on your screen (or grab pen and paper). Imagine your life three years from now. Why three? A one-year horizon is usually too close to dream boldly, while ten years often feels too abstract and distant. Three years is the sweet spot. To borrow from Bill Gates’ famous adage, most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in three.

So, picture yourself writing from September 2028 (or exactly three years from today). Describe in detail what a normal day in your life looks like — from morning to night. As I explained in my recent post on identity-based habit change, the three core domains of life are wealth, health and relationships. Structure your letter around these domains, and write as if you were already living that day (as shown in the visual above):

Wealth
Vividly describe your wealth three years from today:

What does your typical workday look like?
How much money are you making that year?
What’s your lifestyle like (flat/house, vacations, etc.)?

Health
Vividly describe your health three years from today:

How does your mental health feel (stress, happiness)?
How does your physical health feel (fitness, weight)?
Do you feel a sense of meaning and purpose?

Relationships:
Vividly describe your relationships three years from today:

Do you have a partner or children?
What about your closest friendships?
How are things with your family, especially your parents?

The more specific and detailed your vision, the better. Hershfield’s research shows that the more vivid your imagined future, the more compelling it becomes — and the more likely you are to take the daily actions that turn it into reality.

Apart from making it vivid, there are two equally important principles we highlight for our coaching clients when they write their letter: make it ambitious and make it contented. For ambitious people, the first part usually comes naturally. This is about creating your dream life, so it’s perfectly fine to be bold:

Want to earn six or seven figures and live in your dream home? Write it down.
Want to be in the best mental and physical shape of your life? On that page.
Want to find your dream partner and build a family together? Put it there.

Also, make it contented. This second part often surprises people when we first introduce it. You can make your letter contented by defining what “enough” means, especially in the wealth domain. Why? Because you’ll avoid the endless pursuit of “just a little bit more,” which is a recipe for a life of discontent and misery.

Balancing ambition with contentment will help you avoid that sorry fate. You’ll keep striving for what excites you while staying grounded in what actually matters most. As I recommended in last month’s post on goal-setting, pay attention to the trade-offs between wealth, health, and relationships. Here are a couple of helpful questions:

How much yearly income is truly enough for me/us to feel secure?
What kind of home would genuinely make me/us content?
What vacations would bring me/us lasting joy?

Back in late 2022, I wrote a letter to myself from my future self, describing my Three-Year Vision.

I wrote about my workday, my income, my physical and mental health, the house and neighborhood I’d live in with my wife, and the two children we wanted to have over the next three years.

Looking at that letter as I write these lines, I realize I’ve surpassed almost all of it. The life of my 2025 self is beyond what my 2022 self ever dared to imagine. I’ve built a thriving coaching practice, sold my debut book to Portfolio Penguin, and my wife and I are raising two healthy, adorable kids in our dream home.

It’s hard to pinpoint exactly how it all happened, but I’m confident that my letter guided countless small choices. When motivation wasn’t enough to push me forward, my Three-Year Vision pulled me ahead.

This weekend, I’ll sit down again to write a letter to myself from my future self, envisioning 2028. As we enter the final third of 2025, here’s my question for you: What does your dream life look like three years from now?

And here’s my challenge for you:
Take 30 minutes this weekend to write your own Three-Year Vision.

Writing that letter just once in three years is enough. Tuck it away, set a reminder to open it three years from now, and prepare to be astonished by how much of it has come true.

Here’s one thing I know for a fact: your future self will thank you.