When Your Future Feels Exciting and Terrifying at the Same Time
Why we freeze at the edge of good opportunities—and a 10 minute practice that makes your next chapter feel possible.
When I rewatched Jia Jiang’s TED Talk — the one where he set out to get rejected for 100 days — I expected to be inspired to write about trying things out or prototyping.
What I didn’t expect was how familiar his fear sounded.
On his very first day, he walked up to a stranger to ask if he could borrow $100.
By the time the surprised stranger responded “Why?,” Jia had already uttered a “sorry,”spun around and fled the scene.
Later, reflecting on that moment, he admitted:
The fear didn’t come from the “no,” the stranger even asked him “Why?” It came from the version of himself he had to step into just to make the ask.
And that’s when I realized:
This is exactly what so many professionals experience when they consider their next chapter.
It’s not our dream future that unnerves us.
It’s not knowing if they have what it takes to make that positive future a reality.
Why a Positive Future Still Feels Threatening
Research from Stanford and Harvard [1-3] has a simple explanation:
When your future self isn’t clear, your brain reacts as if you’re imagining another person. And we don’t easily invest in strangers.
This neural “distance” leads to hesitation, avoidance, and the quiet pressure to stay the same—even when the future you want is meaningful, exciting, and aligned.
But here’s the important part:
You don’t eliminate this fear by thinking harder about the future.
You eliminate it by reducing the distance between you and the person you’re becoming.
And the fastest way to do that is the same way designers test ideas:
You prototype.
10-Minutes: Prototype for Your Future Self
This is the approach I use in my own life and with mid-career professionals I coach.
It works because it gives your brain a safe first experience of becoming the next version of you—without the pressure of commitment.
1. Write a quick snapshot (3 minutes)
Complete:
“If things unfolded well over the next 6 months, here’s who I’m becoming…”
One messy unpolished paragraph.
2. Pick one behavior to prototype (3 minutes)
Circle a single element of that future self:
more honest in meetings
more spacious in thinking
more grounded under pressure
more expressive
more curious
Choose the one that feels energizing.
3. Run a micro-experiment (4 minutes)
Shrink it to the smallest possible version:
Ask one honest question in the next meeting
Protect one 30-minute thinking slot this week
Share one idea you usually keep to yourself
Take one step toward a project you care about
Small is the point.
Prototyping isn’t about success. It’s about experience through exposure.
Every tiny action makes your future self feel a little less like a stranger.
And the moment that happens, fear loosens its grip.
A Closing Thought
Jia Jiang didn’t become more confident because he received fewer rejections.
He became more confident because he practiced being the person he wanted to become—one tiny experiment at a time.
That’s the real path to any meaningful future.
Not clarity.
Not certainty.
Not readiness.
Just one small prototype that rewires your relationship to who you’re becoming.
References:
Ersner-Hershfield, H., Wimmer, G. E., & Knutson, B. (2009).
Saving for the future self: Neural measures of future self‐continuity predict temporal discounting.Hershfield, H. E. (2011). Future self-continuity: How conceptions of the future self transform intertemporal choice. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 101(2), 366–379.
Bartels, D. M., & Rips, L. J. (2010). Psychological connectedness and intertemporal choice. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 139(1), 49–69.