Well I already don’t feel confident about how long I’m going to live. I spent the “healthiest years of my life” on the brink of death at times so it’s tough to be optimistic about my later years. I’ve handled this thought in different ways as I’ve grown.
First was denial. Things suck now but it’s gotta end sometime, and my life will be much better someday. I was very future-oriented back then. Gotta work hard now so that my idealistic future will be that much better. Right now sucks anyway, may as well make sacrifices for when things will be better. I did not care about being kind to myself in the present.
These days, things are better than they were, but still far from the utopia I imagined, and I’m no longer so optimistic that things will ever be much different. It might be all downhill from here, for all I know. So I’m savoring the present much, much more, and I am much happier. I am kind to myself at the expense of some of my ambition, and that’s fine. I probably won’t be the rocket scientist I used to dream of being, but I also won’t be overworked and I know I will take time for myself, treat myself, and have interesting experiences outside of work.
So I guess it’s not really hypothetical for me – the change I’ve experienced is less focus on the future, more focus on the present. And more happiness.