Step into a scene from your future

Act out a specific future moment as if it were happening now, then work back to what would get you there.

Pourquoi ça marche

In future projection the protagonist moves into the future as if it were the here and now. Orkibi describes it as one of the psychodrama techniques that may change behaviour by letting people try new, more adaptive responses before they need them. Ius, drawing on Sternberg and Garcia's sociodrama text, describes setting the scene in the future, enacting the hoped-for situation, and then working out what would bridge the gap between then and now. Speaking in the present tense makes the future concrete in a way that planning on paper does not.

Comment faire

1. Choose a specific moment: a date, a place and who is there (for example, the first morning in a new job a year from now).
2. Set the space up physically and step into it. Speak in the present tense: "It is a Monday. I am walking in..."
3. Notice what you are doing differently in that scene, and how it feels in your body.
4. Step out, look back at the scene, and name one action this month that connects where you are now to that moment.
5. For an event you dread, rehearse the version you want to happen, not the worst case.

Données probantes

Future projection is listed among the psychodrama techniques found in the literature (Cruz et al., 2018) and appears in the techniques used by studies in a 2025 systematic review. Its rationale is described by Orkibi (2020) and its sociodrama use by Ius (2020). No study tests future projection on its own, so its value rests on clinical practice. (clinical)

Self-guided future projection is an untested adaptation. Rehearsing a dreaded scene can raise strong fear; if it does, return to the present, and take that scene to a trained director rather than repeating it alone.

Sources

• Orkibi, H. (2021; online 2020). Creative adaptability: Conceptual framework, measurement, and outcomes in times of crisis. Frontiers in Psychology, 11, 588172.
• Ius, M. (2020). Sociodrama as a "potential stage" for creating participative and transformative research on social work with families living in vulnerable situations. Zeitschrift für Psychodrama und Soziometrie, 19(Suppl 1), 63-81.
• Cruz, A., Sales, C. M. D., Alves, P., & Moita, G. (2018). The core techniques of Morenian psychodrama: A systematic review of literature. Frontiers in Psychology, 9, 1263.
• Maya, J., Pérez-Berbel, M., Giraldo-Arroyave, L., & Hurtado, I. (2025). Psychodrama: Implementation, study design and effectiveness: A systematic review. BMC Complementary Medicine and Therapies, 25, 232.

Erreur fréquente

Staging a fantasy so far from your life that nothing connects back. The scene works when it is specific and plausible enough that you can name a first step toward it.