Love Letters to My Future Daughter

By [shahjhan

You don’t exist yet—not in this world, not in any photograph, not even in the blur of an ultrasound. You are a maybe. A someday. A soft daydream wrapped in the thinnest kind of hope.

Still, I write to you. Because the world is already trying to speak over you. And I want you to hear me first.

LetteOne: On Your Voice

They will tell you to be quiet.

At school, they’ll call you “talkative” like it’s a flaw.

At meetings, they’ll say you’re “too direct.”

At dinner tables, they’ll interrupt before you finish your sentence.

Let them.

Then keep speaking. Speak in full sentences, and fragments, and fists if you need to. Don’t shrink your thoughts for the comfort of people who only listen to themselves.

The world needyour voice exactly as it is—scratchy or smooth, loud or trembling, rising or breaking. Use it.

Even if it shakes. Especially if it shakes.

Letter Two: On Beauty

You’ll spend years thinking your body is the problem.

Magazines will lie to you in glossy whispers.

Your reflection will flicker like a funhouse mirror.

There will be days you won’t like your nose, your skin, your shape, your softness.

Let me tell you something nobody ever told me:

You were never meant to look perfect.

You were meant to look like you. And "you" will evolve—slowly, beautifully, like moss creeping over stone.

Beauty isn’t symmetry.

Beauty is a scar with a story.

It’s a laugh that makes your whole body move.

It’s kindness that has nothing to prove.

The mirror may lie, but your soul won’t. Trust that instead.

Letter Three: On Love

You’ll want it so badly, it might ache.

Sometimes, love will feel like lightning—sudden, thrilling, dangerous.

Other times, it will feel like waiting for a train that never comes.

There will be people who hold you like glass and people who treat you like smoke.

You will break your heart, more than once. That’s okay.

But promise me this: never beg someone to love you. Never bleed to keep someone warm.

When it’s real, love won’t ask you to become smaller.

It will see you in full light—and not flinch.

It will be work, yes. But nev

Letter Four: On Anger

They’ll teach you to fear your own fire.

They’ll say:

“She’s dramatic.”

“She’s emotional.”

“She’s difficult.”

You are not difficult. You are discerning. And your anger is sacred.

Anger is not shameful—it is a compass. It points to what matters.

Let it rise. Let it move you. Then channel it like thunder down a wire.

Break systems, not hearts. Burn injustice, not bridges.

And never let anyone convince you that rage makes you less lovable. It makes you human.

Letter Five: On Failure

You will fail. Publicly. Spectacularly.

You will forget words on stage.

You will fall for people who don’t fall back.

You will send the wrong email, say the wrong thing, wear the wrong shoes.

And still—you will survive.

Failure isn’t a full stop. It’s a comma. A pause. A lesson you learn right before the next chapter.

Don’t aim to be perfect.

Aim to be resilient.

Letter Six: On Me

If I’m lucky, I’ll get to meet you. I’ll get to braid your hair and hear your bad jokes and wipe peanut butter off your cheek. I’ll get to embarrass you at school drop-offs and cry at your graduation.

But if I don’t—if the timing isn’t right, or life unfolds differently—know this:

I loved you long before you were real.

I dreamed of the sound of your laugh before it existed.

And I fought like hell to become someone worthy of raising you.

This world can be heavy, daughter. But it can also be beautiful. It contains oceans and sunrises and playlists that make you cry at stoplights.

Hold on to that.

Final Letter: On Letters

One day, you might write letters too.

To yourself.

To someone who’s gone.

To someone who hasn’t arrived yet.

Keep them.

They’re the blueprint of becoming.

Love,

Me.

The woman who imagined you. The woman who wrote this to remember herself, too.



Even before I had a daughter, I had something to say to her.”