Аннотация:It is trivial to state that people are able to imagine possible future events and plans. But it is still much to learn about how this future prospection is organized in terms of the entire structure. What does the future look like through the lens of young people? When does the future start / end? Are there any significant differences between people with short and long future perspective? How many events are anticipated in the future? Which events does the future consist of? Does the personal future look optimistic or pessimistic in comparison with the personal past or in comparison with the universal cultural life script? Is it true that our mental images of the future made of memories? To what extent does the positive past predict the positive future? What is the happiest anticipated event? What is the saddest one? Do people consider a death as a part of their future? We addressed these questions by analyzing 226 sets of lifelines. The participants performed a lifeline task for their childhood, personal past, personal future, and a life of a typical person. It was found that the long future perspective was associated with a shift of the most important anticipated events to the later decades of life. The regression analysis revealed that the graphically expressed positivity of a life of a typical person predicted an optimistic personal future. The fifth decade of life was attested by the participants as the saddest with surprised recover of a personal well-being in the sixth decade.