Let’s discuss agency; it’s one of those topics that, once you grasp it, changes how you’ll perceive everything.
Agency is fundamentally your capacity for free will and meaningful action in your own life. It’s the reason you feel in control of your own direction. Because life is chaos, it doesn’t give you control over everything; yet it does provide power over yourself, your responses, your future acts.
Having agency makes you feel as though you’re the one behind the wheel. Though you cannot control traffic, the weather, or whether someone cuts you off, you can choose where you want to go, how you steer, and when to brake.
And devoid of agency? It’s like being stuck in the passenger seat while someone else drives wildly, or worse imprisoned in the trunk with no idea where you’re headed.
Why Agency Matters
Consider the last time you made a truly significant choice. Perhaps it was something major, like choosing to quit a toxic job or establishing a boundary with someone who consistently overstepped. Or perhaps it was something little, like deciding to go for a stroll rather than browsing on your phone.
That was agency in action.
Agency is what allows us to alter course, set limits, and make decisions that truly represent who we are—rather than mindlessly following whatever’s happening around us. You trust yourself when you have a strong sense of agency. You believe your choices really count.
And when you don’t? You have second thoughts about everything. You stall. You feel as though rather than something you have a say in, life is just occurring to you.
Where Does Agency Come From?
You’re not born with agency. Both internal and external elements have shaped it over time.
Internal Factors (The Stuff Inside You):
- Self-awareness—Understanding your own wants, feelings, and motivations.
- Emotional regulation—The capacity to remain grounded enough to make decisions rather than merely reacting.
- Confidence in decision-making—Trusting yourself, even if you don’t always get it “right.”
External Factors (The World Around You):
- Your upbringing—Was it one in which you were free to make decisions? Or were choices rendered for you?
- Opportunities for independence—Was someone always dictating your behavior, or were you urged to think for yourself?
- Culture and society—While some cultures stress human agency and uniqueness, others give compliance, obligation, or following the flow top priority.
The Biggest Mistake People Make: Confusing Agency with Control
This is where people often get tripped-up: agency is not the same as control.
Control is the delusion that you can make the world go your way. Reality alert: you cannot.
Agency, on the other hand, is deciding your response to what transpires. Though you have agency in how you handle losing a job—whether you view it as a failure or as a chance to advance toward something better—you cannot control whether you lose a job in the first place. While you have agency over who you allow in your life and what behavior you accept, you cannot control how others treat you.
Like surfing, although you cannot control the waves, you can learn how to ride them.
What Gets in the Way of Agency?
You might not feel as though you have much agency even though you may understand what it is. And there are a couple of explanations behind that as well:
- Fear of making mistakes—Were you raised to view mistakes as failures? If so, you could find yourself paralyzed when faced with choices.
- Over-reliance on outside validation—Choosing for yourself could feel frightening or “wrong” if you have been taught to seek approval from others.
- Feeling powerless because of prior experiences—You might quit trying completely if life has repeatedly shown you that your decisions have little bearing.
Why This Matters for Trauma Recovery
This relates to trauma in that childhood complex trauma messes with your sense of agency unlike anything else. Agency becomes alien when you grew up in a setting where you weren’t free to make decisions—where survival required obedience, pleasing, or shrinking. It becomes something we have to relearn.
And we can pick it up once more.
First of all, though, we have to know what it is. That’s why this conversation is important.
Final Thought: Your Agency Is Still There
Don’t panic if this message hits close to home and you’re recognizing, “Hey, I don’t feel like I have much agency in my life.” No one can take your agency from you. Though buried, damaged, or forgotten, it doesn’t just vanish.
Waiting for you to rediscover it, it’s always there.
And next time we’ll delve further into that.
Right now, simply ask yourself:
- When’s the last time I made a decision for me?
- Today, what’s one little decision I can make that could remind me of my agency?
Rebuilding this muscle starts with something as simple as choosing what to eat for supper, because you really want it (not because it’s convenient or expected).
Agency’s like a muscle; it develops the more you utilize it.