You Get to Participate in Deciding What Your Life Becomes

There is something almost startling about realizing you have a say in your own life.

Of course, technically, we know that.

We’re adults.

We make decisions all day long.

But that isn’t quite what I mean.

I mean realizing that the beliefs you were handed don’t have to remain your beliefs.

The expectations you grew up with don’t have to become the expectations you carry for the rest of your life.

The way you learned to be doesn’t have to be the only way you know how to be.

And the decisions you made 10, 20 or 30 years ago don’t have to decide what happens next.

You get to participate in deciding what your life becomes.

That realization changed mine.

I Had to Stop Waiting for Permission

When I began asking myself those two questions we’ve talked about this month, What do I think? and What do I want?, I started hearing answers.

That was both wonderful and inconvenient.

Because once you know what you want, you have to decide what you’re going to do with that information.

I began realizing there were things in my life I no longer wanted.

There were beliefs I no longer believed.

There were expectations I had spent years meeting that didn't belong to me.

And nobody was going to appear at my front door with an official permission slip telling me I was now allowed to choose differently.

I had to recognize that I had agency.

This Doesn't Mean We Get Everything We Want

Participating in your life doesn't mean controlling it.

Life still happens.

People we love make choices we wouldn’t choose.

Relationships change.

Bodies change.

Jobs end.

Money gets tight.

People die.

Dreams sometimes don't happen the way we imagined they would.

There are plenty of things we don't get to decide.

I know that.

But I think we sometimes give away our agency in the places where we do have a choice because there are other places where we don't.

Those are different things.

I can't control every circumstance in my life.

But I can decide how I participate in the life that's here.

You Don't Have to Blame Anyone to Choose Differently

This has been important in my own healing.

Understanding how I became who I became didn't require me to create villains.

My parents made choices based on what they knew and believed.

Other people in my life did too.

Some choices hurt me.

Some shaped me in ways that took years to understand.

And I have made choices that affected other people too.

Healing gave me the ability to look at all of that with more clarity.

I can understand why something happened without deciding it needs to continue.

I can have compassion for another person and still choose something different for myself.

I can forgive someone and still change the relationship.

I can take responsibility for my part without taking responsibility for theirs.

Those things can exist together.

Look at the Life You Have Now

Not the life you thought you'd have.

Not the one somebody else imagined for you.

Not the one you think you should have created by now.

This one.

The life you're living today.

What do you love about it?

What have you built that you want to keep?

What feels like you?

And where do you notice yourself thinking:

I don't want to do this anymore.

Pay attention to that.

It doesn't necessarily mean you need to blow up your life.

Sometimes participation looks much smaller.

You change how you spend Tuesday evenings.

You stop automatically volunteering.

You take the painting class you've been thinking about for three years.

You tell your family you're not hosting Thanksgiving this time.

You finally start the thing you keep talking yourself out of.

You rest.

You travel.

You ask for help.

You say what you think.

You change your mind.

These are all ways we participate in creating our lives.

Your Life Is Allowed to Fit You

I spent many years trying to fit myself into a life.

Today, I think about that differently.

I want my life to fit me.

Not perfectly. I don't know anyone whose life fits perfectly.

But I want to recognize myself in it.

I want the things I say yes to to matter to me.

I want room for the people I love.

Room for meaningful work.

Room for creativity.

Room for quiet.

Room for joy.

And room to change my mind about what any of that looks like.

Maybe that's one of the gifts of getting older.

We begin to understand that there is no prize at the end for having lived the life everyone expected us to live.

There is simply the life we lived.

So ask yourself:

What do I think?

What do I want?

And then add one more question:

What am I willing to choose?

You don't need the entire answer today.

Choose one thing.

One small place where your life could look a little more like yours.

And participate.