You might have independence, and you might be an ambitious person—but if you can’t even begin to fathom creating and playing by your own rules, do you really have agency?
The mismatch between past and present doesn’t seem trivial to me — if the “you” of today can so blithely disregard the “you” of yesterday, then it follows that the “you” I’m talking to now might very well not be the one who shows up for our date tomorrow. There’s a kind of unpredictable change that seems to lie outside of the virtues of growth and... See more
you are a self-modifying machine, a particle with partial control over its own future, and it pays to know what all the buttons do. I’ve heard many people describe to me what sound like levers in their own souls, but I know very few people who realize that they can pull on them deliberately, if they want to.
You are the machine that fuels everything else in your life.
Paying attention to the mindset that drives that machine, is simply one of the most important things you can do.
Every move, every decision, every action will rest on that. Be sure it is as optimal as it can be.
you can be high agency without being highly ambitious. That might describe somebody who is highly agentic in shaping the kind of personal, emotional, or spiritual life they want, but who is not especially motivated to succeed financially or professionally.
biggest joke of my life… after years and years of trying so hard, i can just unclench the sense of doing anything and
1. my “willpower” increases dramatically
2. i get better at pretty much everything
(this is not the same thing as non-coercion!)