Agency is the moment you realize you’re allowed to choose
By Melissa Hull
There is a moment in healing that doesn’t get talked about enough.
It’s not the moment of insight.
It’s not the moment of relief.
It’s not even the moment of hope.
It’s the moment you realize you’re allowed to choose.
For a long time after loss, trauma or profound disruption, choice can feel dangerous. When life has already taken so much, choosing can feel like tempting fate. It can feel risky to want more, to decide differently, to imagine a future that isn’t solely shaped by what happened.
So, many people remain suspended in a quiet in-between — not because they don’t know what they want, but because they don’t yet trust themselves to choose it.
This is where agency enters the conversation.
Agency is not control.
It’s not positivity.
It’s not pretending the past didn’t happen.
Agency is authorship.
It’s the recognition that while you may not have chosen what happened to you, you still get to choose how you live in response to it.
That realization is powerful — and often uncomfortable.
After grief or trauma, many people confuse passivity with acceptance. They believe that honoring what has been lost requires enduring what no longer fits. They mistake silence for strength and self-abandonment for loyalty. Over time, they adapt to a life that is manageable but constrained, familiar but small.
From the outside, it can look like progress.
From the inside, it often feels like stagnation.
Agency disrupts that pattern with a question: What am I choosing now?
Not once, but daily.
Agency lives in small, consistent decisions — what you tolerate, what you prioritize, what you postpone and what you no longer agree to carry.
This is where healing takes a leap forward.
Knowledge alone doesn’t change a life. People can understand their patterns, name their wounds and speak fluently about growth — and still live from habit instead of choice. The gap between knowing and living disappears when you reclaim your agency.
Without agency, healing remains theoretical.
This is why so many people feel frustrated years into their personal growth journey. They’ve learned the language, but their lives haven’t expanded. Their relationships haven’t shifted. Their sense of self hasn’t fully returned.
It’s not because they haven’t worked hard enough.
It’s because insight without agency is not enough to reorient a life.
Agency requires responsibility — not blame, but ownership.
Ownership of your energy.
Ownership of your boundaries.
Ownership even of the choice to stay the same.
But passive choices to stay where you are can be confronting.
At some point, agency asks you to acknowledge what you are participating in. Not in a punitive way, but in an honest one. It invites you to see where you’ve been waiting for permission, approval or certainty that may never come.
Agency does not guarantee comfort.
It guarantees movement.
When a person experiences trauma or prolonged loss of control, the nervous system often adapts by becoming vigilant or resigned. Decision-making narrows. Risk feels unsafe. Familiar discomfort becomes preferable to unfamiliar possibility.
Reclaiming agency helps restore a sense of internal control. It signals safety — not because life is predictable, but because you trust yourself to respond.
Agency is intentional, not impulsive.
It requires presence, not certainty.
Choosing differently may mean disappointing others, redefining relationships and grieving versions of yourself you can no longer maintain.
These losses are real.
They deserve acknowledgment.
But avoiding choice doesn’t prevent loss — it prolongs it.
One of the most common fears I hear is this: What if I choose wrong?
An understandable fear, but it assumes the goal is perfection.
Agency is not about getting it right — it’s about being willing to choose again.
When you live from agency, you stop outsourcing your life to circumstances, expectations or roles that once made sense but no longer fit. You stop waiting for clarity before action and start allowing clarity to emerge through action.
This is how people move beyond survival.
Survival asks, What do I need to get through this?
Agency asks, What kind of life am I willing to choose now?
That shift changes everything.
Agency doesn’t erase grief.
It doesn’t bypass pain.
It doesn’t deny history.
It integrates those things.
It allows loss to inform your life without defining its limits. It gives you the authority to decide what belongs in your future and what does not.
This is where boundaries become real — not as rules you enforce, but as expressions of self-respect. When agency is embodied, boundaries no longer need constant explanation. They’re lived.
If you are standing at the edge of something new — feeling both drawn forward and held back — this may be the moment agency is asking to be reclaimed.
Not dramatically.
Not all at once.
But deliberately.
You are allowed to choose your pace.
You are allowed to choose your priorities.
You are allowed to choose a life that reflects who you are becoming — not just what you have survived.
Healing may open the door.
But agency is what carries you through it into an expansive, more intentional life.
Related Reads & Healing Resources
If this reflection on agency resonated, these gentle reads and resources from Melissa Hull may support you as you continue reclaiming authorship over your life.
Related Articles by Melissa Hull
Each of these explores the intersection of grief, healing, boundaries, and self-trust — where agency is practiced daily, not conceptually.
The Healing You Think You Want vs. The Healing You Believe You Deserve
A powerful reflection on why insight alone doesn’t change a life — and how self-worth shapes what we allow ourselves to choose.
👉 https://medium.com/@melissahull/the-healing-you-think-you-want-vs-the-healing-you-believe-you-deserveStrength Isn’t the Same as Wholeness
An exploration of how survival roles can quietly limit our lives long after they’re needed — and how agency helps us release them.
👉 https://medium.com/@melissahull/strength-isnt-the-same-as-wholenessWhen Letting Go Isn’t Giving Up — It’s Choosing Yourself
A reflection on boundaries, self-responsibility, and the courage it takes to stop living on autopilot.
👉 https://medium.com/@melissahull/when-letting-go-isnt-giving-upYou’re Not Behind — You’re Rebuilding
A compassionate reframe for those who feel stalled after trauma, reminding readers that movement doesn’t always look dramatic.
👉 https://medium.com/@melissahull/youre-not-behind-youre-rebuilding
Guided Resources to Support Embodied Agency
Agency isn’t something you think your way into — it’s something you practice. These self-guided resources are designed to support that process gently and at your own pace.
The Living Library
A self-study healing space created for those navigating grief, identity shifts, and emotional reconstruction — without pressure or timelines.
👉 https://melissahull.com/living-libraryGreater Than Grief (Self-Paced Program)
A compassionate program for moving beyond survival mode and reconnecting with choice, meaning, and internal authority after loss.
👉 https://melissahull.com/greater-than-griefGuided Heart Meditation
A grounding meditation designed to help restore safety in the body and reconnect you with your inner sense of direction.
👉 https://melissahull.com/heart-meditationTime to Quit Your C.L.U.B. (Self-Abandonment Patterns Workshop)
A practical and reflective workshop for identifying where you’ve been over-carrying, over-giving, or postponing your own needs.
👉 https://melissahull.com/quit-your-club