Apparently cold and flu season has not yet received the memo that it is SPRING. Ever since the holidays, it seems like one of my kids has been sick at some point almost every week. I work from home, so I’m grateful for the flexibility to adjust around multiple days of a child being home. But of course it’s been disruptive and I’ve had to navigate my own frustrations and feelings around it.
When interruptions and disruptions keep us from the day we had planned, it’s easy to feel like we might as well throw our to-do list in the trash. We can become resigned and feel like if we can’t have the day we planned, we might as well not try to get anything done at all.
But even within circumstances outside of our control, we still have a choice in what we will do. It’s never all or nothing.
When we learn to embrace the reality of what is and stop fighting and resisting our circumstances, we discover that we have a lot more freedom and agency than we thought.
Kate Bowler calls this “Limited Agency” and I love that term. She defines it this way: “The truth that we are decision-makers inside circumstances we did not choose.”
There are limits and external boundaries of our circumstances. But within that is a lot of wide open space and freedom to choose how we will move inside of our limits.
As Kate says, we can’t do everything, but this doesn’t mean we do nothing. There is a lot we can do.
We still get to choose. Not from endless options, but within the reality that is given to us. And that still leaves a lot of freedom and agency.
The more we can accept and consent to our reality, the more we will be free to make choices. But when we resist our actual life, we actually constrain ourselves more than if we would simply let go.
So how do we embrace the agency we do have when our schedule keeps shifting?
I have been surprised to notice that in a season full of changed plans and interruptions, I have been really drawn to intentionally planning my days.
Too often, I can feel like a victim of my circumstances. There is too much opposition and interruptions. So why bother making a plan at all when it’s just going to change?
But I’m noticing that even with a child home sick today–and many other days the past few months–I am still able to get a lot done.
There are interruptions, of course, and not one of these days has gone exactly according to my plan. For example, even in writing this very article, I have stopped and started multiple times. I’m having to embrace the truth that “done is better than perfect” and put my words out there anyway, even as I wish I had more time with it.
When the schedule is thrown off, I have to be creative with when I will fit things in. And there are some things that I simply have to let go, because even on the best days, I can’t do it all.
More often than not, the plan doesn’t get completely thrown out. It simply gets adjusted.
You can’t make adjustments to a blank page, so that’s why planning even when life is unpredictable is still important.
The plan becomes something to return to, a steadying anchor when life feels a little chaotic.
And here’s the beauty of it all: I made the plan and I chose it, so I am free to alter it whenever I want or need.
Sometimes it gets shifted by choice, and other times it’s because of circumstances beyond my control. But the invitation is to practice acceptance and agency, working with my limits but choosing to do what I can.
This is more than just about our schedule, of course. It’s the posture we take towards our time, which of course makes up our very life.
The tension is to make a plan without trying to control my time.
A few questions to consider:
What is true about the reality of my life right now?
What are the limits?
What is the space within the limits that is mine to choose?
Am I grasping for control?
Am I accepting reality, or resisting it?
Can I be kind to myself when things don’t go as planned? (AND kind to the people who interrupted my day?)
Making a plan is not about trying to predict or control every moment. It’s setting an intention, and then allowing that to be a guide for your day. But the plan is not in charge of your day, and there is both the freedom and necessity to adjust.
Even as we faithfully plan out our days and do the work that is ours to do, may we choose trust and surrender in our schedule. May we embrace both the reality and limits of our life, and lean into our “Limited Agency” as we do what we can.
Tell us in the comments: How do you respond when your plans need adjusting? What is one practical way you can embrace both reality and limited agency?
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