Are We Living, or Being Lived?
How we can become more active authors of our own lives
Posted June 1, 2026 | Reviewed by Davia Sills
For more than 20 years, one question has stayed with me: Are we living—or are we being lived?
At first, this may sound like a philosophical question. But it is also a deeply psychological one. Many people know the experience of functioning on the outside while feeling increasingly absent on the inside. They meet obligations, answer messages, care for others, adapt to expectations, and move through the day with impressive discipline. Yet beneath this functioning, a quiet unease may emerge: Is this still my life, or am I being carried along by fear , duty, old wounds, social roles, and expectations I never consciously chose?
Human development has always stood between two poles. We are shaped by forces we did not choose: biology, family, culture, childhood experiences, social conditions, attachment patterns, and historical circumstances. But human beings are not simply the passive result of these forces. We interpret, respond to, resist, adapt to, and reorganize our lives. We are shaped, but not finally defined.
Shaped, But Not Finished
The life of Ray Charles illustrates this tension. Born Raymond Charles Robinson in 1930 in Albany, Georgia, he grew up in poverty in Greenville, Florida. He lost his sight by age seven, experienced racial discrimination , lived largely without his father, and lost his mother as a teenager . At the Florida School for the Deaf and the Blind in St. Augustine, he studied music, learned Braille, and developed the abilities that later became the basis of his artistic life.
After moving to Seattle, he began performing in clubs and eventually became one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century, blending gospel, blues, rhythm and blues, jazz, and country into a distinctive musical language.
Ray Charles should not be reduced to a simple story of overcoming adversity. His biography is more complex. It shows that human lives are neither fully determined by adverse conditions nor freely invented outside them. Development occurs in the dynamic space between what happens to us and what we are still able to do with what has happened.
Early experiences matter. A child who grows up with safety and reliable attachment is likely to develop a different sense of the world than one who grows up with fear, instability, humiliation , or loss. But childhood is not destiny. People can form new relationships, revise old meanings, develop new competencies, and create new forms of self-understanding. As Erik Erikson showed, identity is not a fixed possession; it is an ongoing dialogue between the person, others, and the social world.
When Survival Strategies Take Over
To be “lived” means that this dialogue becomes narrow. Life is no longer experienced as a space of participation, but as a chain of reactions. A person reacts to pressure, shame , fear of rejection, performance demands, or an inner voice that says, “You must,” “You cannot,” or “You are not enough.” Such reactions are not signs of weakness. Often, they are signs of adaptation. Perfectionism may once have protected a person from criticism. Emotional withdrawal may have protected someone from disappointment. People-pleasing may have preserved belonging. Control may have created safety in an unpredictable environment.
The problem begins when former survival strategies become the architecture of an entire life. What once protected us may later limit us. What once helped us adapt may later prevent us from living with greater freedom, dignity, and inner coherence.
The Theory of Universal Psychological Needs, which I developed from my longstanding work on trauma , resilience , and psychological diagnostics, offers a useful lens here. This loss of authorship can be understood as a disturbance in the regulation of basic psychological needs: safety and predictability; attachment and belonging; autonomy and influence; competence and effectiveness; dignity and recognition; and meaning and coherence. These are not luxuries. They are central dimensions of psychological stability.
In Ray Charles’s life, several of these needs were deeply threatened: safety by poverty, loss, and blindness; belonging and dignity by racism and social exclusion; autonomy by structural barriers. At the same time, music became a field of competence, influence, recognition, and meaning. His art did not erase suffering, but it created a space in which he could act, shape, express, connect, and be recognized.
Becoming a Co-Author Again
When people feel that they are being lived, several psychological needs are often frustrated at the same time. They may be outwardly successful but inwardly unsafe. They may be socially connected but not truly recognized. They may carry responsibility without experiencing influence. They may perform well while feeling ineffective or empty. In such situations, the question is not simply, “What is wrong with me?” A more precise question is: Which fundamental need has been neglected, injured, or overruled for too long?
Taking one’s life into one’s own hands does not mean controlling everything. Control is not the same as autonomy. Perfection is not the same as competence. Approval is not the same as dignity. Constant activity is not the same as meaning. A person may appear highly disciplined and still be deeply unfree. Conversely, a small act of self-directed choice can sometimes mark the beginning of psychological recovery.
We all carry traces of our biology, our families, our cultures, our losses, and our histories. Absolute freedom is an illusion. But complete helplessness is also not the truth. Between these two extremes lies the space in which development happens.
Perhaps living begins precisely there: in the moment when a person no longer asks only, “What is expected of me?” but begins to ask, “What do I need in order to become more fully present in my own life?”
We may never become completely free from what has shaped us. But we can become less governed by it. And that may be one of the deepest tasks of psychological growth: not to control life completely, but to become its co-author again.
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Sefik Tagay, Ph.D., is a professor of psychology at TH Köln, University of Applied Sciences in Germany.
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This article is part of the Bringwise Psychology Journal — daily insights on human behavior, mental health, and personal growth.