In this talk I describe some of the key arguments and conclusions in my book ‘Freely determined: What the new psychology of the self teaches us about how to live” (Basic Books, 2022). The book relies on philosopher Christian List’s arguments in his book “Why free will is real.” Sidestepping centuries of philosophical debate, List turned to psychology in defining free will as the ability to consider several action alternatives, select one, and begin enacting it. I show that personal goal research, which prompts people to select new goals to pursue, directly addresses this critical capacity. I also discuss my self-concordance goal research, showing that the real problem isn’t whether we have free will (we do, and indeed, it is inescapable); rather, it’s whether we can use it wisely, to choose goals that will fulfill us. I’ll also consider emerging neuroscience research that supports List’s depiction of free will, showing that it helps explain why we have difficulty choosing wisely -- namely, because setting goals is a system 2 capacity that is somewhat cut off from system 1, where our innate preferences and potentials lie. I conclude by discussing our creative breakthrough model of goal reorientation, which says that we can ask our nonconscious mind for hints, which it will give us. We merely must be open to these hints, and courageous enough to follow them.