Free will is a tricky subject. It certainly feels like I can deliberate and come to a free choice, by abstracting decisions from my immediate and prior influences.

I have previously tried to come to terms with not having free will, and it left me feeling stripped of any agency / control, utterly depressed, demotivated, and incapable of doing anything. If there is no reason for my actions, other than the initial state of the universe evolving forward in time, then there is no point to anything. Most people can't live like that.

Could there be an alternative explanation, based on unknown physics; selecting between different permissible universes?

I heard an argument from Terence McKenna that I liked, along the lines of: You should choose to believe in free will, because it appears that we have it. If you choose to believe in it, and it doesn't exist, then you had no choice but to believe in it anyway.

I think the phrase 'You can do what you will. But you can't will what you will.' is the correct perspective.

People are repulsed by the idea of having no free will because of their biology; meaning seems to be what drives our conscious thought. I think Terence's argument can be made simpler: You don't have the free will to choose whether the absence of free will bother you.

That being said, I hope this argument nudges you in a better direction: Trying to 'will what you will' only leads to pointless frustration(you can't change the laws of the universe). Accept this, and allow yourself to 'do what you will'. Somehow, we have the power to do this.

Give up on free will; the rest of the universe doesn't seem to be bothered over it. Best of luck, fellow lifeform.

But that is a fallacy of excluding the middle; your point feels intuitively true, but is not necessarily the case

It is possible for something to not be simply and entirely caused by a prior state, and yet not be random

Understanding this does require a kind of thinking that our brains find difficult, though

I think it is somewhat of a grey area if you are free to influence the world, but your choices reflect your preferences. I think it is better to argue about whether consciousness has causal power, since that is semantically clearer.