Is self-control really a fitting term in this context?

What might work better, being that this is a list of things that a life lived in the Holy Spirit will produce? Every other aspect or facet of a life lived in submission to agape love is outwardly focused, in terms of how that love is worked out expressing in relation to others: from joy, peace, long-tempered-ness, and being kind, to living virtuously and being meek rather than being a sourpuss, constantly agitated or anxious, ever-offended, mean, Corrupt, and smashing everyone around you because you can. See what I did there? More or less what the Holy Spirit led Paul to do earlier in Galatians 5, as a contrast to the life yielded to the Holy Spirit. Notice I didn’t include this week’s aspect, or its converse in my lists, as are Agape love & its opposite absent… this is not an oversight. It is intentional.
Hold onto your skivvies.
Don’t get them all in a bunch.
Here are my reasons:

1) to link the two more strongly in your mind & heart

2) to challenge calling this last aspect “self”-control.

Ok, so let’s tackle what I was saying about this term in the beginning… is “‘self’-Control” really a good fit in this list? Is a re-thinking in order? If the list is of fruit of a spirit-guided life, then why is the last thing on the list something that is often treated as a synonym for will-power? Does it make sense that the crowning aspect seems to have more to do with us, and our self-will & determination than with our Choice to be 100% submitted to the Holy Spirit? I contend that that term is better understood as living submission to The Holy Spirit. So what would a better phrase be? Rather than Self-Control, how about Full Submission?

What has this to do with Agape love? Logically, as we read or hear this list, it is important to contextualize it, and this whole list, as I mentioned earlier, is about what will be produced as a result of a laid – down life in relation to the Holy Spirit, rather than to the spirit of this age. The First thing to appear, then, is agape love, and the others items incarnate this reality, or show us what love really looks like in practice: joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, virtuous, meek, and ultimately moving us toward maturity in Christ. That is, being moved by the impulses of the Holy Spirit (Romans 8:14-17). Those impulses are always characterized by love. Never vanity or conceitedness, anger, or insisting on our own way to the harm of others in any way. In this way, agape love and submission to the Holy Spirit are almost inextricably linked, and that is also a more biblically coherent term than self-control is.

Father,
As we wrap up this look at the Fruit of your Spirit in our lives, I submit myself to you and to the Holy Spirit afresh. Come, abide with me and cause these things to spring up in my life today. Let your love, joy, patience, Sweetness, peace, holiness, meekness, and a continued & deepened submission to you become hallmarks of my life, from now on.

Amen.