How did Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz reconcile human freedom with monads that contain their future actions?

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz reconciled the concept of human freedom with his theory of monads—which are individual, soullike substances that contain the entirety of their future states—through the doctrine of preestablished harmony.12

In Leibniz’s metaphysical system, monads do not interact causally with one another. Instead, God, in a single creative act at the beginning of time, synchronized the entire universe so that every monad’s internal development perfectly corresponds with the states of all other monads. Because each monad’s future is contained within its own nature, its actions are determined by its own internal perceptions and appetites rather than by external forces.12

Leibniz maintained that this internal determination does not negate freedom. He argued that because the monad acts according to its own nature and internal logic, its actions are spontaneous and self-determined. The harmony established by God ensures that these individual, free actions align with the order of the universe, allowing for a coherent reality without requiring genuine causal interaction between mind and body.12