Since you are a Calvinist, read the Westminster Confession's opening paragraph on Chapter 3
Here is the same in modern English provided by the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.
1. God, from all eternity, did—by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will—freely and unchangeably ordain whatever comes to pass. Yet he ordered all things in such a way that he is not the author of sin, nor does he force his creatures to act against their wills; neither is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.
The way I understand this is, we freely choose what we want but our choices always follow the reasons (secondary causes) under God’s control that we base our choices on.
I think what you may be getting at is the Bondage of the Will. Luther in his response to Erasmus coined this term. So for those playing at home this is not a Calvin deal but a Reformation deal and Luther was the main proponent.
Luther when opposing Erasmus used Romans 6 to show we have our wills for sure, but it is either in bondage to sin and death or slaves to Christ and righteousness.
Luther said to Erasmus,
It is in the highest degree wholesome and necessary, for a Christian to know whether or not his will has anything to do in matters pertaining to salvation. Indeed let me tell you, that is the hinge on which our discussion turns. . . . For if I am ignorant of the nature, extent, and limits of what I can and must do with reference to God, I shall be equally ignorant and uncertain of the nature, extent, and limits of what God can and will do in me. . . . Now, if I am ignorant of God’s works and power, I am ignorant of God himself; and if I do not know God, I cannot worship, praise, give thanks, or serve Him, for I do not know how much I should attribute to myself and how much to Him. (quoted in Luther Selections, 179)
More now of the pertinent info from a John Piper article:
Luther knew that Erasmus, more than any other opponent, had put his finger on the deeper issue at stake beneath the justification controversy and the controversy over the mass and indulgences and Mary and purgatory. And that issue was whether human beings are so sinful that God’s sovereign grace must create and decisively fulfill every human inclination to believe and obey God.
Erasmus did not believe this. Luther did — so did Calvin and Zwingli. Erasmus’s belief that the fallen human will contributed its own decisive self-determining power to the act of faith and the pursuit of holiness was, in Luther’s mind, a perilous underestimation of the desperate condition of man without Christ. In Gordon Rupp’s assessment of Luther’s debate with Erasmus, he commented, “At the end of the day, Luther could maintain the great Anselmian retort: ‘Thou hast not considered the gravity of sin’” (Luther and Erasmus, 12.).
And I think the following may be what you are getting at with regards to the Gospel:
And, Luther would add, the failure to see the gravity our sin and the depth of our corruption and the bondage of our will, if unchecked, will become an assault on the freedom and sovereignty and the glory of God’s grace in salvation, and therefore an assault on the very gospel itself. In 1528, Luther put it like this: “I condemn and reject as nothing but error all doctrines which exalt our ‘free will,’ as being directly opposed to [the] mediation and grace of our Lord Jesus Christ” (What Luther Says, Vol. 3, 1376–1377). By “free will,” I think he means decisive self-determination in acts of faith and obedience.
In another place he said,
This is my absolute opinion: he that will maintain that a man’s free-will is able to do or work anything in spiritual cases, be they never so small, denies Christ. This I have always maintained in my writings, especially in those against Erasmus. (The Tabletalk of Martin Luther, 206)
He doesn’t mean that the will is inactive. He means that wherever it is active in faith and obedience, God is decisively active, creating and fulfilling the acts.
Remainder of the piece well worth the read:
The Bondage of the Will, the Sovereignty of Grace, and the Glory of God