On April 16th, 1963, the reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. was in a bad position. Specifically, he was in a jail cell in Birmingham, Alabama. More broadly, the civil rights movement had few allies and was being violently opposed by the people in power.1
He could have spent this time becoming bitter about his imprisonment or stoking anger among his followers. He could have despaired about how badly things were going. Instead, he chose to improve his future position and the future position of the movement.
He penned the now-famous “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” to a group of other clergymen – white ones – in an effort to gain their support. He appealed to their shared values and highlighted their shared humanity. He laid out the reasons for his campaign of non-violent civil disobedience. He explained that his people could wait no longer for their rights, for “justice too long delayed is justice denied.”2
Would it work?
That, like his current position, was outside of his control. This was simply the action he could take that might improve his future position. For, as he wrote, “what else can one do when he is alone in a narrow jail cell, other than write long letters, think long thoughts and pray long prayers?”2
Improving Your Future Position
I hope your current position in life is not so dire, but I’d wager there are some things about your current position that you’re unhappy with. It could be your career, your finances, your relationships, your mental health, your physical health – anything you wish were different.
Your current position may or may not be your fault. But that doesn’t matter because, either way, you’re response-able. You can do the work to make things better.
If you don’t like your career, start learning what you need to earn a better one. If you’re unhappy with your weight, start making different choices. If you’re chronically prone to depression, start doing the things that prevent it. I’m not suggesting these actions are easy, or that it’s fair for you to have to do them. I’m merely saying they’re within your power.
The Stoics argued that you have to focus on what you can control rather than what you can’t.3 You can’t control the position you’re in today because that’s determined by the past. But you can improve your position tomorrow by taking positive action today.4
Influencing the Future
Likewise, you can’t control what happens in the future, but you can position yourself to be better prepared for whatever does happen.
You don’t control what the economy is going to do, but you can put yourself in a safer position by spending less than you earn, avoiding unnecessary debt, and cultivating multiple income streams.
You don’t control whether or not people believe what you say. But you can position yourself such that people are more likely to believe you. How? By living with integrity.
Ski season is coming … probably. I can’t control whether or not it snows. But I can position myself to be ready for it when it does. So I’m diligently strengthening my legs in preparation. I can’t truly control whether or not I take a bad fall this season – one that might lead to a knee injury – but I can do the stretching and training that reduces my risk of getting hurt.
The fact that you don’t control something doesn’t mean you should give up and be passive. It means you have to focus your energy on the aspects of the situation that you can control, the ones that influence the outcome indirectly.
Improving the Position of Future People
In November 1978, the gay rights activist Harvey Milk was in a terrible position. He could probably sense that there would be little progress for homosexuals in America for decades. More pressingly, he was quite sure that he would soon be assassinated.
So he did something heroic.
He used his voice to improve the position of the movement – to make life better for future generations of gay people. He recorded a message, to be played after his death, pleading with his followers to stay hopeful, to persist, and to remain peaceful. Nine days later, he was murdered, but the gay rights movement lived on, in part because of his carefully chosen final words.5
The final and most noble version of Stoic positioning is to devote yourself to improving the position of other people, of future people, even though your own position is hopeless. It might be impossible to improve your own circumstances, but you can still improve the circumstances of the people who will come after you. You can still make the future better for someone else.
You can still do good; you can still be good. That is always within your control.
1“Birmingham campaign.” Wikipedia.
2King, Jr. Martin Luther. “Letter from a Birmingham Jail.” 16 April 1963.
3Holiday, Ryan, and Stephen Hanselman. The Daily Stoic. Portfolio, 2016.
4Inspired by Shane Parrish’s Clear Thinking and Stoicism.
5Holiday, Ryan. Right Thing Right Now. Portfolio, 2024.
Chris Loper has been writing about self-improvement and helping busy adults with habit formation since 2017.
He also writes an education blog for parents and students for Northwest Educational Services.
Along with Greg Smith, Chris is the cocreator of Parenting for Academic Success, a series of transformative classes that create empowered parents, confident students, and harmonious families.
His most recent endeavor combines his academic and habit-formation expertise to help students thrive in college. Visit SmartCollegeHabits.com to learn more.
In 2021, Chris published a humorous memoir titled Wood Floats and Other Brilliant Observations, a book that blends crazy stories with practical life lessons.
He lives in Issaquah, WA where he is the owner of South Cove Tutoring.