In a letter, Jack London explained two kinds of career happiness:
Every man, at the beginning of his career (whether laying bricks or writing books or anything else), has two choices. He may choose immediate happiness, or ultimate happiness. . . . He who chooses ultimate happiness, and has the ability, and works hard, will find that the reward for his effort is cumulative, that the interest on his energy invested is compounded. The artisan who is industrious, steady, reliant, is suddenly, one day, advanced to a foremanship with increased wages. Now is that advance due to what he did that day, or the day before? Ah, no, it is due to the long years of industry and steadiness. The same with the reputation of a business man or artist. The thing grows and compounds. He is not only “paid for having done something once upon a time,” . . . but he has been paid for continuing to do something through quite a period of time.
In another letter, he added:
A choice of ultimate happiness in preference to proximate happiness, when the element of chance is given due consideration, is, I believe, the wisest course for a man to follow under the sun. He that chooses proximate happiness is a brute; he that chooses immortal happiness is an ass; but he that chooses ultimate happiness knows his business. (Quoted in The Life of the Creative Spirit, p.169)
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The Utah State University Library has a Jack and Charmian London collection. Find out about it by clicking on: USU's London Collection
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