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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does each floor represent?

2. What does Dan do just before darkness falls?

3. What is the shadow side of the second floor as fear is of the first?

4. What does the Tower represent?

5. Who is Dan's guardian angel?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the path to the heart? Does this seem difficult?

2. What does Dan say about himself at the beginning of chapter 13, and what do you think he means?

3. Does Dan change his mind about the settlement? How?

4. What does Mama Chia say about second-floor energies?

5. From whom does Dan ask permission to be there and what do you think this is symbolic of?

6. What do you think Mama Chia means when she says that "The Great Leap" is frightful, but above the heart, it becomes "an elevator ride?"

7. To whom does Mama Chia want Dan to be grateful and what does that mean?

8. How does the level at which Dan is in this section manifest in sexual energy?

9. What happens with Dan and the punks and do you think it will have significance later?

10. What is foreshadowed in this section?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Dan writes that every day one must choose to master the energy of life or squander it. Discuss the following:

What do you think Dan means by the above statement? Give examples from the text and your own life if applicable.

Analyze and discuss several times in the text when you think Dan squanders the energy of life.

Analyze and discuss several times in the text when you think Dan masters the energy of life.

Essay Topic 2

Besides being a retired banker, Mama Chia is also a midwife, who is busy bringing a new life into the world while Dan is recuperating from exposure and dehydration. Discuss one of the following:

What are the parallels between Dan's surfboard experience and Mama Chia bringing a new baby into the world?

Discuss the seeming paradox that Mama Chia works for and retires from a bank and is also a shaman and midwife.

What do you think Dan needs to birth?

Essay Topic 3

Mama Chia's purpose in mentoring Dan seems to be to teach him about the three selves. Discuss one of the following:

What are the three selves. Discuss fully.

Discuss the symbolic representations of the three selves both in the book and in your own experience.

Discuss whether or not you think the idea of three selves has validity as truth.

(see the answer keys)

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