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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 the author claim "cannot proliferate" without our thoughts?

2. What does Chodron claim is our relationship to reaching out to others?

3. Why does Chodron work with aspirations?

4. What is the compassionate aspiration that the author begins with as she begins to teach?

5. What are the four qualities of maitri?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Chodron compare to "tapping into a spring of living water that has been temporarily encased in solid rock"?

2. What does Chodron write is the "foundation" of bodhichitta training?

3. What does "of the two witnesses, hold the principal one" mean?

4. What is bodhichitta?

5. According to Chodron, what is our relationship with enlightenment?

6. What are the stages of the formal practice of tonglen?

7. What are the stages of the formal practice of loving-kindness?

8. How did the nineteenth century yogi Patrul Rinpoche suggest arousing compassion?

9. Why does the author include an anecdote about finding her boyfriend "passionately embracing another woman"?

10. Chodron asserts that there are two options in life. The first is "to grow up and relate to life directly." What is the second?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

How does Chodron define suffering? Where does she claim it comes from? How does she recommend avoiding it?

Essay Topic 2

In The Places That Scare You, what do the terms maitri and tonglen mean? How does Chodron write that these are these cultivated?

Essay Topic 3

What does Chodron mean by aspirations? How do these differ from affirmations? In the formal practice of aspirations, is there a difference in the aspirations for different qualities?

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