| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Some Reminiscences by Joseph Conrad: his seat protectively by my side. The sledge was a very small
one and it looked utterly insignificant, almost like a toy behind
the four big bays harnessed two and two. We three, counting the
coachman, filled it completely. He was a young fellow with clear
blue eyes; the high collar of his livery fur coat framed his
cheery countenance and stood all round level with the top of his
head.
"Now, Joseph," my companion addressed him, "do you think we shall
manage to get home before six?" His answer was that we would
surely, with God's help, and providing there were no heavy drifts
in the long stretch between certain villages whose names came
 Some Reminiscences |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Finished by H. Rider Haggard: For some hundreds of yards I rode on thus recklessly, because
recklessness seemed my only chance. Thrice I met bodies of
Zulus, but on each occasion they scattered before me, calling out
words that I could not catch. It was as though they were
frightened of something they saw about me. Perhaps they thought
that I was mad to ride thus among them. Indeed I must have
looked mad, or perhaps there was something else. At any rate I
believed that I was going to win right through them when an
accident happened.
A bullet struck my mare somewhere in the back. I don't know
where it came from, but as I saw no Zulu shoot, I think it must
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Across The Plains by Robert Louis Stevenson: must turn out and work like demons, for it is not only the pleasant
groves that are destroyed; the climate and the soil are equally at
stake, and these fires prevent the rains of the next winter and dry
up perennial fountains. California has been a land of promise in
its time, like Palestine; but if the woods continue so swiftly to
perish, it may become, like Palestine, a land of desolation.
To visit the woods while they are languidly burning is a strange
piece of experience. The fire passes through the underbrush at a
run. Every here and there a tree flares up instantaneously from
root to summit, scattering tufts of flame, and is quenched, it
seems, as quickly. But this last is only in semblance. For after
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