Loss and Gain: Bilbo Baggins

A brilliant description of loss and gain happened to Bilbo Baggins in the Hobbit by JRR Tolkien:

"The Bagginses have lived in the neighbourhood of The Hill ... and people considered them very respectable, ... because they never had any adventures or did anything unexpected ... This is a story of how a Baggins had an adventure, and found himself doing and saying things altogether unexpected. He may have lost the neighbours' respect, but he gained -- well, you will see whether he gained anything in the end."

Four reliances

Rely on the message of the teacher, not on his personality;
Rely on the meaning, not just on the words;
Rely on the real meaning, not on the provisional one;
Rely on your wisdom mind, not on your ordinary, judgmental mind.

From the Buddha as quoted in the book "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying"

Value

The question of value depends on the frame of reference.

From the book "Becoming Enlightened"

Making it right -- Is it too late?

Michael A. Green was recently released after spending 27 years of his life serving the crime he did not commit.

Here is the full story published in the NewYork Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/13/us/13exonerate.html?ref=us.

His compensation of $2.2 million did not help him coping with several questions he has been facing:

• Why was he convicted 27 years ago?
• What should he do with the rest of his life?
• Here is the account of Mr. Green about his free life:
  

  "Mr. Green, in the meantime, said the experience of freedom had “been a trip.” Just stepping in a grocery store or shopping for clothing at a mall overwhelms his senses, he said.

  But the best years of his life are lost forever, he says. He wonders what happened to his girlfriend, whom he lost contact with after being sent to prison. He breaks down when talking about his mother’s death in 2006 and how he missed the funeral."

Mr. Green's story is sad evidence of a failure of justice system and our society to correct the wrongdoings to people's lives.

Judgmental culture and new media technologies

The events surrounding what happened to Shirley Sharrod has taught us so many lessons about our actions in the world that anyone can write a so-called "news". Some of these lessons are written by the NYTimes Op-Ed contributor, Van Jones:

"The only solution is for Americans to adjust our culture over time to our new media technologies. The information system gives us more data than ever before, faster than ever before. But we don’t yet have the wisdom in place to help us deal with it."

"In time, we will. The worst of the partisans will get their comeuppance and become cautionary tales for others. Public leaders will learn to be more transparent. We will teach our children not to rush to judgment. Technology will evolve to better expose fakers."

"We have to understand that no one can be defined by a single photograph, open-mike gaffe or sound bite. Not even our greatest leaders could have survived if they had to be taken to task for every poorly conceived utterance or youthful demonstration of immature political views. When it comes to politics in the age of Facebook, the killer app to stop the “gotcha” bullies won’t be a technological one — it will be a wiser, more forgiving culture."