Paul Monaco .org

As a Buddhist I believe in making good cause to receive great benefit.  Kiva is an organization that helps you do that in a really easy way.

Many entreprenuers in developing or poverty stricken areas have a great deal of difficulty securing capital to reinvest into their businesses to foster growth.  Sometimes it’s due to a lack of established credit, other times the amount needed is so low that large financial institutions don’t find this a profitable venture.

In May 2007 I used Kiva to help out Maria Elena Cabral Guerrerawith a small loan to help her purchase inventory for her shoe sales business.  You can imagine how great this made me feel.  Though I’m generally a very charitable person, I suffer from being extremely skeptical of charitable organizations and even more skeptical of the people who seek assistance.  With Kiva, people who receive funds are fully expected to pay it back and they work hard to do so.. which is indicated by their 95% re-payment rate. 

Now that Maria has payed back her loan, the funds are marked as available.  In the next few days I’ll make another post and share with you how I re-invested and may actually take on an additional business to support.  What better way is there to kick off the Year Of Capable People and Development!

What karmic timing.  Nearly a year ago when I launched PaulMonaco.com I kicked it off with the 2007 theme of the Soka Gakkai which was “2007 - Year of Advancement and Victory” and today in alignment with 2008 being dubbed “2008 - The Year of Capable people and Development” I launch both PaulMonaco.org and PaulMonaco.net!

Looking back over the past year it truly has been a year of advancement and victory for me.  I’ve developed a very strong faith in my Buddhist practice, introduced several people to the practice one of which who has official professed his dedication to this Buddhism by receiving the Gohonzon and in general have just completly moved my karma in a positive direction.

Not only have I done much for myself by quitting smoking and drinking but my making of financial contributions both to the advancement of the Soka Gakkai as well as other charitable organizations such as Kiva.org  have all caused benefits to come back to me tenfold.

With all this in mind, this site will focus on health, environmental, spiritual and other similar issues as seen through my Buddhist eyes. 

Thank you for reading and being here to witness this stage of development in my life.

p.s. - More light hearted posts can be found at paulmonaco.com and to satisfy the inner geek in your paulmonaco.net has just been launched as well!