Let me shift the topic a bit from the usual negosyo columns I write. My wife and I decided to visit our daughter in LA. She studies in Enderun Manila and is doing a six-month internship with the Peninsula in Beverly Hills. She’s the only Filipina that they’ve ever accepted, due to her persistence and constant follow-ups in getting them to accept. In a meeting in Manila, they visited the school and decided to accept her this one time. As usual, she does not even want us to eat or stay in the hotel as she’s embarrassed to let people know who she is.

The Internet in America today is so widely accessible that you can’t live without it, and it’s now even more important than TV to this new generation. For the first time, I decided to download a book using Kindle in my iPad. I bought a book from Amazon, one of what I’ve been hearing about a lot lately. It’s about a four-year old boy who had a near death experience, and this book has sold 3.4 million copies, excluding ebooks, in a matter of a few months. The book is called Heaven is for Real.

So for the first time, I decided to download it through Amazon and read it using my iPad. I’m not a reader but the moment I opened the first chapter, I could not stop and finished reading the ebook in an hour. Over the past years I’ve read stories about near-death experience, and one other book that stuck with me is called Into the Light. I’ve also heard of numerous stories, like the one of my wife when she had a dream about her mother. My wife, too, had a similar experience. Her mom died at a young age. We just had Christian, our eldest today, who was about three months old then. She was quite close to her mom, being the eldest in the family. After many years, her mom appeared to her in a dream and showed her how heaven looked like–streets of gold, angels singing, and her mom looking young as ever–she recounts her dream to me. She said people do not age in heaven.

What makes this book different is that this is about a four-year old boy who really did not know much about the Bible and the many secrets of his parents. It’s reassuring to know that heaven is for real. The story somehow relates to my wife’s dream – that we will all look young, that we will indeed still see our loved ones and so on and so forth.

I sent an email to my family to read it. I “gifted” my mom with it, (a feature in Amazon to send her the ebook) and she, too, was wowed by it. And she could not stop reading the book. On the other hand, a friend of mine asked me why I’m thinking of death. Jokingly, I said to her if one does not think of death once in a while then we would think we are immortal and never prepare for it.

As entrepreneurs, sometimes we need quiet time. Visiting my daughter, aside from accompanying my wife in shopping, is indeed quiet time for me. The book Heaven is for Real came to my attention months back, but it was only during my quiet time that I made an effort to read it. Many of the religious in faith still wonder and I sure have my doubts with the question, is there life after death? Well, this book through Colton does confirm heaven is for real. Even the image of Christ is identified in the book which is amazing.

For those who have lost a loved one, especially a child or parent, this book gives reassurance to the many questions you will have. It also provokes in us, especially in successful entrepreneurs, to start to do some project that will help those in poverty in our country. As we live our earthly life and our ambitious ways – and there is nothing wrong with that – but those who have been blessed to have more should find a way to share it and this can be done in many ways. I guess our real goal is to reach heaven as this is for real.

On Aug. 23, Go Negosyo will have its first forum on Social Entrepreneurship and we are gathering together the players and stakeholders in the SE field. As we pursue the entrepreneurship advocacy, we got exposed to inspiring social entrepreneurs who are the CHANGEMAKERS, helping solve specific social problems as their primary objective in running a business. It’s true, we can mix profit-making business with social work, and we believe this is a sustainable way to help communities and address social problems like poverty.

We’ve featured role models in the SE sector and we want to help develop more entrepreneurs with ‘social objectives’. In this Social Entrepreneurship Lunch Forum sponsored by the British Embassy, we’ll have our special guest speaker, Stephen Bubb, a leading social entrepreneur and advocate in UK. We’re inviting stakeholders in the SE field, including the league of corporate foundations, the SE organizations, government policy-makers and the Go Negosyo community of entrepreneurs. We hope we can increase the flock of SEs and develop CSI for existing businesses by integrating a social project in their operations.

This free-of-charge forum is by invitation only, but for those who want to be part of this special affair, let us know about your foundation and reserve for seats at 637-9229 or 631-8101 local 7106. Look for Jap Uminga or Steph Dy. Limited seats only.

Contact me: feedback@gonegosyo.net or Joey Concepcion Facebook account. Visit www.gonegosyo.net. Watch the top rating entrep show GO NEGOSYO: Kaya Mo! on GMA News TV, Saturday and Sunday 8 to 8:30 a.m.