Anita Moorjani

Anita Moorjani is the woman whose journey to the edge of death — and back — became one of the most influential spiritual stories of our time. Born Anita Shamdasani in Singapore to Indian Sindhi parents and raised in Hong Kong at the crossroads of Indian, British, and Chinese cultures, she spent much of her early life doing what so many do: suppressing herself to please others, and living quietly in fear. In 2002 she was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma, and after a four-year battle her body finally gave way. On the morning of February 2, 2006, she fell into a coma, her organs failing, and doctors told her family she had only hours to live. What happened next defied every expectation: Anita found herself in an expanded state of awareness — a near-death experience of overwhelming, unconditional love, in the presence of her late father and best friend — where she understood with total clarity that she had spent her life dimming her own light, and that healing awaited her if she chose to return. She chose to return. To her doctors' astonishment, her tumours shrank rapidly, and within weeks she was released from hospital — free of cancer. Her story reached Dr. Wayne Dyer, who was so moved that he asked his publisher, Hay House, to find her; the resulting memoir, Dying to Be Me (2012), hit the New York Times bestseller list within two weeks and has now sold over two million copies in some 45 languages, earning designation as a Contemporary Classic. Her medical records have been publicly scrutinised — including on The Dr. Oz Show — and her TED talk has drawn millions of views. Subsequent books, including What If This Is Heaven? and Sensitive Is the New Strong, extend her message to the empaths and sensitive souls she believes the world most needs. Named among the world's 100 most spiritually influential living people for twelve consecutive years and recipient of the New Thought Walden Award, Anita now travels the world speaking with warmth and humour to sold-out audiences, and gathers her global community through retreats, workshops, and her online Sanctuary. Her teaching distils what she learned on the other side into a handful of radical permissions: love yourself unconditionally, live fearlessly, let go of who you think you're supposed to be — because, as she discovered in that hospital bed, you are already magnificent, and heaven is not a place but a state of being.