http://www.ncreview.com/ 1934-1127 http://www.ncreview.com/biography/dying-to-be-me-my-journey-from-cancer-to-near-death-to-true-healing Anita Moorjani’s first book is the moving, almost unbelievable experience of Moorjani being in end-stage lymphoma, raced to the hospital in a coma as her organs shut down in the final hours before her death, and then returning from the coma and returning to good health in just a few weeks after a transformative experience on the other side of life. The insights and understandings she gained about what had caused her cancer, what her ongoing life’s purpose was meant to be, how to heal herself, and how to love life in a profound way is the topic of this first book. Moorjani’s story of her experience went ‘viral’ when she shared it on the “Near Death Experience Research Foundation” website. It was given the site’s highest rating due to the well-documented medical records, doctor’s reports, and medical tests that accompanied it. Soon, a U.S. doctor flew to Hong Kong who was researching “spontaneous remission” met with her in Hong Kong to hear more about her incredible journey, and, then, through a marvelous set of synchronicities and ‘divine’ accidents her story came to Wayne Dyer’s attention. He urged her to write a book and basically commanded Hay House to publish it. But, even more important, than the depth of information Moorjani shares with the reader about her early life, her experience with cancer, and her revelations on the other side is her thoughtful and gentle advice about how to live one’s life right now. She came back from the other side with the newfound understanding that self-hate and fear had driven her own creative forces to ‘create’ her cancer. She says, “When I relinquished my hold on physical life, I didn’t feel I needed to do anything in particular to enter the other realm such as pray, chant, use mantras, forgiveness, or any other technique….I instinctively understood that I was dying because of all my fears. I wasn’t expressing my true self because worries were preventing me from doing so….” Moorjani now “allows” life. Moorjani is very careful to avoid proselytizing or insisting that people act or believe any or all of what she writes about. She knows now, in the deepest way, that we are all on individual journeys of magnificence, self-discovery, and creativity. She does not seek to give anyone “a right path”—just reminds them that we are truly all One and that physical life is meant to be a place of joy! For anyone wrestling with a disease, driving oneself to be ‘perfect’, living in sadness or aloneness, this is perhaps the best book to read right now. The reader will come away knowing that he or she is perfect and magnificent--right here and right now!! ]]> Fri, 24 Aug 2012 04:36:03 -0700 1934-989 http://www.ncreview.com/biography/dying-to-be-me-my-journey-from-cancer-to-near-death-to-true-healing Growing up, Anita Moorjani tried to mold herself into what was expected of her by others and by her culture, causing emotional and psychological triggers that she believes contributed to a four-year battle with cancer that shut down her organs and nearly took her life. In a coma in the hospital, as doctors prepared Anita’s family for her imminent death, she left her body and experienced a life with no limits, a freedom from physical and emotional pain, an understanding of what caused her cancer, and a choice to return to the living. Dying to be Me, now a New York Times bestseller, chronicles her early years of suppressing her real self, her journey to death and back, and the miraculous healing that followed. In writing this inspirational memoir, she hopes to help others benefit from what she learned about healing and living “as a reflection of who we really are,” and experience the unconditional love that is within and around us always. ]]> Fri, 13 Apr 2012 03:13:42 -0700 1934-876 http://www.ncreview.com/biography/dying-to-be-me-my-journey-from-cancer-to-near-death-to-true-healing "I believe that the greatest truths of the universe don’t lie outside, in the study of the stars and planets. They lie deep within us, in the magnificence of our heart, mind, and soul. Until we understand what is within, we can’t understand what is without." So begins this true account of one woman’s journey to the edge of death and her medically miraculous return. Moorjani was an ordinary person who, like many of us, had some issues with self-worth: she describes herself as a “people pleaser” who feared disapproval, regardless of the source. Her struggle to please everyone was amplified by being born into traditional Hindu heritage and living within a Chinese culture that was largely under British influence. These divergent cultural expectations amplified her lifelong fear of disapproval and not being “good enough.” As a young married woman she was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma in 2002, and after four long years of trying every alternative treatment she could imagine, she slipped into a coma as her vital organs began shutting down. Her brain and lungs were filled with fluid, she had tumors the size of lemons from the base of her skull to her abdomen, and her skin was split open with lesions trying to excrete the toxins: the doctors said she had only hours to live. As the hospital staff busied around her and family members arrived, she was acutely aware of every detail—and yet felt nothing. She had been released from all her physical and emotional pain, and she felt magnificent. During her 24-hour coma, Moorjani had a NDE experience that she describes as a realm of clarity and expansiveness: “a state of being.” Moorjani understood her spiritual essence, her oneness with Universal energy, and that the universe is comprised of unconditional love. Making the choice to return, she knew that “every cell in my body would respond.” Her rapid and complete return to health defies all medical knowledge and is verified by numerous tests performed following her recovery that she was, and continues to be, completely healed. “Realizing that I am love was the most important lesson I learned, allowing me to release all fear, and that’s the key that saved my life,” Moorjani recalls. This soul-searching memoir is a cathartic testimony to the true magnificence and healing capacity of every human being. ]]> Fri, 06 Jan 2012 15:05:39 -0800