By: Lisa Patrick
Holly Porter’s career spans more than two decades across entrepreneurship, real estate, event production, and business consulting. As the founder or co-founder of eleven ventures, she has built a professional life grounded in leadership, strategy, and service. Yet it was an unexpected and life-altering health crisis that ultimately reshaped the direction of her work—and her understanding of purpose.
During a seventy-day hospitalization with COVID, Porter faced a near-death experience that stripped away her voice, physical strength, and sensory awareness. Removed from the identity she had long associated with achievement and momentum, she encountered what she describes as a profound moment of clarity—an experience she refers to as the “Stadium of Light.” In that space, she came to understand that her life’s work was unfinished, and that survival alone was not the point.
That experience became the foundation for her book, Near Death Shift: What Dying Taught Me About Life, Business, and Purpose. Rather than positioning the book as a memoir alone, Porter frames it as a reflection on how confronting death can radically reorient how one lives, leads, and relates to the world.
In Near Death Shift, Porter traces the emotional and spiritual terrain of her recovery, offering insight into what it means to surrender control while remaining engaged with life. What distinguishes the book is the way she translates an ineffable experience into a practical framework for everyday living. Her SHIFT model—Surrender, Hope, Intuition, Faith, and Transformation—emerged not as a theoretical construct, but as a lived process forged during recovery. As she relearned how to walk, breathe, and function independently, Porter also began to rebuild her sense of mission, guided less by urgency and more by intuition.
“You don’t have to die to experience a near-life awakening,” Porter writes. “You just have to be willing to shift.”
The book speaks to a broad audience, particularly entrepreneurs, leaders, and individuals navigating moments of uncertainty or transition. By blending reflections on leadership with spiritual inquiry, Porter challenges the assumption that resilience must come at the expense of inner alignment. Instead, she proposes that clarity, compassion, and purpose can coexist with ambition and impact.
Porter’s professional life reflects the same themes explored in her writing. As CEO of Retreat RnR and founder of the Adventure Bucket Wish Foundation, she focuses on creating environments where individuals—particularly women—can reconnect with identity, possibility, and purpose. Through retreats, mentoring, and consulting, she emphasizes leadership that integrates emotional awareness with strategic action.
Her work has been recognized with numerous honors, including the President’s Lifetime Achievement Award for over 4,000 hours of volunteer service, the Unite 2025 World Honoree Award from Leaders of All Nations International (LOANI), and an Honorary Doctorate in Humanitarianism from the Global International Alliance. In 2025, she was also presented with the Beautiful Survivors Award by LOANI.
At its core, Near Death Shift positions hardship not as something to bypass, but as a teacher. By blending personal narrative with spiritual reflection, the book invites readers to consider how illness, loss, or burnout can become catalysts for clarity. Rather than offering fixed answers, Porter encourages inquiry—asking what remains when familiar identities fall away, and how faith and presence can shape what comes next.
In a culture that often prioritizes relentless momentum, Holly Porter’s work invites a different conversation—one centered on listening, recalibration, and trust. Her story is not framed as a triumph over hardship, but as an ongoing practice of choosing alignment over autopilot and meaning over momentum. Porter’s journey is a testament to the power of resilience not as a means of survival, but as a path to profound personal transformation, reminding others that true success comes from embracing both struggle and surrender.
Near Death Shift is available through Holly Porter’s official website, as well as through major book retailers.
