I didn’t set out to become a grief expert.
For more than two decades, I helped build startup companies. Then life asked me to build something I never imagined: a new version of myself.
In 2018, my healthy 12-year-old son, Tommy, passed away unexpectedly. Doctors couldn’t explain why, and I couldn’t imagine how to move forward.
So I did what entrepreneurs do.
I began again.
The same mindset that helps founders navigate uncertainty, reinvention, and impossible odds became the framework that helped me survive the unthinkable. Along the way, I discovered something surprising: healing isn’t about getting your old life back. It’s about growing into a life you never could have imagined before.
Today, through my writing, speaking, and the TM23 Foundation, I share my story and all that I have learned about healing and transformation to make the process easier for others, to provide a template that school never taught us, and to give people hope that even life’s hardest moments can become the beginning of a new purpose, a more open heart, and a life full of boundless possibilities and meaning.
I believe…
Survival isn’t enough.
Love keeps growing even after loss.
We honor the people we love by fully living.
Play is one of the strongest remedies for pain.
The unthinkable is an invitation for transformation.
Our lives and our hearts are meant to keep expanding.
More About Nikki Mark
Nikki speaks around the world about what becomes possible after life’s hardest moments.
Her work blends entrepreneurship, storytelling, and lived experience to offer alternative ways of healing our hearts and help people rethink what comes next after loss.
Through keynote speaking, TEDx talks, books, articles and special events, she invites audiences into a conversation that’s practical, hopeful and deeply healing for the human heart.
Most people know Nikki as a writer and speaker sharing all she’s learned about life, death and the journey in between.
She’s actually teaching something even more expansive.
How to rebuild a life when the old one no longer exists.
Recognition
Nationally Published
The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Oprah Daily, TODAY, Katie Couric Media, Maria Shriver’s Sunday Paper, and more.
National Media
People Magazine, The Kelly Clarkson Show, and other national media appearances.
Highly Acclaimed Memoir
Tommy’s Field praised by Publishers Weekly as an “inspirational debut” and described by Laura Dern as “a gift to a world in need of healing.”
$3.8M+
Raised through the TM23 Foundation
3
State-of-the-art Tommy’s Fields completed
1 More
Tommy’s Field currently in development
100,000+
Children playing on Tommy’s Fields each year
25,000+
Readers receiving Nikki’s weekly healing resources
