Some awakenings come softly. Others arrive like a snake that swallows you whole.

At the height of her career, Cara Pacific Campbell had the kind of success people post about: awards, titles, and a thriving family. But when her body finally collapsed, no amount of willpower could hold it all together. Overcome by burnout and a chronic illness she couldn’t outwork, outthink, or outperform, she had to surrender everything she thought made her valuable.

Upspiraling: The Ancient Path to Wholeness is the raw, sometimes funny, always honest story of what happens when the body shuts down and the soul steps in. It’s about losing everything that isn’t real—and being remade from the inside out.

Through the intersecting worlds of neuroscience, psychology, and ancient spiritual traditions, Cara explores how unhealed trauma, chronic stress, and generational conditioning kept her trapped in survival mode and desperately searching for more. She examines how the nervous system, the subconscious, and even the cells themselves conspired to make and keep her sick—and how she used chronic illness as an invitation to find real healing.


In Upspiraling, you’ll discover:

• How chronic stress can keep your nervous system stuck in survival mode—and how to shift out of it
• How somatic awareness and emotional honesty uncover the patterns draining your energy
• How inherited beliefs and overachiever/ good girl conditioning can fuel collapse—and what changes when you finally release them
• How ancient practices (including the shamanic medicine wheel) can help you reclaim your inner compass

“I was hooked from page one! If you’re curious about shamanism and wondering what it looks like to be initiated as a shaman, Cara's story is both riveting + relatable! Just like Cara, you are being guided….will you say yes to the adventure?”
- Sarah Bamford Seidelmann MD, author of Swimming with Elephants

“Cara’s story is fierce, honest, and wildly liberating. She invites you into the raw places most of us avoid, and somehow makes the journey feel like permission to finally stop performing and start telling the truth. This book is medicine for anyone who’s exhausted from pushing, striving, and pretending. It’s powerful, courageous, and needed.”
- Rebecca Shisler Marshall, PhD, author of Whole Body Upgrade

A bold, compelling story told in a vibrant, lovable voice, and quite likely the truth you’ve been longing to hear.
From sales director to shamanism, Cara Pacific Campbell brings us on her journey to death’s door and home again with deep, applicable wisdom to share.

By all conventionally accepted metrics, Cara was highly, highly successful, living the very good life, raring to meet and greet any challenge, a born leader who could fix every sad situation with a solid solution… except for her body that broke down every so often. Finally it gave out and forced her to surrender the career that she thought defined her, along with her addiction to success on society’s terms. And then she was forced to reassess and bring forth what she truly wanted from life.

Being Cara, she’s paying it forward in this retelling. I’ve learned so much from her that I can directly apply to my life, and so—I suspect strongly—will you.
- Amy Hallberg, author of German Awakening

This is not a book about fixing yourself. It’s about remembering who you are.

If you’re tired of white-knuckling your way through life—and ready to trade hustle for wholeness—Upspiraling will meet you where you are and walk you home. Buy your copy today.

268 Pages