Upward Spiral Workbook
Positive life changes lead to positive brain changes. Drawing on the huge success of his groundbreaking book, The Upward Spiral, neuroscientist Alex Korb offers actionable, step-by-step skills to help you reshape your brain and create an upward spiral towards a happier, healthier life.
Depression is defined by a collection of symptoms. You feel crappy most of the time. Nothing seems interesting, and everything seems overwhelming. You have trouble with sleep. You feel guilty and anxious and have thoughts that life isn’t worth living. Each symptom reinforces and inspires new symptoms, and this is a sign that your brain circuits are caught in the downward spiral of depression. So, how can you reverse it?
In his first book, The Upward Spiral, neuroscientist Alex Korb demystified the intricate brain processes that cause depression and outlined a practical and effective approach for getting better. Based on the latest research, this evidence-based workbook takes the theory behind Korb’s breakthrough book and distills it into concrete, actionable exercises and skills.
Just as one small trigger can drag you down, an effective intervention can start enough momentum to carry you back up. Exercise, attention to breathing, gratitude, sleep hygiene, and positive social interactions are just some of the offerings in this workbook that can help alter activity in specific neural circuits, setting you on the path toward an upward spiral to happiness and well-being.
Editorial Reviews
“The Upward Spiral approach to well-being blends the best of cutting-edge science with practical step-by-step instructions for improving your life. Alex Korb is a scientist and coach, insightful guide and encouraging teacher, who in this workbook offers you grounded ways to bring an uplifting strategy to ease anxiety and melt away depression to live a more meaningful, connected, and inspiring life ahead.”
—Daniel J. Siegel, MD, New York Times bestselling author of Aware
“The Upward Spiral is a helpful and eminently sensible approach to changing the thoughts and behaviors associated with depression. Alex Korb provides a practical guide for getting a handle on the disruption and pain caused by this common and painful condition.”
—Kay Redfield Jamison, author of An Unquiet Mind, and Pulitzer Prize finalist for Robert Lowell, Setting the River on Fire
“Deeply practical and effective tools based in science to not only grow strengths for resiliency around anxiety and depression—but also boost your skills for happiness.”
—Elisha Goldstein, PhD, author of Uncovering Happiness
“This easy-to-read book is chock-full of simple-to-do, scientifically supported ideas and exercises to overcome depression. Can you benefit from Korb’s techniques to train your brain to adopt new thinking and acting patterns that can also prevent depression from coming back? Let’s see. Change your facial expression as if you were smiling. If you can do this, you can do the antidepression exercises in this book. As you test new, helpful ideas and habit-forming actions, you may soon enough find the powerlessness thinking of pessimism replaced by the powerful thinking of realistic optimism. At that point, here is a question for you: What did I learn by taking charge of my own progress?”
—William Knaus, EdD, author of The Cognitive Behavioral Workbook for Depression and The Cognitive Behavioral Workbook for Anxiety
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