Stop Overthinking Your Relationship

It’s time to stop overthinking your relationship! The four-step approach in this book will help you move beyond excessive rumination, so you can rediscover joy, ease, and meaningful connection with your partner.Rumination—obsessive thinking about an idea, situation, or choice that can interfere with normal life—is a common and destructive issue that can negatively impact romantic relationships, whether you’re just starting out or have been in a committed relationship for years. If you overthink your relationship and get stuck in cycles of anxiety, blame, or doubt, your negative thinking and judgments about your partner may be unfounded, unwanted, and may even threaten to tear apart an otherwise healthy relationship. You may feel anxious, worried, hopeless, and frustrated, but even if you know your overthinking is a problem, it can be seriously hard to stop.In Stop Overthinking Your Relationship, certified couples therapist Alicia Muñoz draws from cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and mindfulness to offer an effective, four-step approach to reduce rumination and change negative thinking patterns. By understanding both your own unique attachment style—as well as your partner’s—you’ll learn how to communicate more effectively, meet each other’s needs, and focus on what really matters in your relationship.Using the SLOW approach, you’ll learn how to: ·See rumination in process ·Label your rumination cycle ·Open yourself and make space ·Welcome blocked experiences This powerful blend of evidence-based psychology and practical guidance will help you overcome the unwanted thoughts and rumination that get in the way of trust and authenticity in your relationship. The book also includes individual and shared exercises, so you can “choose your own adventure” by working with the techniques alone, with your partner, or using a combination of both.By practicing the exercises in this user-friendly book, you’ll learn how to stop overthinking your relationship and discover a newfound sense of security, confidence, and wholeness—both as an individual and as part of a couple.

"Alicia Muñoz's Stop Overthinking Your Relationship highlights the problem of relationship rumination--and charts a path toward healthier relationships. The book focuses on how repetitive negative thinking absorbs too much of the energy and attention that a relationship needs to flourish. Muñoz says that this is a common problem in romantic relationships, but one that is not often discussed. She does the powerful work of helping individuals and couples to recognize the issue, as well as to cultivate the attention and compassion needed for change.... Stop Overthinking Your Relationship is a self-help book that gives couples the power to reclaim their relationships from repetitive negative thinking." --Foreword Reviews-- "Foreword Reviews", "Alicia Muñoz is a true artist--in how she sees the nuances of relationships and in how she helps readers address the complexities in simple yet effective ways. It doesn't hurt that she draws us in with writing that's at once compassionate, direct, and utterly engaging." --Livia Kent, MFA, editor in chief of Psychotherapy Networker--Livia Kent, MFA, "Anxiety and overthinking cloud the lens through which we view and experience our relationships, often fueling disconnection and challenges that, left unchecked, become increasingly difficult to overcome. In this book, Alicia Muñoz blends her expertise and vast experience to peel back the curtain on anxious overthinking, illustrate the overt and nuanced ways it affects relationships, and, importantly, she shares tools and practices that reveal a clear path to more understanding, connection, and love." --Jodi Richardson, PhD, international anxiety and well-being speaker; best-selling author of Anxious Kids and Anxious Mums; and host of the podcast, Well, hello anxiety--Jodi Richardson, PhD, "If you ever feel like you are drowning in the negative cycles of your own thought, this is the book for you. Alicia Muñoz provides a detailed description of this debilitating phenomenon, and an equally detailed description of the process of moving from rumination to engagement and connection. We recommend a careful reading and practice of the liberating processes." --Harville Hendrix, PhD, and Helen LaKelly Hunt, PhD, coauthors of Getting the Love You Want--Harville Hendrix, PhD, and Helen LaKelly Hunt, PhD, "If you've ever experienced the ways that incessant worrying can erode the foundation of a relationship or undermine your self-confidence, then you'll appreciate Alicia Muñoz's straightforward guide to slowing down, reconnecting to yourself and others, and finally resolving whatever might be causing your anxious mind to go into overdrive. Those thoughts will become a gift--once you learn how to unwrap them and use what's inside to reclaim your power." --Neil Sattin, host of the Relationship Alive podcast--Neil Sattin

Linda Carroll is an Oregon-based psychotherapist, workshop presenter, and author of numerous books, including "Love Cycles, The Five Essential Stages of Lasting Love and "Love Skills: The Keys to Unlocking Lasting, Wholehearted Love." She speaks frequently on the subject of relationship communication throughout the USA and Mexico.