Paranoia

Does anyone here suffer from a tendency towards paranoia?

Yes, Me, but My advice is "Paranoia" is a thing to learn about and to heed, just like any other Sense - just like Sight or Hearing: If One hears or sees something coming to engage You, then that is the time to pay attention and perhaps to Act... or in this case, "be paranoid". Paranoia is also often dismissed by others, just like "over-sensitive" sight or hearing, too... because it is aimed at Yourself, others can dismiss it as "just imagining things", because what happens is likely not aimed at *them*...

I hope this is so far understood. I shall say some other things, mostly about My own experience(s) now. *External* matters are the cause of paranoia, as if something had occurred to trigger that awareness, and keep it so high a concern. Just like having once being partly blinded or deafened, there is an awareness there. The BIG problem & trick is to "manage" it, and learn from it...

There is a difference between Paranoia and *Justified Paranoia*. If beginning, start simply, by not projecting it or assuming it of all others --- e.g. "stand tall and ignore others". When the paranoia is justified, then pay quick attention to the feeling and get used to it. People who really are whispering or plotting against You, will usually show it via body language or actions. Then learn about that and see what happens, and even if nothing happens just then, remember it and get used to it.

...I cannot really advise much more, since everyone is different and this leads onto lots of different topics (e.g. body language, gestures, bullying, etc.) But I am posting this anyway, to mostly say to not dismiss things totally but rather to take into perspective direction towards a learning situation. 

Thanks for your detailed reply. I like the idea of standing tall. Most of my paranoia happens at night when I'm alone, ruminating over the events of the day and beating myself up about it. But I will try working on this when I get some energy back. My workload is crushing me at the moment. 

Thanks for your detailed reply. I like the idea of standing tall. Most of my paranoia happens at night when I'm alone, ruminating over the events of the day and beating myself up about it. But I will try working on this when I get some energy back. My workload is crushing me at the moment. 

In that case, it sounds like you’re tired at the end of the day and instead of saying to yourself when you get home, ok, I’m tired, it’s been a busy day for me, so I now need to do something that will help relax me, such as listening to relaxing music through headphones or whatever it is that relaxes you, instead of simply allowing the mind to run wild.

This is not easy, I’m currently working on it myself, but you’ve got a good start - you’ve identified that it happens most often in the evenings when you’re alone and the day is done. So it could be helpful to begin to build some relaxation strategies into your day, for example, as soon as you get home you do x,y or z ~ whatever it is that helps you to wind down and what I’m finding is, that when I do that, I don’t even need to ruminate on the day, all the conversations I’ve had etc etc ~ sometimes I can see those thoughts going through my mind but because I’m so relaxed I can allow them to just be and when I don’t pay attention to them they don’t harm me. 

For me, what I’m finding is that I’m going to have to create/build/find strategies that work for me that I can build into my daily routines to enable me to be more relaxed and minimise and eventually even prevent this cyclic obsessive thinking I get into which can often look like paranoia and always involves me giving myself a hard time. Good luck