Security Paranoia?
Ever find yourself worried about your security? Whether physical, digital, or emotional, security is a panic inducing topic. At times security can cause crippling paranoia due to circumstances that are out of your control.
The other day at the local McDonald’s, the cashier was texting on her phone and took a little less than a minute to process my payment. This caused my brain to immediately think the worst and become fearful that maybe the cashier was taking pictures of the card. I recognized that this was just paranoia and that it could be possible that she was just texting and nothing malicious took place. However, my brain couldn’t help but continue to feel as though my security was violated.
Another situation occurred recently where I needed to share card details over the phone to complete a payment. In general, I typically am against this practice and will ask for other options for payment, however there were no additional options and this was a time sensitive matter. Unfortunately, these kinds of moments are the moments when your security can be easily compromised so I did my due dilligence to confirm that who I was speaking to was my intended subject. While I was already paranoid during the situation, as I began to provide payment details the phone connection began to make all kinds of odd sounds that were reminiscent of dial up tones. My paranoia was off the charts because it felt like this was some sort of eavesdropping or recording happening. Though once payment was complete, I received my receipt via email and confirmed that the receipt was from the intended sender. This put me at ease but ultimately the feeling of paranoia remains.
At times I find the feeling of paranoia so crippling that it can alter how you live life. In the last year I faithfully left the house at 5 am to go to the gym, but paranoia of physical security settled in and now my morning workouts are completed strictly from home.
There is no solution to the feeling of security paranoia, only measures you can take to minimize the amount of paranoia. Take those measures where you can and try your best to still live life uneffected by what has not occurred. Too often we worry about the things that aren’t reality and allow real life to pass us by. While security is important, life is too short to allow crippling paranoia to be an influence.