Paranoia and the Paranoid's Relationship to the World

In the world inhabited by a paranoid person, nothing just happens to him. Everything is done to him. And the paranoid creates a world in which his persecution is the dry iving engine and sole purpose of that universe. As this way of thinking sets in, it's only a matter of time before paranoia turns into panic. The idea that most things that happen have nothing whatever to do with him is increasingly lost on the paranoid. When people lack a grounded sense of their own identity, anything can be experienced as a grave threat to break that identity up. It becomes difficult for the paranoid to even conceive of a truly independent, indifferent other.