Things Not To Worry About

I frequently have trouble sleeping. Chalk it up to being bipolar, to being prone to nightmares, to general restlessness and an overabundance of energy that doesn’t get expended due to a mostly sedentary existence, or garden variety insomnia. Whatever the cause, I rarely sleep more than 6 hours a night, and frequently have trouble even getting that much.

Enter the wondrous world of guided meditation, ASMR, and Bob Ross. My iPad frequently sits beside me, broadcasting soothing tones, noises of fabric and brushes crinkling and sweeping, rain sounds and the like. Those generally are enough to get me under, though there’s no guarantee that I’ll stay that way.

But it also leads to irrational fears. Not in the case of Bob Ross – I’m pretty sure I trust him, anyway – but with some of those meditation/hypnosis videos. I mean, given that they put me out, how do I really know what suggestions they’re giving me?

One says it helps boost self-esteem. Another claims it will help attract wealth. A third states that it gets you in touch with your creativity and yet another says it helps end procrastination. Maybe they do; I’ve been doing a lot better in all those areas recently. Of course, I’ve been listening to them for a lot longer than just the last couple of months, and they didn’t seem to be helping in those regards until the doctors found the correct mad science mixture of mood stabilizers, steroids and antidepressants and my employers put me on the fast track for being a trainer and team leader, so… grains of salt, eh?

But I find myself wondering if maybe those soothing audio tracks have other, more sinister purposes. The label says it’s going to help you with depression, but what if there are actually suggestions in there to enhance it? Or to make you buy a particular product, or to do something else unpleasant or unhelpful?

Maybe even to kill?

I know it’s irrational. I know it’s silly. But the idea still bothers me. Maybe I should just stick to Bob. He’s safe. He won’t tell me to hurt anyone. I think.

Irrational or not, though, it sounds like an amusing story idea, at least…

What about you out there? Is there some inane and beneficial thing that you do or use that you sometimes worry might be bent to sinister purposes? Let us know down below!