Are the best chess players paranoid?

Thinking back over the years to the few masters and expert level players I have known and played OTB, I realized a common thread. Seems like they were all paranoid to some degree when it came to chess, always looking at what the other player could do to them and double/triple checking everything......

.....Do you mean cautious?

Caution can be a form of paranoia in it's extreme.

Isn't this "caution" justified though? They have been probably playing a game that lasts several hours (possibly with prior games played that same day) and chess has the unforgiving nature that one blunder can cost you the game. With so much time and effort invested, I don't really see this as caution, but rather the opposite. I think it would be careless if they didn't give such a careful inspection.

Crazy? Yes. Paranoid? Sometimes.

Nice to know I atleast have some attributes of a chess master.

I recently got a little more paranoid and my rating went up....makes me look carefully at what the other player can do instead of just concentrating on myself.