Angels, super-heroes, and perfection
Will: “This girl – she’s beautiful, she’s
smart, she’s fun. She’s different to the other girls I’ve been with.”
Sean: “So call her up, Romeo”
“Why? So I can realise that she’s not that smart? That she’s fucking boring? This girl’s perfect right now. I don’t want to ruin that.”
“Maybe you’re perfect right now. Maybe you
don’t want to ruin that.... You’re not perfect sport, and let me save you the
suspense – this girl you’ve met, she isn’t perfect either. But the question is
whether or not you’re perfect for each other.”
- from
Good Will Hunting
I look up to many people. I’ve idolised a few of them. The difference is this: I can admire someone
and still understand that they have flaws; but when I idolise somebody I see
only a part of them. To me they no longer have human failings, or if they do
then I perceive these as being strengths.
In every case this has made it difficult
for me to interact with them. And in every case I’ve ended up disappointed.
Nobody is perfect. And coming to see this only late in a relationship is painful.
We grow up reading fairy tales. It’s easy
to tell the good guys from the bad guys. The princes and princesses in these
stories are portrayed as wonderful and beautiful and perfect. Boys want to be
the prince, girls the princess. We learn to idolise from a young age. Fine for the heroes in stories for children,
but it teaches us that perfection exists.
It doesn’t; at least not for humans.
Idolising somebody places a barrier between
us. We can never really get to know them. When we realise our idol is part made
of lead – the human part – as well as lustrous gold, then we feel let down. But
the disappointment that we feel can allow us to review and reform our
relationship with them.
Remember, there are many ways to dehumanise
someone, and one of these is to idolise them.
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