We all have a tendency to idolize the people that impress us. Those icons who we think are epitomes of perfection, possessing qualities which we can only dream about and working in ways that just astounds us. Be it actors, musicians, political leaders, social activists, comedians, or even our next door neighbor. We are star struck by them.
But when we idolize these personas, what is it that we are really admiring? The image that we have in our minds of these people is so incredibly skewed! We select the parts of that person that we admire and eliminate all the other characteristics that make up that person as a whole. We focus on the parts that we consider brilliant and expect that person to be like that forever and always.
To take the example of an actor, oftentimes we love a certain character so much that we connect the actor portraying it to only that character. It’s like we forget that that person exists as somebody else in real life and might be different from what we expect. That actor, no matter how much we wish for it, is not going to be a mirror image of our beloved character. And because we are unable to accept this fact, we start criticizing the actor.
We start finding reasons to hate that person so much so that the actor actually risks either getting the wrath of his ‘fan’ base or putting up a facade at all times for everybody else to see. The same is true for all of our idols. These people who we probably admire more for the way that we think that they are than what they truly are. This sense of mistaken admiration is forcing people to put on pretences and act as if they are a different kind of perfect, one that is acceptable in society and one that the broader audience can aspire towards.
This is resulting in a very pretentious and fake society, where no one is really able to be themselves for fear of jostling somebody’s preconceived notions. We have to start giving the other person a chance to truly be themselves before we start judging and idolizing. If we become more accepting of the person as they truly are and just detach ourselves from our imagination of a person to their real self, there will be much less to complain about and a lot more to admire.
