Your Heroes Are Not Real

Why Syndrome was right

May 17, 2025

“Accept that all of your heroes are full of crap. Your heroes aren’t gods. They’re just regular people who got good at one thing by sacrificing literally everything else”
-Jason Pargin

This has some serious Syndrome post meeting Mr Incredible vibes. You idolize the rockstar, the academic, the athlete. They do things you dream you can do, have the life you wish you could have, and just look flat out cool while doing it.

It’s not that this is a facade put on by your idol, it’s one you unwittingly put on yourself. You have zoomed in on one specific characteristic and assumed it denotes character as a whole. Zoom out, you’ll see the tradeoffs.

You don’t need to rip the poster off the wall, just realize the person on the wall doesn’t actually exist.