How to stop idealizing people — almost no one talks about this step. Not in self-help books, not in therapy, not in personal development courses. And yet it’s the one thing that makes real independence possible.
I want to talk about achieving independence — specifically about one step whose absence makes it impossible to get there. To that state of choice. Of no longer acting out of fear of loss.
This is a step I’ve had to take many times to make a significant change. It was absolutely necessary. And at the same time I’ve watched many people who wouldn’t allow themselves to take it — and because of that they kept going in circles, or significantly delayed the change that was already trying to happen.
That’s why this article exists.
The Step
Allow yourself to move from one extreme to the other.
There are two extremes here. The first: idealizing — seeing someone or something as perfect, making endless excuses, refusing to see what’s really there. The second: the anger and disgust that come when the illusion breaks. Most people are stuck in the first. Almost no one talks about the necessity of the second.
From idealizing someone — a friend, a parent — or something — a job, a situation — to actually seeing their flaws. Their unfair behaviors. Their words that have no basis in fact. Conditions that maybe aren’t as perfect as you thought, as you wanted to believe. Allow yourself to feel the disgust and anger that comes with that — which doesn’t mean you have to pour it all over that person right away.
Don’t be afraid of the feelings that start to take over when the rose-colored glasses finally come off. They will be strong. Sometimes very strong. You might worry that you’ll stop liking someone, stop loving them — or that these feelings will stay with you forever and make any further relationship impossible. That everything will change.
Your subconscious might want to pull you back to familiar ground — back to idealizing, to eternally making excuses for someone, to believing what you want to believe.
And here’s the most interesting part: that anger, that disgust — the second extreme — it’s not permanent. Often it’s surprisingly temporary. And yet it plays a crucial role in finding the middle ground between the two — which is what a healthy relationship actually looks like. You don’t need to control this process. You just need to allow yourself to feel what starts coming up when the illusion falls away.
The Teenage Rebellion Analogy
To make this concrete — it’s the same process we call teenage rebellion.
A child who is trusting and fully dependent on their parents — who they usually imitate — enters a phase of rebellion. A moment where parents are “terrible,” but also where the teenager starts to genuinely see their flaws and inconsistencies. This process is difficult — but it’s necessary for that child to later become an independent adult. Someone who can choose to maintain a healthy relationship with their parents, enjoy their company, appreciate what they did — while also seeing their shortcomings realistically. (This doesn’t apply to pathological relationships.)
What This Has Looked Like in My Life
I’ve been through many moments where allowing myself to go from one extreme to the other helped me ultimately find a healthy balance — and was necessary to gain real independence.
Starting with my relationship with my parents, through contact with mentors, friends whose behavior was sometimes toxic — some of those relationships I consciously chose to end entirely. It was also a necessary step when it came to moving forward from jobs, to setting conditions in a way that actually worked for me. I’ll admit — I landed in good places where I genuinely thrived. But precisely because of that I also had a tendency to idealize the conditions and the people. When I started seeing more options I grew stronger — and started noticing things I hadn’t wanted to see before.
Fear would creep in — fear of ruining a “good situation,” or of going from bad to worse. Because when I finally looked clearly, I started feeling anger. Negative feelings directed outward — not at myself (as in “I’m not enough”) but at the situation (as in “they’re the ones behaving unfairly”).
And those feelings don’t mean you need to take drastic steps immediately — actually, it’s better to wait. They need to be accepted, allowed to exist. And then you’ll notice the mind starts to balance things out on its own — you’ll be aware of the real negatives, aware of what was genuinely good, and ready to position yourself in a way that actually works for you — or to decide to walk away entirely.
