How to Stop Worshipping Muppets and Save Your Sanity
The day you stop putting people on a pedestal and seeing them through some rosy bullshit filter is the day your brain finally stops leaking out of your ears.
For years you walk around treating total muppets like they are profound geniuses just because they wear a nice suit or speak with a polished accent, when in reality they are just as clueless, greedy, and prone to taking a massive dump on your carpet as any wild animal.
You spend your twenties forgiving absolute boundary-stomping behaviour from partners, friends, and bossy managers, convincing yourself that deep down inside their twisted little souls lies a golden heart waiting to be rescued by your endless patience. Sitting out here in Asia drinking cheap lager in thirty-degree heat while watching the old country crumble from three thousand miles away gives you a right proper perspective on how much time you wasted giving bad actors the benefit of the doubt.
The moment you realise that most people are just self-interested meat sacks driven by fear, status, and whatever free sausage roll is dangling in front of their noses, the whole fake illusion collapses and you finally start breathing clear air.
Governments, corporate suits, and bank managers rely entirely on you romanticizing them so they can keep their fat fingers in your back pocket without you raising a fist.
They paint themselves as noble public servants and brilliant industry leaders, but once you strip away the expensive PR machinery and look at the actual results, you see a bunch of overpaid toddlers smashing the toys because nobody ever told them no. It is the exact same dynamic with personal relationships, where you spend years inventing excuses for some self-absorbed narcissist who wouldn’t pull you out of a burning ditch unless there was a photo opportunity in it for them.
You stop looking at what people promise to be and start looking at what they actually deliver on the ground, which cuts through the endless fog of emotional blackmails and political propaganda like a hot blade through lard. Suddenly you do not get disappointed when a politician lies, a bank steals your money through hidden fees, or a dodgy mate stabs you in the spine for twenty quid, because you expected them to act like rats the second the lights went out anyway.
Stripping away the romantic fairytale does not turn you into a bitter old bastard living in a dark cave, it just turns you into someone who cannot be played for a fool ever again. You start picking your inner circle like a paranoid nightclub bouncer, kicking out the freeloaders, the drama junkies, and the fake visionaries who live on empty talk and zero execution.
You look back at your younger self crying over some broken heart or stressing over some middle management performance review and you just want to shake that soft lad by the shoulders until his teeth rattle. Once you accept that the world is run by insecure apes wearing expensive watches, you stop begging for their approval and start building your own castle where their endless nonsense cannot reach you.
The whole circus keeps running on the backs of gullible fools who still believe the clowns are in charge of something important, but once you see the red noses for what they are, you just sit back, enjoy your drink, and laugh as the big top catches fire.