One of the many things I loved about the movie Selma was a scene, no more than five minutes long, maybe only a couple of minutes, that alluded to Dr. King’s infidelities. He cheated on Coretta.
Does that make his accomplishments less valuable? Less astonishing? Less inspiring?
Not to me. What it does is takes him off the pedestal of perfection – of framing him as a different kind of person – and instead shows him as a person, one who, in his own ways, was as flawed and fallible as the rest of us and yet still did extraordinary things.
We do this a lot, right? We label people extraordinary as though it’s a difference in their DNA rather than a difference in their decision making.
I think a piece of it is the whole thing where we compare our internal experience to others’ external presentation. We don’t see their self-doubt and confused inner processes the way we see every excruciating detail of our own.
I think another piece of it is that if we see extraordinary people – whether it’s Dr. King or your mentor – as ordinary people making extraordinary decisions, then we feel the full weight of our ability, and responsibility, to make extraordinary decisions… if, indeed, that’s the life we want…