Falling Heroes: Why Heroes Tend to Self-Destruct

Gravity dictates that what goes up must come down. It might well be the law of human nature as well. Most people have an extensive and growing list of fallen heroes. In politics, we have seen Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, Ted Kennedy, Gary Hart, and John Edwards. In music we have had Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin, Jimmy Hendrix, Kurt Cobain, and Michael Jackson. In sports we have witnessed the fall of

O.J. Simpson, Mike Tyson, Kobe Bryant, and most recently Tiger Woods. Below, I will explore the dynamics of the hero to help explain why so many tend to collapse, burn out, drop out, or die.

I will refer to Joseph Campbell’s classic text The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949) in this paper and use his model of the hero as a point of departure. Campbell’s theory was that most hero myths across nearly every culture describe a similar journey. The hero hears a call to adventure and with the aid of a special person, he departs to a strange world where he is initiated in battle and returns home with a boon of wisdom to share with his culture. He calls this a

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“monomyth” and suggests that every great myth contains this narrative arc, including the lives of Jesus Christ and Buddha. Campbell’s writings and theories have been used by noted filmmakers, including George Lucas as well as the writers of the following film series: the Matrix, Batman, and Harry Potter. He summarizes: “A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are then encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man” (p. 30).

I wish to discuss three elements of the hero myth. The first is early childhood precursors of the hero, which are always referred to. The second is the role of the mentor or guide in the hero’s life, and the third is the overcompensation seen in most hero stories.

The Anti-hero within Every Hero

Nearly every comic book hero has an alter-ego. Superman’s also Clark Kent, Spiderman’s Peter Parker, and Batman’s Bruce Wayne. These comic book heroes were all orphaned at an early age: Superman was orphaned when Krypton was destroyed, Bruce Wayne witnessed the death of his parents, and Peter Parker not only was orphaned, but also lost the kindly uncle who raised him.

In our real life heroes, we frequently can see similar childhood trauma. Barack Obama’s father left before Barack was a year old, Bill Clinton’s father was killed in a car accident before he was born, and Richard Nixon had an abusive father and controlling mother. Tiger Woods, an African American raised in an all-white neighborhood, was ridiculed throughout childhood. Early childhood experiences are formative. When a child experiences this kind of chronic deprivation, loss, or parental failure, they will frequently develop a narcissistic character structure. Inside, they remain the “antihero,” the indecisive, frightened, self-hating, and empty

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self. On the inside they are confused, hesitant, and shy Clark Kent hiding behind his glasses, and our real life heroes are the same. They simply suppress, repress, and deny their weak, self-hating persona; but it remains. Tiger Woods gave up his thick glasses and became a body builder, and Obama gave up his shyness, as did Nixon. They set themselves on a hero’s quest to redefine themselves without the benefit of a suit of armor, but the antihero remains alive.

I would suggest that contrary to Campbell’s idea that the hero hears a calling early on, it is more accurate to say that the hero has an inner need which gives them the enormous fuel it will take in order to reinvent themselves into supermen. The journey is one that will take them 10 to 20 years to complete.

The Need of the Mentor or Guide

Campbell gives short time to the concept of the mentor. He simply says that after the hero commits to his quest, his guide or magical helper will appear to him. George Lucas gave this mentor figure more attention when he introduced Luke Skywalker to Jedi Master Yoda, whose puppet was modeled after the face of Albert Einstein. Yoda was Luke Skywalker’s mentor and teacher though in most films, comics, and usually in real life, the training period is minimized or denied. In therapy, the narcissistic patient will want to deny any real dependence, and this is what makes it so difficult to treat them successfully. As Heinz Kohut remarked, they tend to steal or swallow whole any interpretation and then run from the relationship prematurely. We even see that in the Star Wars series, when the young apprentice leaves Yoda before completing his training. In reality, this sets up the inevitable collapse of the hero, as we shall see in the next section.

Overcompensation and Inevitable Collapse

Alfred Adler (1870-1937), together with Freud and

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Jung, was one of the three founders of depth psychology. Adler was most famous for his theory of the inferiority complex and over-compensation, which I believe can be applied to the theory of the hero. We have seen how there is a duality in the makeup of mythic and real life heroes. Superman is also Clark Kent and Tiger Woods is also the shy, stuttering boy who was laughed at in kindergarten and tied to a tree. This duality, as Adler explained, sets up an endless and unconscious need to overcome a sense of inferiority and self-loathing. It produces the unquenchable greed and insatiable hunger, that we see in all heroes. If our hero, perchance, becomes as successful as Tiger Woods, then this leads to grandiosity, a sense of invulnerability, arrogance, and the fatal mistake. Such mistakes laid low Bill Clinton, Richard Nixon, and Tiger Woods.

Freud once wrote an article entitled, “Wrecked by Success,” and I used it to write about what happened to Don Imus, the famous radio shock jock who went too far and was fired. Many of our heroes are wrecked by success because they are driven by the unquenchable need to undo childhood emptiness, and ultimately cloak it with a sense of omnipotence. This is quickly followed by a collapse or a grand mistake. It is what killed Michael Jackson, who worked himself to death; it brought down Tiger Woods, who sought women to fill up his particular emptiness; and it destroys most of the rest.

Conclusion

This is the sad story of the hero; it is not a story of rising action to the glorious summit as Campbell outlined for us. The rising action of the hero is often followed by falling action and a sad denouement: the hero is defeated by his own nature, one that is hidden from him and us until the last chapter. Tiger Woods, Richard Nixon, and the other modern heroes live out their lives in shame with their scarlet letter, and we the public simply change the channel and look for another

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hero to adore. So where is the boon that Campbell spoke of? What do we learn from these heroes? An immoderate life will inevitably destroy you, but it certainly is entertaining to watch it happen. Such is the hero’s life.

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