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32 Things That Get Romanticized All The Time But For All The Wrong Reasons
Interview With Expert
Here’s my guilty confession: as a teenager, I was absolutely besotted by vampires, all thanks to Vampire Diaries. However, in hindsight, I don’t think I will just stand still if one comes barging after me in real life because I don’t want to be its food.
The thing is, almost all of us have such romanticized ideas of something, but they can all come crashing down when we actually have to live it in real life. When Reddit user SoloSammySilva asked, “What's something people only romanticize because they've never actually done it?” here’s what people had to say!
More info: Reddit
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
Being stalked. Seriously, a friend of mine was raving about a romance book where the guy stalks a woman and is obsessed with her “but he saves her life”. I’ve been stalked, nothing about it is romantic.
Allen Packard 2 weeks ago
No, it is not. Keyed my car, made up stories about me, accused me of vastly inappropriate things, not fun.
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#2
Living in the past
The 1920s weren't awesome. Nor were the 1200s or the 1400s. You wouldn't have enjoyed life more if you were a knight in medieval times, you'd probably just die from an infection.
JB 1 week ago
Every time I’m faced with someone saying vaccines are dangerous, what happened to the people who lived before vaccines? They died. Or they survived but had to suffer pain the whole rest of their mostly short lives. My maternal Nan was born before polio vaccines existed. Her left leg was completely withered. She walked with a cane, didn’t complain but even my toddler self could see the pain she suffered every day. She’s one of the “lucky” ones who didn’t end up in an iron lung. Imagine considering yourself lucky that your life wasn’t spent in a steel or iron cage?
#3
Alcoholism. Characters in movies who drink heavily are often shown as cool or funny.
The reality is vastly different.
As you scroll through the list, you may realize that you have experienced some of these things firsthand, when you found them lucrative in the beginning, only to find they are not all that they're made out to be. To better understand what makes them so appealing to us in the first place, Bored Panda reached out to Eden Lobo, a counselor and psychology professor.
She explained that without real-life exposure, people rely on secondhand narratives, which often portray the experience in a glamorous or overly simplified way. However, she also added that romanticizing something new can be a way to cope with dissatisfaction in one’s current life, as unfamiliar experiences are often imagined as a "way out" or a solution to current problems.
#4
Depression. No, they're not all tortured geniuses, they're just tortured.
DaisyBee 2 weeks ago
There was nothing romantic about me back in January. You don’t know how pathetic you can feel until you’re having to rely on your parents to do everything for you because you’re in such a bad state mentally, you can’t stand to be alone for 5 minutes without being a risk to yourself
#5
The Mafia
Edit: After almost 3k upvotes I wanna clarify that I’ve never had any encounters with the mob in real life. However I do enjoy mafia themed movies and shows and thought “it probably isn’t like this at all in real life”. Thanks for the comments!
#6
Been in a serious relationship with “the bad boy.”.
Vinnie 2 weeks ago
No need for a "bad boy". Bad boys were fun when I lived with my parents, but not after I moved out. Bad boys are not practical when one has to go to work the next day. I'm pretty happy with my "occasionally sarcastic boy who just rolls his eyes when wife makes inappropriate jokes".
Prof. Lobo believes that media and social comparison play a major role in shaping unrealistic expectations of experiences by presenting curated, idealized, and often incomplete portrayals of reality. She brought up the social comparison theory by Leon Festinger, which states that people evaluate themselves and their lives by comparing them to others, especially peers.
"When those comparisons are made against filtered, idealized media content, it often results in distorted perceptions. Another thing is that movies, ads, and shows often frame life events like falling in love, moving to a new city, or chasing a dream as transformative and flawless. This storytelling leads people to overestimate the emotional payoff of unfamiliar experiences," she noted.
#7
Moving out to the middle of nowhere and building a shelter and living off the land.
Rick Murray 1 week ago
I'm halfway there. I'm in the middle of nowhere. But it's a house some blokes put together half a millennia ago. Which is good because I have zero skills with that sort of thing.
#8
Having ADHD or Autism.
Goover 1 week ago
It sucks. Life is a constant struggle, when you're near middle age and your extreme childhood ADHD turned into adult ADHD without decreasing at all. Yay I'm so creative. Yay I think out of the box. Meanwhile I have 32 projects at 99% completion and a perpetually annoyed spouse and boss.
#9
Growing up rough or poor.
People like to romanticize it, but actually living it sucks.
Our expert stressed that unfulfilled desires and dissatisfaction with one's current life are key drivers behind idealizing the unfamiliar, and psychologists often describe this as a form of psychological escape or projection. Prof. Lobo expressed, "When people feel stuck, bored, or unhappy in their current situation, they often turn to fantasies of an alternate reality."
"This process helps them mentally escape discomfort by imagining an experience as inherently better. Romanticizing the unfamiliar can also act as a psychological buffer, giving people something to look forward to. It can momentarily lift mood or increase motivation, even if the fantasy isn’t realistic."
She also spoke about how people often project their unmet emotional needs onto external goals. She explained this through simple examples: someone craving freedom may romanticize solo travel, while someone longing for stability may idealize marriage, without accounting for the challenges involved.
#10
Being a teacher. I cried so much. It was traumatic. It wasn't even the kids or the long hours. It was the other teachers.
#11
War, I’d imagine.
Earonn - 1 week ago
Oh yes, it's so romanticised. The "brotherhood", the "facing death", the "live in the moment". I don't even doubt this happens. But there's also boredom and horror. War is romanticised for the same reasons why motherhood is romanticised: because if we're honest about it, no young person would be so stupid as to pursue it.
#12
Renovating an old house.
Are you a person who can never sit still?
Probably for you.
Do you enjoy downtime?
Probably not for you. .
We also conversed with Prof. Lobo about the impact it can have when people are slapped by reality when they experience these romanticized things. She noted that people often feel a sharp sense of disappointment or emotional letdown, which is especially painful when the experience was highly anticipated or romanticized as life-changing.
"Psychologically, this can create cognitive dissonance, the discomfort of realizing that what you believed would make you happy actually doesn’t. People often tie their identity to their goals. When an idealized experience fails to deliver, it can cause a kind of existential hangover, leaving them feeling lost, stuck, or unsure of what to pursue next," she summed up.
#13
S*x in the shower. Water is not lube.
PeepPeep the duck 1 week ago
I always notice more men liking the idea than us girls 😂 it sucks, the friction is beyond bad
#14
Running thru a field of flowers.
You kick up dander and pollen, your feet get tangled in the flower stems... It doesn't last long...
Then you finally collapse in a patch of wild flowers and land on an ant hill or a ground wasps' nest or it's really a hidden bog.
Well, that sounds quite sad, doesn't it? Alas, that's just how life is, one failed romanticized expectation after another, I guess. All we can do is hope that at least a few of them actually turn out as we think, right? Anyway, dear readers, now we want to hear from you and your such glamorized illusions. Don't hesitate to leave them in the comments!
#16
Bed rotting…honestly the romanticization of mental illnesses as a whole.
#17
Being a full time creative: design, painting, acting, marketing, etc. Not everyone is cut out for that lifestyle.
#18
This is kind of specific, but there are tons of gym addicts/serious lifters that think their ultimate goal is owning their own gym.
We used to own a couple in Texas, and let me tell you, we worked our a*ses off non-stop. It’s very expensive, time consuming and exhausting.
LooseSeal's $10 Banana 1 week ago
Really being any kind of business owner seems awful. You shoulder all the risk. You work more than anybody. You're responsible for everything. I'm quite happy to work my 8 hours and head home not having to think about it.
#19
Whip cream or food related stuff on body during s*x. It gets sticky, gets everywhere. Not as hot as it’s made out to be.
#20
Being a manager.
I thought it was all big paycheques and corporate perks.
Nope, I'm just babysitting grown adults.
Apatheist Account2 2 weeks ago
It depends on the people and the job. It suits some, not others. My role in life was to be a hand-on computing manager, and I was lucky enough to do that.
#21
Piracy.
People assume that piracy was all treasure hunting, drinking and sword fights thanks almost-exclusively to Robert Louis Stevenson's novel "Treasure Island". In reality, no buried treasure has ever been found in the quantities we'd otherwise been led to believe, there were never maps where X marked the spot and most pirates weren't world class swordsmen. The majority of pirates during the golden age were ex-navy officers or personnel, freed sl**es or criminals on the run who initially accepted pardons from England as privateers to prey on Spanish treasure fleets in the Atlantic. And even then, the "treasure" wasn't so much gold or jewels as it was spices, cloth and other textiles. Finding actual gold or jewels was extremely rare. Additionally, most pirate ships were not massive galleons or man-o-wars; they were pretty commonly sloops of 20-30 men and maybe a handful of 10 pound guns. Truth be told, most pirates didn't even k**l their captives either; they just tied them up, ransacked the ship and fled. It was extremely rare for someone to actually k**l a prisoner in a pirate raid. But even rarer still was ship to ship combat, as repairs were extremely expensive and most crews wanted to avoid drawn-out conflicts as much as possible.
#22
Getting blackout drunk. To this day, it's one of the few things I get really uncomfortable thinking about.
#23
Having twins. They see them when their parents finally get them out of the house. They're all cute in matching outfits.
And people say, "I always wanted twins!"
I almost died having these twins. They never slept. They fight like feral cats.
My house is never ever clean.
This is not something people should be wanting.
But they are cute. I have no regrets.
PeepPeep the duck 1 week ago (edited)
Best memory of nieces who are twins - one uses their push along bike to ride up to the edge of the top of the stairs in a QLDer house, and decides to go down and crash, twin two rolls her bike over after watching and decides to do the same thing?????? It happened so fast I wouldn’t of made it back to stop them, they are ok and teenagers now
#25
Infidelity
You hear in movies, you console your friends but only when you actually get cheated you will know how bad it is .
It literally makes you question everything.. at what point did your relationship break? How come the person you loved and trusted did this ? Were you not good enough ? .
#26
Getting rid of all their possessions and wealth.
#27
Forensic work. Especially crime scene investigation.
I was CSI for several years before I transferred to my current position (NIBIN analyst). CSI is rewarding if you can do it, but it's a rough job. Not even just emotionally, but physically. I spent 45 minutes in the third floor (attic) of a house with no air conditioning in August looking for a knife that was on the front porch in plain view of homicide detectives while they sat there talking to the parents of the deceased. I was furious.
Lab work isn't necessarily better. You definitely have days of just looking at evidence under a microscope all day. It can be very monotonous.
#28
Library work in public libraries. It’s like retail except everyone gets to tell you their taxes pay your wages. I love being a librarian, but d**n do you meet some awful people, and it sure isn’t “reading books all day”.
Julius Zuke 1 week ago
As a librarian, I never had time to read on the job. You can say, "What's the big deal about keeping useless old books in order?", but it is a big deal if someone needs that one tiny bit of information. Hats off to the Tacoma, Washington Public Library, whose attention to detail allowed my wife to retrace her roots and vividly visualize the lives of her ancestors.
#29
Bartending.
PeepPeep the duck 1 week ago
People are romanticising 10-12 hour split shifts ? Who are these weirdos
#32
Starting a business.
Gavin Johnson 1 week ago
My friend started her own business six years ago, she’s worked every hour sent to her and by grit and determination she’s built a successful business. She’s never going to be a millionaire, but she didn’t fit into regular jobs and knew her only way to be satisfied was to work for herself, so she did. She’s an inspiration and rarity, she made a small business work. https://thewarrenstockport.co.uk/ Have a look, she sells all sorts of stuff!
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