Reality does not conform to the ideal, but confirms it.

Ideals are often dismissed because nothing in the actual world lives up to them. No friendship is perfectly loyal, no institution perfectly just. Yet every imperfect instance still points toward the shape it is falling short of, and you recognise the failure only because you already understand the ideal. The gap is not evidence against the standard; it is how you come to know the standard exists.

When a person or a cause you believed in disappoints you, try not to conclude that the value itself was naive. Ask what the disappointment reveals about what you were hoping for, and keep hold of that.