We said we were building children's self-esteem so they could be successful, but it never occurred to us that giving kids what psychologists call "cheap self-esteem" could do more harm than good by making our kids think they're 10-feet tall and bulletproof when they're neither.

CNN: Commentary: Joe, Kanye, Serena -- aren't they special?

Franco and Zimbardo have argued that deifying heroes like this -- what they call "the myth of the 'heroic elect'" -- has the perverse effect of making us blind to our own heroic potential.

CNN: What made London Samaritan so brave