Ted Mosby is actually the bad guy of How I Met Your Mother...

On closer inspection, Ted’s supposedly “endearing” romantic ideas appear more like narcissistic delusions which he projects onto a series of unlucky women. The show is full of examples where Ted acts selfishly and screws over love interests

“You lied and told her you had broken up with your girlfriend so you could nail Robin.”

And he refuses to allow other people’s feelings to factor into his narrative of reality where he’s the romantic protagonist.

“She can’t say it’s not to be. It is meant to be, and you know why? Cause I mean it to be!”

But he uses his idea of himself as a “good guy” to let himself off the hook for awful behavior—because (his subconscious reasoning goes) nothing a good guy does could be “that bad.”

Robin: “What could she mean when she says ‘no’? I don’t know, it is totally cryptic.” Ted: “This is far from over!”

This pattern of behavior also makes Ted himself deeply unhappy. So Ted Mosby represents a cautionary tale about what happens when you let fantasies close you off to connecting with other human beings as they really are.