For generations, children learned the familiar rhyme: “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” No one believed it literally. Words can wound deeply. Yet the saying reflected an important truth: life inevitably includes criticism, disappointment, conflict, rejection, and failure. Growing up meant learning not simply to avoid these experiences but to cope with them.

Today, society appears to have travelled in the opposite direction. Anxiety has become one of epidemic proportions in the twenty-first century. Governments devote billions to mental health initiatives. Schools redesign policies to reduce emotional distress. Universities provide trigger warnings and safe spaces. Employers emphasize psychological safety. Parents increasingly intervene to protect children from disappointment, while social media platforms actively monitor harmful speech.

These developments arise from good intentions, but they also raise an important question. Are we finally taking mental health seriously, or have we begun treating ordinary adversity as something from which people should be protected?

The Rise of the Anxiety Society. There is no question that anxiety disorders are real. Millions of people experience debilitating levels of anxiety that deserve understanding, evidence-based treatment, and compassion. Society deserves credit for reducing the stigma surrounding mental illness and encouraging people to seek help.

Yet another question has quietly emerged. Have we begun to blur the distinction between clinical anxiety and the ordinary stresses that have always accompanied life? If nervousness before an examination, uncertainty about the future, discomfort during disagreement, or disappointment after failure are increasingly viewed as conditions requiring institutional intervention, we may be redefining the normal challenges of life as problems to be eliminated rather than experiences through which people grow.

Stress Was Never the Enemy. Human beings evolved in an uncertain world. Fear alerts us to danger. Stress prepares the body to respond. Anxiety encourages caution before important decisions. The body’s stress response is not a design flaw but one of nature’s most sophisticated survival systems. The goal of human development has never been to eliminate stress. It has been to learn how to manage it.

Like muscles, resilience develops through use. Moderate challenges strengthen confidence, judgment, and emotional endurance. Psychologists sometimes describe this as “stress inoculation”: manageable adversity prepares individuals for greater challenges later in life. Shielding people from every discomfort may unintentionally leave them less prepared for the realities they will inevitably encounter.

From Understanding Trauma to Medicalizing Discomfort. Modern psychology has profoundly improved our understanding of emotional well-being. Beginning with pioneers such as Sigmund Freud and expanding through decades of scientific research, society came to appreciate the lasting effects of trauma, abuse, and chronic stress. This has been an important advance. But every correction risks becoming an overcorrection.

If every disappointment becomes trauma, every criticism becomes harm, and every uncomfortable conversation becomes psychologically unsafe, ordinary life itself begins to appear hazardous. The language of therapy can gradually become the language of everyday living, encouraging us to interpret discomfort not as something to navigate but as something from which we should be protected.

The Expanding Role of Institutions. Institutions naturally seek to reduce harm. Schools address bullying. Employers combat harassment. Governments expand mental health services. These are worthwhile objectives. The more difficult question is where legitimate protection ends and excessive protection begins.

Should universities shield students from ideas they find offensive? Should employers eliminate every source of interpersonal conflict? Should governments regulate speech because it may increase someone’s anxiety? Should parents remove every obstacle from their children’s path? Reasonable people will answer these questions differently. Yet together they explore a deeper issue: how much adversity is an essential part of becoming a capable, resilient adult?

The Parenting Paradox. Perhaps nowhere is this tension more visible than in modern parenting. Every parent wants to protect a child from unnecessary suffering. Yet one of parenting’s greatest responsibilities is not simply protection—it is preparation.

In recent decades, many educators have observed the rise of the overprotective parent. Problems are quickly solved. Conflicts are mediated. Disappointments are softened. Risks are minimized. The intentions are admirable because they arise from love. Yet love alone does not guarantee the desired outcome.

Consider the familiar childhood complaint: “I’m bored.” Previous generations often responded, “Then go find something to do.” Boredom was not viewed as a crisis requiring adult intervention but as an invitation to imagination. Children built forts, invented games, explored the neighbourhood, read books, or simply learned to entertain themselves. Today, many parents instinctively organize, supervise, or provide stimulation. In protecting children from boredom, we may also be depriving them of one of creativity’s greatest teachers.

The same principle applies to anxiety. Not every anxious feeling signals danger. Quite often it reflects uncertainty, unfamiliarity, or confusion about what comes next. Learning to tolerate uncertainty—to discover that one can think through it, adapt to it, and eventually master it—is part of becoming a confident adult.

Parents therefore walk a delicate line. Genuine anxiety deserves understanding and, when necessary, professional support. But ordinary nervousness before a presentation, frustration while learning a difficult skill, disappointment after failure, or uncertainty when entering unfamiliar situations are not necessarily problems to remove. They are often the very experiences through which resilience develops.

Preparing People for Life. Perhaps one of the unintended consequences of our anxiety-conscious culture is that we have begun preparing life for children instead of preparing children for life.

Every obstacle removed is one less opportunity to develop judgment. Every conflict solved by an adult is one less opportunity to learn negotiation. Every disappointment prevented is one less opportunity to discover that failure is survivable. Confidence seldom comes from being protected. More often, it comes from discovering that one is capable. This does not mean abandoning compassion. It means recognizing that compassion sometimes involves encouragement rather than rescue.

The Human Relevance Question. This discussion reaches beyond parenting and mental health. It touches the central theme explored throughout The Lost Commons.

As governments, schools, employers, technology companies, and increasingly artificial intelligence assume greater responsibility for guiding decisions and reducing discomfort, we should ask an important question. Are we cultivating capable, self-governing citizens, or are we gradually transferring judgment, resilience, and responsibility to institutions?

The danger is not simply dependency. It is the gradual erosion of personal agency. The more institutions become responsible for protecting us from every discomfort, the fewer opportunities individuals have to develop the wisdom and confidence that come from confronting life’s inevitable uncertainties. Human relevance has never depended on avoiding difficulty. It has depended on our uniquely human capacity to learn from it.

Protection or Preparation? The challenge for modern society is not choosing between compassion and resilience. We need both. Those experiencing genuine anxiety disorders deserve understanding, treatment, and support. At the same time, ordinary stress, criticism, uncertainty, boredom, disappointment, and failure are not necessarily signs that something has gone wrong. They are often the experiences through which judgment, character, creativity, and wisdom are formed.

Perhaps the defining question of our time is not whether anxiety has become an epidemic. It may be whether our response to anxiety has unintentionally confused protection with preparation.

Every generation has faced uncertainty. Every child has encountered fear, boredom, frustration, rejection, and failure. The challenge has never been to remove these experiences from life but to prepare people to meet them with confidence, resilience, curiosity, and judgment.

If we succeed in eliminating every source of discomfort, we may also eliminate many of the experiences that teach us who we are capable of becoming. In the end, resilience—like freedom, responsibility, and wisdom—is not something institutions can give us. It is something each generation must discover, one challenge at a time.