There comes a time in every civilization when freedom begins to eat its own children, when the pursuit of individuality quietly mutates into worship of the self. We are living in that time. A generation born with language at its fingertips now struggles to find meaning beyond the mirror. Every sentence begins with I and ends with me. What was once the boldness of self-expression has become the liturgy of self-obsession.
We live among soft gods now. They chant mantras of peace and energy, boundaries and vibes. They burn sage, talk of vibrations, and curate calm like an aesthetic. Every emotion is a red flag, every disagreement a sign of toxicity, every discomfort an excuse to walk away. The new gospel is I do me.They talk about boundaries as if it’s the new commandment and self-care as if it’s salvation.
They wear serenity like a filter and call avoidance healing. Their heads are clear, yes, but only because the hard truths have been swept under the rug.
It is a choreography of curated calm. Walk into any café or scroll through your timeline and you will see it, a generation fluent in affirmation but estranged from introspection. They sip iced coffee and speak of self-care as if language could replace labor, as if journaling could substitute for growth. They want peace without process, wholeness without humility, healing without confrontation. Everything is curated and intentional except the core.
And I wonder, are we raising children or constructing brands? Are we building thinkers or influencers? There was a time when values were passed down like heirlooms, now they are replaced by slogans. The measure of character has shifted from how one treats others to how many agree with them online. We used to build lives, now we build aesthetics.
But the fault is not theirs alone. Many parents, desperate to give their children what they never had, stripped parenting of its spine. I don’t want my child to suffer like I did, they say, and in protecting them from pain they deny them strength. We no longer raise children, we negotiate with them. We no longer guide, we appease. In confusing provision with protection.
We remove the very friction that forges character.We pacify. We confuse leniency with love and approval with affection. The result is a generation that knows its rights but not its responsibilities.
We say we want to give them everything we lacked, the best schools, the best toys, the best of every comfort, but somewhere along the line abundance dulled appreciation. We fought for every little thing, they complain when the Wi-Fi slows. We trekked to school under the sun, they grumble that the car’s AC is not cold enough. We saved for months for one pair of shoes, they have four and still say they have nothing to wear. Love became indulgence, indulgence became entitlement.
Maybe the real gift is not in giving them everything but in teaching them the value of something, the joy of earning, the pride of responsibility, the quiet beauty of gratitude. Because comfort without character is fragility in disguise, and privilege without perspective is a curse wearing designer clothes.
This generation loves authenticity but confuses impulse with honesty. I am just being real, they say, even when being cruel. I am protecting my energy, even when avoiding accountability. I do not need validation, even as they build entire identities on attention. Authenticity without introspection is ego in disguise. Freedom without restraint is chaos. Confidence without wisdom is noise.
The tragedy is not that they are lost but that they no longer know it. Their chaos comes with captions, so it feels curated. Their confusion is widely shared, so it feels normal. Every flaw is branded, every weakness excused by trauma, every bad habit baptized as self-care. Everyone is healing, but few are growing. Everyone is speaking their truth, but no one is confronting it.
We tell them to love themselves but forget to teach them what to love themselves for. We teach them to express, not to endure, to feel, not to think, to speak, not to listen. They live loudly but shallowly, mistaking visibility for value.
They have mastered the aesthetics of depth without its discipline. They crave understanding but fear correction. They curate serenity for the camera while chaos hums quietly behind the captions
Parenting used to be about shaping values. Now it’s about maintaining peace.
The home, once a training ground for discipline, has become a sanctuary for indulgence. Children no longer fear disappointing their parents because their parents are afraid of losing their friendship. We have made comfort the highest goal of upbringing, forgetting that character is born in discomfort. There is no greatness in ease.
Yet this is not condemnation. It is a call, a plea to parents to parent again, and to the young to seek meaning beyond hashtags. To remember that peace is not the absence of discomfort but the presence of purpose. The old ways were not perfect, but they gave structure to chaos. This generation has brilliance and access like never before, but what it lacks is the weight of truth.
Every era must find its voice, but no era has ever built greatness on convenience. The future will not belong to those most expressive, but to those most grounded, to those who understand that freedom without discipline is emptiness with better lighting. Regardless of the noise, some still crave substance. Beneath the filters, some still yearn for meaning. Our task is not to silence them but to guide them, to remind them that the self they seek to love must first be a self worth knowing.
One day, when the noise fades and the screens go dim, they may rediscover what we once knew, that peace is not a mood but a discipline, that love is not freedom from responsibility but the courage to care even when it hurts, that accountability is not control but love wearing the face of structure. And perhaps then they will understand that the highest form of freedom is not doing you but becoming someone others can depend on.
Because in the end the tragedy is not that we lost our way but that we forgot there was ever a path. The age of soft gods will pass, but not before it reminds us of a hard truth, that peace without purpose is emptiness in perfect light, that freedom without restraint is not evolution but decay, beautifully packaged and sold as progress.
The post The age of soft Gods, by Stephanie Shaakaa appeared first on Vanguard News.
