It means, according to what our mass communications have been telling them, that they are trying hard, that they are fighting the odds. Conversely, if they are not stressed, it means that they are doing something wrong in their lives. It has been clear for quite some time now that stress is not good for us. But because we have legitimized it, not everyone is going to pay attention to that fact. It is even possible that we have gone beyond legitimizing stress and have romanticized it.
Stress is like alcohol and tobacco recognized as harmful, yet seen as necessary by some.
Just as generations of creative writers grew up thinking that alcoholism equaled creativity, so generations of business and professional people, students and athletes have come to think that stress equals effectiveness. And that we have to be suspicious of these figures that serve to feed the businesses of these merchants of the temple of modern times who would be very much at pains to demonstrate the efficiency of the anti-stress methods they market. The word has had this ambiguity all along. Stress began life as a variant on distress in the 14th century. It meant the experience of physical hardship, starvation, torture, and pain.