I'm tired of pretending. It's all I do.
I get paid to be nice and friendly and smiley, and to try as hard as I can to be extroverted, instead of the introvert that I am.
I'm tired of "I'm good," or at the very least, "I'm fine," being the expected response to "How are you?"
Why do I comply with the societal expectations? Because I know that not many people actually care. Asking how someone is, in itself, is a societal expectation.
You pretend to care about my life and well-being, and in return, I pretend that it's fine. Even if it's very not fine.
Don't worry, this isn't going to be another one of those posts where I bitch and complain about all of the reasons I'm dissatisfied with my life.
Maybe I just work too much. Maybe it's the fact that my jobs require me to occasionally pretend in order to do good work. Maybe I don't get out enough. Maybe I'm too isolated here. Maybe it's a combination of all of them.
I guess the moral of this story is that if you see me, please don't ask me how I am.
I don't want to have to lie to you.
I've been running into this a lot lately. My boss' boss keeps asking me how I am and I always answer "okay." I don't see the need to tell my coworkers my every thought and word vomit for the sake of word vomiting. Okay is just that... okay. Not great, not wonderful, but I'm still breathing. Take it at that.
ReplyDeleteI hate that. I had someone at work a few days ago ask me about five times if I was okay, despite my insistence that I was fine. I kind of had to stop myself from giving her a black eye.
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