this post was submitted on 27 Nov 2024
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Pretending to give a shit when I don't
It's literally how I make all my money.
Teach me your secrets!
Which half are you having trouble with? The apathy, or the pretense?
The pretense. I do not have a good poker face.
You don't want a poker face! You want to be very expressive. But voice is even more important. Pitch voice soft and a little low, and always decreasing at the end of a sentence, the opposite of asking a question. Like a kind parent talking to a tired toddler or particularly stupid dog.
You're trying to slip information into the person at a subconscious level, and the information you want to slip in is that you, the speaker, are trustworthy and will take care of them. It's much easier to do this than to actually figure out and fix whatever bullshit problem they've created for themselves.
Note that this is not effective on people you see everyday, as they will eventually realize you didn't do anything to actually help them. But for one-offs, work associates-of-associates, clients you're not the sole contact for, and the more distant sort of relative, it works pretty well.
That's pretty hilarious and I don't doubt it's efficacy!
I'll admit my trouble with these situations is I can't help but care about people or fixing things, often to save them from themselves as if they're, like you said, toddlers.
I start to resent being taken advantage of though. It's tough. :(
So you're also struggling with the apathy part, huh? For me, waiting tables, I just don't think of the guests as fully human. They come in hungry and I make sure they leave happy. Giving them a sense of assurance is a part of that, but as soon as they're out the door they cease to exist.
As to resentment, you shouldn't be resentful of something you choose to do, or to put it another way, you shouldn't choose things to do that harm your own well-being.
Haha I used to wait tables long ago. I know exactly where you're coming from!
My most recent job nearly drove me mad. I worked for a public library computer lab. I got a chair, and could look busy scrolling reddit instead of hurredly rushing to the walk-in freezer to scream. Hooray!
But it actually made me miss the simplicity of taking and delivering orders and "flipping" tables. This was a job where I'm pretty sure I did some good sometimes, but you might know how dumb and angry people get with anything digital.
Explanation of what that entailed:
Everything was an end-of-the-world crisis for each unique individual that came in, everything required multiple steps, often stymied by the fact people thought they were being clever by having 13 email addresses and forgetting the passwords and not updating the phone number the recovery code was tied to. ("And I MUST print this thing for a job interview in like 1 hour! Oh computers are terrible I hate them you must be a genius, back in my day we just shook a hand and got a salary rabble rabble.")It was an awkward position because you really couldn't just say "Wow, sucks to be u." If they were siphoning too much life force.
They would not leave until closing if you just left em' there. And the worst ones lived like down the street so they'd show up every day. And they piled up. And instead of a section of tables, it was ~20-30 computer seats I was in charge of.
I genuinely want to help people live better lives. And I seized the opportunity when I could, but man, people have bandwidth. Dropping the individual systemic issues of an entire society on singular "caring profession" workers is downright vile. I'm so thankful I escaped. I'm still mentally recovering.
But hey, making more then $2.14 an hour was nice. Lol
Yeah, I agree. I hate that socioeconomics always seems to push us in that position. If it's not harmful, it seems to be relegated to the select few or outmoded as a job, it seems. (I'm trying REALLY hard to not be a doomer! Lol)
You're absolutely right though. I struggle to "not care". I think if everybody cared more about each other things would be better, but y'know, reality. Lol
I want to be social monke and love and help people, but everything must be some kind of infinite assembly line of the screaming masses. :(
I'm trying to finally be a digital artist and make games instead. It's definitely not the moneybags route, but I have a lot more energy to put towards the people who deserve it from me...
It takes too much energy to have a good poker face, I'd rather just stay grumpy.