your answer is some kind of zen level wisdom I still need to master.

Happy that you can, but apparently I cannot (yet?)

are you sure you didn’t mean to say ‘you are’?

does this also work with women? most nurses I work with are women and are simply incapable of being silent more than 2 minutes.

they may be offended in short term. but in the long you will have more respect.

they WILL be offended and proceed to furiously talk behind my back and destroy my credibility

I’m very introverted and to me any kind of question about me is a prying one: my age, where I was born, how long I’ve been living where I am. I simply don’t get why I have to tell my coworkers about this, nor I understand why they get offended if I don’t answer the question. If I’m fired or I quit I’m not going to see them ever again. Who cares?

I’m a nurse and at my hospital there are rituals that bore me but anyone else finds, apparently, great: after report, talking time, usually 30 minutes. They talk about boring stuff, are loud and obnoxious, I simply don’t understand why adults act like this. I read to pass the time, but have to be there with them because we’re officially working. This happens at least three times per shift: once more to have lunch (for whatever reason we ALL must have lunch together, even if it means not having your own chair) and after charting, where, once again, I must remain with them because that’s officially working time. If I leave, have a seat in the pause room and start reading, I get yelled at, no matter than I can also hear the bell from there.

It gets very boring. God my new job cannot start soon enough.

I don’t have the luxury of having my own working station.

I’ve started to do extra chores just not to have to hear them. It also reduces the chance of them asking me about me.

Yeah every single one of your coworkers is childish on an elementary school level, sure.

I guess I should’ve written ‘my coworkers sometimes behave like elementary school children’ which is every time they have nothing to do. This is what I feel. I guess to them, they ain’t being childish but engaging. To me it still feels childish.

You either work with a ton of real weirdos, or more likely are way overemphasizig to get people to take your complaints more seriously.

I don’t believe I’m overemphasizing. This is how perceive reality. And I haven’t even started with the patient population

Your perception of yourself and your coworkers is not as objective and devoid of emotion as you think.

you are right, everything I wrote is how I perceive reality, which is, mostly subjective, but to me it still feels objective, if that makes sense. I don’t believe my post (the one that started the thread) is objective, it’s how I perceive my coworkers.

They demand authenticity and complain that people express emotions in the same sentence.

wait, you are right. My coworkers are authentic and they get along among themselves, whereas my way of being authentic seems to be the complete opposite. They are authentic being silly, loud and childish, I am authentic reading a book and not yapping.

We are simply incompatible. I mean its sad people believe a workplace is like an elementary school, but, what can I do to change it? Nothing. I’m glad I’m leaving. In future, I’ll look for jobs where I don’t have to endure silly people like this, a work with as less human contact as possible, or at least with no needy patients that demand you listen to their rants and become their therapist for 4 hours per shift. God I hate that.

The whole post can be summarized as “Life would be so much better if other people’s thoughts and behaviours were organized around me and my preferences”.

while true, I’d suggest ‘Life would be so much better if other people’s thoughts were left unsaid and coworkers let me work’

this is a chance to start looking for better fitting jobs.

I’m in my 50s, always feel like an alien, and still think I’m 19yo.

don’t let anyone take your inner child away. Don’t let society change this about you.

I’m guessing that wasn’t what you wanted to hear.

it’s ok, the book is already helpful. At this point I have no expectations about society anymore. It’s survival mechanisms what interest me.

I’ve at some time adjusted my field of work to be 100% remote, and now I’m seeing how to change even that. I’ve eliminated Interactions with undesired people almost completely.

then “all” I have to do is to keep looking for jobs where I almost never interact with people…

oh, Iraq produces wmd