alternative post title: how can I grow a thicker skin, so I simply stop caring what my coworkers think or say?
I’m still looking for a drama free workplace and I don’t understand why people seem to enjoy creating chaos out of nowhere
Working in several industries, I’ve met:
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white Christian nationalist: too many Arabs and Mexicans in our country, somebody should send them all back to where they belong, and I’m very Christian. This was 5 minutes after meeting me for the first time. Why even tell this to a coworker?
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Married woman complaining to me about how her husband isn’t so affectionate nowadays: 2 minutes after meeting me for the first time. Who does that? Shouldn’t you tell this to somebody you trust, like a friend and not a stranger you met 2 minutes ago?
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An anti vaxxer trying to convert me to his cause, or however you want to call it.
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And just today: ‘it’s good that Trump was shot’ Why would a sane person blurt that out in the middle of our pause for everyone to hear you? Why do you need to antagonize your coworkers? This was a manager btw.
I have waaaaay more examples, but I’ll keep it simple.
I just want to work and go home. Completely drama free. I don’t want to care what coworkers think, but apparently I’m very thin skinned and I’m easy to be triggered. Each of the examples I wrote triggered me: I wanted to yell ‘fck off, you piece of sht, I don’t give a f*ck what you think, leave me alone’, or something like that. But I need the job.
My conundrum: If this happens at every workplace, wouldn’t it make more sense to stay with the devil you know?
Unless, of course, you’ve job hopped till you found a drama free workplace… please tell me how you did it.
I want to be the old guy who doesn’t give a f*ck about stuff like this, yet it still triggers me.
Yes, I work as a contractor for a power company. I talk to my boss maybe once a month beyond the daily meetings when nothing is going on. I’m considered remote so there’s no office I have to go to, just jump in my truck and do my job, come home when I’m finished and get paid 8 hours. Each area has one worker so there’s no one to give you grief beyond the other departments which don’t do things right and create issues but that’s their problem, not mine. I fix what I can and move on.
I mostly drive around listening to music, talking to friends, and investigating issues. Most of my work is 30 minutes to an hour from one to the next.
There is the downside of the dangers that comes from it but honestly driving and dogs are more dangerous than the electricity if you just do your job correctly. I’d take every bad aspect of my job over sitting in a stuffy box full of bitter people who haven’t matured past grade school mindsets. Before this one, every job I had contained shitass lazy coworkers and piss poor management. At this job my work ethic gets recognized as there’s no one else to take credit for my work behind my back.
If “politics is what happens when 3 or more people must make a decision”, drama will always follow. While there are careers that have less drama, there is no such thing as one without it. My suggestion: find allies. Not in an oppositional way, but in a way that they support you and your work. Think if someone were to call you an asshole in front of everyone else, your ally would stand up and say “no they aren’t”. If you work at a place where there is no such person, it is apathetic at best, and toxic at worst.
You could always just tell them to their face that you think them saying that makes you think they are racist, unfaithful, indoctrinated in misinformation, etc.or otherwise call out the behavior/comments as unacceptable in the workplace. Won’t necessarily make them reconsider their flawed ideals but can hopefully let them know that you don’t want to hear about it. I work remote now and that definetly cuts down on small talk in general. At a previous job some guy was deep in Christianity and was talking to me about how evolution just doesn’t make sense and God must be real because of it. I just brushed off and ignored comments like that because it wasn’t worth the hassle.
I’ve been working for almost 10 companies in 20 years, and I have only found 2 drama free workplaces so far. It’s random and I don’t think there are signs that could show you whether a job is good or bad.
Most HR people are happy when they hire you but it usually means nothing, sorry.
Last but not least, drama free could also mean “we’re gonna fire everybody in a few months,” which makes the choices more difficult to make.
do you have any advice for me, now that I’m applying and might work elsewhere? Is there anything I could ask during interviewing to indicate I loathe drama, people full of themselves talking politics or conspiracies or openly discussing how vaginas look like?
Maybe try to detect or feel if the person in front of you is really a nice person or if he’s faking it.
The last HR guy I met was so nice to me and enthusiastic that it was really suspicious. I had met real psychopaths before and I was careful. But in the end, he really wanted to take care of the coworkers, and it took me one whole month to understand this.
