I’m an introvert and I like going to work to do my job and go home. I don’t understand people who use a job as a substitute for friendship or marriage. It’s a means to an end.
The sooner I do my duties, the longer my downtime is going to be, and I love having my downtime.
Many of my colleagues see me and immediately start asking questions I don’t want to answer, but neither do I want to hurt their feelings, I mostly want to be left alone. In the past this has been deconstructed as arrogance and people with fragile egos feel insulted by my indifference to them and that I prefer to work than to talk to them.
The world is made by extroverts. I have observed that people are eager to help you if you give them attention. I don’t get it, but neither I’m not going to change how extroverts think or feel.
If I give them the attention they need for as long as they need it I’m going to end up with daily headaches and neither my job nor theirs is going to be done.
I want to appear approachable, but keeping the info I feed them to a minimum. How do I do that?
What do you talk about to your coworkers?
What do you say to stop conversation organically? (meaning they don’t get offended).
Way to not answer the question
are you aware that people need money to pay bills or are you so privileged this is a foreign reality to you?
What are you talking about? YOU are the one who responded to the question “given you have to work, would you rather have a job you like or a job you hate” with the answer “I’d rather just not work”. I’m aware the vast majority, including myself, need to work. You’re the only one suggesting you wouldn’t work.
The guy who asked you the question was saying that the fact that we have to work is just that, a fact. So how are you going to make that fact more bearable? They were suggesting you should try to find work or a workplace that doesn’t leave you in dread of every work day, or at the very least finding a way to set boundaries at work or make peace with small talk being a part of your day. Those things are not always easy or feasible in the short term, but they’re saying that should be your goal.