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.
As someone said before it's not directly a consequence of a workplace, it's a part of interracting with a random selection of people from wildly different backgrounds.
Nod your head as if you weakly agree. Throw in a random opinion of your own, but I don't recommend the extreme ones. Questions also work especially when they are seemingly neutral and cause doubt in the original speaker.
For example if a Christian nationalist starts hating on Mexicans don't fall into the trap of repeating typical responses about respect for immigrants. Ask him how he reconciles that with the fact that Mexicans are predominantly Christians. Or something unexpected like that.