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).
Most people spend 40+ hours a week at work. It seems wild to me to be insufferable and unhappy for such a significant time of my life. I like befriending my coworkers. Fine if you don’t want to, I guess, but people like OP confuse me. We all have to work. Why not try to make the experience more enjoyable? It doesn’t mean you still can’t have a significant other or friends outside of work. The two aren’t mutually exclusive even though OP seems to weirdly make it out to be that way.
You can’t think of any reason at all why socializing at work could mean less socializing outside of work?