this post was submitted on 23 Oct 2025
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When I started working with English-speaking people it was genuinely a bit of a culture shock that everyone asks you "how are you doing" all the time. The first time it happened I spent like a minute quickly going over my week. The other person was surprised/annoyed and it all was kind of awkward. It took me like two weeks to finally start answering "goodthankswhataboutyou" instead of trying to think of a real answer.
What I always think when people ask me that: "Do you actually want to know the truth, do you actually care? Or are you just wasting air asking meaningless questions?"
But usually respond with a "I'm fine, thanks. What about you?" as protocol requires π€ πππ«
My favorite is the people who respond βOh, you know, living the dreamβ. Only the most depressed people in the pits of despair answer like that
Same here, I kept answering "tired" and it kept annoying some people π€£
i used to answer honestly like because this and i never understood; and still don't (i'm on the spectrum); why some people got angry/frustrated and it almost always eventually germinated into a full blown fire-this-asshole-already movement in the places i worked at until my therapist made me aware that people don't really expect a true answer and will only accept certain responses.
i call it the social handshake now and i allot an extra 10 minutes every single time i schedule a work meeting an wait to hear certain key words/phrases before continuing on for the actual reason why i scheduled the meeting. lol
I always answer "well I'm still here" and let them make of it what they want.
Is this still the case? I thought this was slowly falling out of style, but maybe it depends on the place.
More and more in my experience it goes something like:
"How's it going?"
"It's going"
"Yeaaah..."
Well, I still hear it a lot. Would be great to replace it with some other greeting that made more literal sense.