[jasode]

>For some people, their work/job is just such a big part of their identity, that for them this is a problem.

That's only 1/2 of the dynamic. People also like to assign an identity to others.

For example, if I say, "I'm semi-retired." ... the follow-up question is always "Oh, so what did you do before that?" ... which is polite coded-speak for, "Did you inherit money or what work did you do for money that put you in the position to do that?"

People are naturally curious about your rough level of success, wealth, expertise, etc. Having a "no identity" stance isn't really a satisfactory answer for many listeners. They want to know more.

EDIT to replies: I do understand the harmless "small talk" aspect. I should've added more to re-emphasize the "people assigning identity" aspect.

Once I reply to the followup question with "Oh, I used to do consulting for finance" what then happens is others then introduce me as "And this is jasode -- he was a consultant for X". My ex-consultant life that I last did over 15 years ago is now part of a tagline/subheading associated with my name even though I never intended it.

The point is other people have this irresistible urge to "fill in the blank" with an identity -- especially an identity that is tied to how one earned money. I'm not complaining about this and it's just an observation of what humans naturally do.

[mr_mitm]

It's also a low risk topic that can generate lots of follow up questions. It's regular small talk. Also, people here seem to downplay it, but doesn't it tell you a lot about a person what they do roughly half of their waking time? What they chose to do with their life? Sure, you're not your job or your career, but it's also a very normal part about getting to know someone and I'm not sure equating it to some way of gauging success levels is necessarily to right way to think about it.

[jasode]

>It's regular small talk. Also, people here seem to downplay it, but doesn't it tell you a lot about a person what they do roughly half of their waking time? What they chose to do with their life?

Having a natural ebb & flow to conversation is all true but that's not the issue. Let me restate it differently.

It's ok and natural to ask what people do/did for work. It's also natural to respond and share what was a significant aspect of their life.

The meta-observation is: others then like to compress whatever life narrative they hear into a "shorthand" or "identity" -- even if the recipient never intended it to be his/her identity. Several parent comments mention "their work being their identity is the problem". My point is that the identity we get tagged with is often outside of our control and we didn't create the problem of work being our identity.

My neighbors know me as the "ex-consultant". For that identity to change, I'd have to do something new that was significant enough to override that ... such as... get into another career, open a restaurant, become founder of a startup, etc.

How does one have "no identity related to their job"? Sometimes you can't unless one wants to be evasive about what one does to earn money.

[dpark]

> My neighbors know me as the "ex-consultant" … How does one have "no identity related to their job"?

The obvious answer is to have some other identifier that supersedes the job. Do you have some other interest or hobby that you spend your time doing? That you talk about all the time?

People get associated with their job because it’s probably the thing they spend the most time on and it’s also a common topic of conversation. If every time someone asked you about your job you said, “it’s good” and steered the conversation into a story about your latest epic ski trip, you’d probably be the “guy who skis” instead of the “ex-consultant”.

[gen220]

Situations like this work as a filter of sorts (If you’re so obsessed with measuring relative status/prestige that you want to reduce me to a job title, we’re probably not going to be friends?).

The fact that you’re neighbors with these people changes things. Maybe it’s a wedge into a Socratic discussion about how work isn’t and has never been your identity, where you come to some new and better mutual understanding.

But yeah it’s challenging. If people are so accustomed to viewing about themselves and others thru the conventional status/hierarchical lens… sometimes they can’t understand that it’s a lens and not reality.

[ryandrake]

You can often politely dodge probing questions about your employment. When someone, for the purpose of small talk, asks me what I do for a living I just say I'm an exotic dancer or a runway model. It's funny and breaks the ice a little. Then I'll ask them about their watch or something. If they insist "no, really, what do you do for a living??" I'll politely say I work with computers and again try to move on. Very rarely I'll get someone who won't drop it "come on, WHAT COMPANY???" and at that point I know they're really not interested in talking--they just want to stack rank me in terms of importance or salary or whatever and I politely dip.

[pixl97]

>It's also a low risk topic

In modern life, yes. I wonder if it was such a low risk topic as we moved towards the past? For example the fear of the stranger is something that is very common in past writing across a number of cultures. If you met a stranger and they said they were a soldier it would have different ramifications than if they said they were a baker. Also in smaller social groups that required the work of everyone to survive it was a way of measuring the resources available in said group.

[inglor_cz]

It is not just about assigning identity to others.

I am probing for topics of mutual interest, or topics that make other people passionate, to learn more about them generally.

In some people, this is completely orthogonal to their careers, but most of the time, there is an overlap. Like, I haven't yet met a railway engineer who wasn't a raging railway nerd at the same time.

[yibg]

> People are naturally curious about your rough level of success, wealth, expertise, etc.

I definitely find this more true in some cultures. e.g. silicon valley, it seems people want to know where you're at on the "hierarchy". Many parts of Asia too, you get treated differently if you're a low level worker, regular worker, executive etc.