• Replies 19 replies
  • Subscribers 16 subscribers
  • Views 3521 views
  • Users 0 members are here
Options
Related
Hints and tips
  • To quote someone's message, first select/highlight the relevant text, and then use the Quote button that appears
  • To "mention" someone, type @ followed by the start of the forum name, and choose from the list; that person will get a notification of being mentioned

Answering "How are you?"

AC

I generally find the concept of lying abhorrent, so dread the question, especially when I am not OK - which happens often.

I have sometimes paused to think about the answer, which has led to "What's wrong?", to which my answer has been, cryptically, "it's complicated". End of conversation.

It's not that I don't want to talk about it, I do. I just don't feel comfortable in opening up, especially the risk of not being asked again, and generally ignored in the future.

Is it just me?

Parents

  • With the right person (someone I know will take it in the right spirit) I'll sometimes say 'Do you want the socially conventional answer or the truth?' 

    More commonly, I opt for 'Ticking over' or 'surviving' - said in a friendly way, not a morose tone. I think that's the best way to say that an ever fluctuating ratio of strikes to gutters is in play. 

    I'm not averse to the odd 'good' or 'just fine' if I feel that things are going especially well, but there's a tiny bit of complacency in that that I can feel might have an iron price. So.. rare and appropriate.

    The real 'I'm good' moments should maybe be true and embracing of gratitude as you say them. They might even be a moment of surprised self-realisation that 'good' means 'good enough' (the sanest kind of good - cotentment in the 'isness' of an intuitively-guagued 'right' balance in things ). For a good illustration of this, maybe some of you recall the moment at the end of Frasier Season One, where - after 20 something episodes of resistance to his domestic situation, chasing elusive sustainable 'highs', worrying about his status, having his ego knocked about by this and that, he just has a moment of stillness where he realises that all (for now) is well, and that's good enough:

    Waitress: Zimbabwe, decaf, non-fat milk, no cinnamon in sight.
          Now - ARE YOU HAPPY?
 Frasier: [answering Niles's question:] You know, in the greater
          scheme... yes, I'd say I am. 

He tastes his coffee.  Fade out.
Reply

  • With the right person (someone I know will take it in the right spirit) I'll sometimes say 'Do you want the socially conventional answer or the truth?' 

    More commonly, I opt for 'Ticking over' or 'surviving' - said in a friendly way, not a morose tone. I think that's the best way to say that an ever fluctuating ratio of strikes to gutters is in play. 

    I'm not averse to the odd 'good' or 'just fine' if I feel that things are going especially well, but there's a tiny bit of complacency in that that I can feel might have an iron price. So.. rare and appropriate.

    The real 'I'm good' moments should maybe be true and embracing of gratitude as you say them. They might even be a moment of surprised self-realisation that 'good' means 'good enough' (the sanest kind of good - cotentment in the 'isness' of an intuitively-guagued 'right' balance in things ). For a good illustration of this, maybe some of you recall the moment at the end of Frasier Season One, where - after 20 something episodes of resistance to his domestic situation, chasing elusive sustainable 'highs', worrying about his status, having his ego knocked about by this and that, he just has a moment of stillness where he realises that all (for now) is well, and that's good enough:

    Waitress: Zimbabwe, decaf, non-fat milk, no cinnamon in sight.
          Now - ARE YOU HAPPY?
 Frasier: [answering Niles's question:] You know, in the greater
          scheme... yes, I'd say I am. 

He tastes his coffee.  Fade out.
Children
No Data