I think it’s an issue of what is appropriate. When we ask, “how are you?” We don’t want you to give us the entire rundown on your day or week or whatever. Usually this is small talk that is designed to grease the transition into doing something together. We want to focus on the transition, and saying “fine” does that quite well, even if you do have a cold coming on, or if your uncle just passed away, or you are worried about your doctor’s appointment.
Your colleague doesn’t need to know any of that and can’t do anything about it and even if they can, you don’t want them to. You don’t have that relationship with them. So we pretend and we say what is appropriate for the situation.
When I was young, before I understood this, it really bothered me. Why do we ask how we are if we don’t care? I didn’t realize that that question didn’t mean how are you. It means hello, I acknowledge you, let’s have a few more minutes of small talk and then we will be ready to work together.
People need transition time. We need to gently move into the next thing together. For that to happen, we need to put on a mask that is appropriate for the next situation. We need to put on a new role. This isn’t really pretending. It’s just switching off things that are not appropriate and switching on the things we need now.
Funny. It took me decades to figure this out. I mean, I knew intellectually what small talk does, but it seemed wrong for so long until I had finally done it enough to see the effect it had on both others and me.
Now I know how it works and I can introduce real things into the conversation more. I know how to set people at ease, and yet introduce reality with a joke, but not to linger on it too long. I can be both a mensch and focus on the job at hand. It all depends on how the other person responds to me. Sometimes I can see that the other person needs to talk about something before we get down to work. Sometimes I can see they don’t want anything but work. I do what is necessary. It isn’t pretending. It’s being sensitive to social exigencies, I guess.