I mean, why are you so gung ho to earn money for someone else?

Seriously. Shit on company time, party on personal. “Getting to the point” is only relevant if the job won’t get done at all if it isn’t done now. Relax, hang back, do the job at a sustainable pace. You’ll have a longer and happier career that way

The rest of it? That ain’t about age, that’s about people. No matter where you work, there’s always gossipers and hidebound co-worker of any age. You wanna talk about folks that won’t try things? Run across a brand-spanking new out of school nurse. Those folks won’t budge on anything sometimes. Mostly because they’re terrified, and they think that if they stick to exactly what they learned in class, anything that does go wrong won’t be their fault, but still.

If you want to avoid that part, it’s easy. Just chill, be open to listening to others, whether they’re fresh out of school or fifty year veterans coasting to retirement. There’s almost always something you can learn from anyone, as long as you make the effort to look for it. Which is also how you avoid burnouts.

You gotta realize, most people spend a third of their lives at some job doing shit that they only do because they get paid to. The rest spend a third of their lives at some job doing shit they want to do, but also have to do because they need to get paid. Everyone has to find the balance between the raw fact that they’re stuck there, even if that’s their choice. Very few people can just say “fuck it” and go live off the land somewhere, you dig? So they find the path to making work work as much as possible. They find ways to make it bearable.

So, you gotta learn how to adapt to that, or you’ll be that miserable bastard that’s always in his office glaring and grumbling about everyone, tense as fuck and never invited to fun shit.

It’s always going to be partially about getting along with people, no matter what the job is, where it is, how old you get. It can be a matter of degrees, like a park ranger may deal with people less frequently if they’re waaaaay out in the boonies, but your typical office job where erasers and paper are a main component? You ain’t escaping people, ever. They’ll be there every day, just like you. So you either find a way to appreciate them to some degree as they are, or you’ll just be miserable.

And, that process is exactly how you don’t fall into those same traps they do. As you figure out how to get along with weirdos and idiots, you learn how to not be like them.

I feel age has little to do with it. I‘ve seen these traits in people from all ages.

I don’t think this is an age thing:

fixation on trivialities about a client’s appearance or something funny he did instead of getting directly to the point

I see this a lot on political comments on Lemmy and Reddit. People call politicians they don’t like weird pet names and insult their appearance. It’s like they’ve been classified as “other” so the normal rules don’t apply.

There’s value in referring to everyone respectfully. It’s easy to throw clients into the out group because they’re relatively transient. Don’t. Have empathy. Focus on what you have in common and shared goals.

Do your will

If you lose the ability to do your own will, and only do what is expected from you, that’s when you lose yourself

Disregard society. Doesn’t matter if you’re currently confirming or not, when you do something.

You do it, because of your own will.

I think, with that ethic base framework, you can just be yourself.

You already succeeded by noticing and asking this question. People who are old or stubborn in this way were born that way and never grew out of it.

Don’t get old.

People over 60 shouldn’t be working. Cognitive abilities go downhill fast from there. It’s not always noticeable in the beginning but a 70 year old is mentally pretty much a child with experience.