What Are You Passionate About?
Whenever I meet someone new in a social setting, I specifically don't ask them what they do for a living because I'm not interested in the thing society requires them to do so they can pay for groceries.
Instead I ask, "What are you passionate about?" or "What brings joy to your life?" and I genuinely want an answer.
If that thing also happens to be the thing they do to pay the bills, so be it - lay it on me. I'm just trying to avoid having someone tell me about some job they are indifferent towards or actually hate. Why would anyone want to know about that or talk about it?
Despite being kind of simple and direct, it's quickly disarming and yields some really interesting results. Sometimes people tell me about a hobby they're really into (I'm here for it - nerd out!). Sometimes people talk about whatever their kids do (this honestly feels like a cop-out for folks who don't know what they really like). Once in a while, though, people tell me something surprisingly personal and actually really interesting.
That's the good stuff!
Only after I've asked this question and listened to someone's response do I occasionally receive the same question back. I cater my response a bit, depending on the situation. Eg, older folks don't really seem to care that I make music and sell it on the internet - they want to know about my day job. Whereas other music folks tend to ask what I'm working on right now or non-musicians closer to my age might just ask what I'm passionate about - setting me up to nerd out about the music.
I highly recommend this - it leads to far more interesting conversations and you get to glimpse into someone else's world - not just wherever they ended up to collect a paycheque.