I used to volunteer on a Distress Line, and would occasionally be told something similar.

At the line I volunteered on, we weren't allowed to give any advice. Instead we were trained in active listening and motivational questioning to help people figure out for themselves what they wanted, around whatever issue they had called in about. That worked for about 70% of the calls.

Then there were the regulars who just called into talk because they were socially isolated and lonely. On those calls, the objective was to make conversation, but we were discouraged from sharing too much information about ourselves, and were supposed to keep the conversation focused on the caller - kind of hard to do when they want to talk politics. Those were the calls I struggled with being "interesting" enough on.

I wouldn't take what the caller said personally. He clearly needed something different than you were prepared / allowed to offer.

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