TL;DR Often, you have to make friends to make friends. Here's how you can break out of the isolation cycle.
Table of Contents:
1: Introduction and Background
2: How to make acquaintances
3: How to make your acquaintances friends
There is a loneliness problem in the US right now. Everyone knows it and the research backs it up. Many people turn to the internet for socialization, which, while it can be helpful and meaningful, does not provide a true substitute for in person interaction. While I cannot create large societal change, I hope to provide some small, practical advice on how to make social connections.
It is very easy to choose to give up. A few months ago, I may have done exactly that thing. I was nearly completely isolated in terms of in person connections and had been for years, having lost nearly all in person relationships due to an unfortunate coincidence of a study abroad year merging with covid, and then a forced university transfer just as I was beginning to form connections again. I would have believed that with my disabilities and trans status causing me to be already behind, it was impossible for me to build a meaningful in-person social network in 2023.
I was wrong. I have met so many people over the past few months. I've learned I might, secretly, be an extrovert? I've learned that socializing improves my mental health and allows me to be more resilient. I am happier than I can ever remember being since I was a very young child.
Full disclosure, and if you want to roll your eyes and stop reading this post now, that's okay. I do have one connection- a six year relationship, that has been long distance for around half of those years, but started in highschool. Without that one connection, the rest of the steps in the guide would have been so much harder, the barrier to entry so much higher, that I understand why people would give up attempting it entirely. I can beg you to give my methods a chance, but even I must confront the fact that during the years I was away from my partner, the barriers felt almost insurmountable. almost. HOWEVER: I did manage to form some friendships during that time using these methods. They may not have been as robust or healthy as my social network is today but they were deeply important in a time where I was struggling to just stay alive. And I believe that that is worth it.
Okay, so how do you make friends?
The overall goal is to make acquaintances who will over time introduce you to their friends. You can than expand your social network, and choose which connections to put effort into deepening. Example: Because my partner goes to the same university as me, he introduced me to his friend group. I was then able to sit at their table, and got to know many more people just by being there. I was then able to expand my network of acquaintances by making friends with those people's friends.
However:
Making acquaintances can be super difficult. Even in this example, my partner, someone I already knew, was the linking point. Here's why.
In general, you have to make friends to meet friends.
How can you meet new people if you have no one to introduce you, and no one to go places with you?
Here we can see why starting from nothing is extremely difficult. Additionally, when you've gone without meeting other people for a long period of time, your social skills decline and your social anxiety increases, creating an even higher barrier to entry.
And, these days, it's can be really hard to find people who are even interested in meeting other people!
How to make acquaintances
The solution to this problem varies based on where you are, both physically and your life situation. I am coming from the cultural perspective of living in the United States. I'm also a university student, so a lot of this advice will come from that perspective, but I'll try to add tips that are applicable for everyone.To make acquaintances, you will have to leave your house. It sounds simple but this can be really difficult if you struggle with transportation or have disabilities that cause you to be overwhelmed in public or don't like being perceived or, really, anything else. Think of this as work you are putting in now for a return later. Not leaving gives you really no chance at meeting people, therefore, no in person friends.
However, although just leaving the house and going for a walk can be great for your mental health, and can even work as exposure therapy for some issues, it won't necessarily help you talk to people. The best way to do this is going to small or medium sized events that have a specific focus. These can definitely be university clubs, but I've also had a lot of success finding things at my local library. And then there are also meetup.com and eventbrite.com, which are online platforms structured to help you meet people in person. Of course, those two options will require you to use extra safety precautions. I haven't successfully been to anything from Meetup but that is just because my level of anxiety is too high. I believe facebook can be used as an event finding platform as well.
I highly recommend getting a hobby if you don't have one, as you can then attend events related to that hobby. For example, if you crochet, you could attend a craft night, or if you work with wood/metal, you could attend a local makerspace. You don't have to be super interested in it, but you should have a low level of interest since it's not good to build relationships on lies.
You can also usually find organizations based around a minority status you may have, which often hold events. You can usually find these kinds of things through a google search, although they might only have a minimal internet presence, so you could have to call or email for more information.
Some examples of events I've been to that actually helped me get to know people:
- A pumpkin farm visit organized by my university's Gender and Sexuality Alliance
- A book club at my local library
- A support group at my small town's LGBT center
- A crafting night organized on a university discord server
If I were able to drive, I would have gone to the big city near me where there were many more opportunities for events like these. I can't do that, but thankfully my university has many events available.
A second thing that I've done is join university discord servers, particularly ones like the GSA discord or the discord for my major. After participating for a bit, I post something like "I'll be doing homework in the [university center] from [time] to [time] if anyone would like to meet up". This doesn't always work, but during the beginning of the semester it can be especially helpful.
It could definitely also be possible to meet people just by asking if you could sit with them at the cafeteria or by starting up conversations at a community festival or something, but I'm writing this guide for people like me - anxious people. :)
Once you have met someone once or twice (people seem to not react very well if I've only met them once, so I'd go with twice to be safe), you can probably ask them for their contact information, like Snapchat or Discord (or cohost 🤔). I find that if I add people to Discord, I usually never contact them again, because it feels too forward to message them directly. Snapchat is useful for me because of its story feature- I can reply to people's stories to start conversation, and they can reply to mine. This also automatically gives us something to talk about. This is where something like instagram or facebook could be useful as well, it's just that people in my age group don't tend to use those as often. You could at this point be tempted to move the conversation entirely online, but this has almost never worked for me. Regularly seeing people in person is the best way for you to feel connected to them, and them to you. This is when you can move to the second part of the solution:
How to keep your acquaintances and make them friends
There are a few ways to do this. You can, of course, plan to see your acquaintances frequently throughout the course of the day, like if they are in a college class with you or if you have break periods at the same time. I get the impression that this wouldn't work out so well for adults, and it doesn't work too well for me either because I'm faceblind (I can't usually recognize people unless I know them well). What I do is I post events on my snapchat story and ask if anyone would like to go with me. I find that most people I know are also lonely and looking for things to do, so this often works out. I don't want it to be accidentally perceived as a date if I asked someone directly, but I'm not sure how much of this concern is founded. I will sometimes ask someone directly to go to something if I know them better or if it's an event that I know they would enjoy in particular, which is also what I would do if I didn't have snapchat. (I believe on facebook if you rsvp yes to events it will show your friends that you did so- seems like a useful feature, despite meta being a terrible company.)You should try to keep in mind whether that person is receptive to having conversations and meeting you - this guide is not an excuse to harass people. You can pay attention to things like leaving if you show up somewhere, not replying to your messages, or not initiating any conversations or messages. I'm sure there are more subtle signs but again I am autistic so I do not know how to properly describe them. I recommend finding other resources for that.
You won't have a connection with everyone you talk to- but try not to write them off either. Give it a few meetings if possible, because you might have gotten the wrong first impression or you might learn new and interesting things about the person. It's also fine to have some people stay acquaintances. It took me many years to learn that not everyone has to be either a stranger or a close friend. You don't have to open up to your acquaintances but you might enjoy hanging out with them sometimes, going places with them so you don't have to go alone, or studying for classes together.
If you want to make some truly close friends, you will have to be willing to put in a lot of time and effort. Effort, because you have to meet a lot of people to find the right people for you, and time, because you have to spend many many hours getting to know a person for them to become a close friend.
If you got this far, I'm impressed. And surprised. I hope you learned something and that this was at least slightly worth it to you. Best of luck!
Also, please comment if you got here so I know if someone actually did. Thanks!
