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The Challenge of Making Friends as an Adult

nytimes.com

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Re: The Challenge of Making Friends as an Adult

#31

Post by gruseom »

m0nastic wrote: post #24

I hadn't really ever given this much thought, but now if I categorize the overwhelming majority of my friends, they fall into the following buckets: High-School Friends (who I still stay in touch with, although only peripherally, as I don't still live where I grew up) College Friends (which includes a subset of High School friends, who I do a better job of staying in touch with, but who also mostly live back where I…

m0nastic

my natural state is to never want to leave the house under any circumstances

Coincidence? :)

Re: The Challenge of Making Friends as an Adult

#32

Post by iterationx »

The why is so much more interesting. Part of it is a product of topology, visualize this pattern: home, car, work, car, home. There's not a lot of surface area in there to meet someone. This is a product of America's lack of streets, we have roads not streets. Roads are for cars, streets are for people. Some good reading on this subject is, "The Great Good Place: Cafes, Coffee Shops, Bookstores, Bars, Hair Salons, and Other Hangouts at the Heart of a Community", and of course "Streets for People, A Primer for Americans".

Re: The Challenge of Making Friends as an Adult

#33

Post by franze »

dannyr wrote: post #18
majormajor wrote: post #2

You don't even need to me approaching middle age. I'm in my 20s and moved halfway across the country recently, and am continually amazed at how hard it is to make good friends of the same gender. Given all the websites/events/groups dedicated to meeting people to date I've found it far easier than ever to get dates, but more difficult to make friends. It's a weird reversal. There's probably an opportunity for a littl…

I'm older now and I have been going through the same thing. I made a lot of lifelong friends when I was in the East Coast. When I was in my late 20s, I decided to move out West. My friends were my support system back in the East Coast and now I don't have them. Starting over when you're older is hard. Most people my age have established their own circle of friends. It feels out-of-place trying to join an existing cir…

my solution: travel

1) you meet a lot of people while traveling (quantity)

2) you and them are out of context (and out of existing social circles)

3) all are a little bit more relaxed

4) you start pretty fast talking about things that are interesting without (social circle / insider) background information - you can filter them for quality (if they are interesting enough for do friendship follow ups)

from the last 5 years about 80% of the new people i now call friends i met during traveling

Re: The Challenge of Making Friends as an Adult

#34

Post by m0nastic »

gruseom wrote: post #31
m0nastic wrote: post #24

I hadn't really ever given this much thought, but now if I categorize the overwhelming majority of my friends, they fall into the following buckets: High-School Friends (who I still stay in touch with, although only peripherally, as I don't still live where I grew up) College Friends (which includes a subset of High School friends, who I do a better job of staying in touch with, but who also mostly live back where I…

m0nastic my natural state is to never want to leave the house under any circumstances Coincidence? :)

The name was suggested to me many many years ago on IRC, but I'm sure it resonated at least partly because of the way I'm wired. ;)

Re: The Challenge of Making Friends as an Adult

#35

Post by jkbyc »

Timothee wrote: post #25
m0th87 wrote: post #19

> Thayer Prime, a 32-year-old strategy consultant who lives in London, has even developed a playful 100-point scale (100 being “best friend forever”). In her mind, she starts to dock new friend candidates as they begin to display annoying or disloyal behavior. Nine times out of 10, she said, her new friends end up from 30 to 60, or little more than an acquaintance. Whoa. I would never want to be acquaintances with th…

"Whoa. I would never want to be acquaintances with this person." Thinking of specific numbers is very cynical indeed, but I agree with the point made though. For example, there's a former colleague I've had a few lunches with, every 3-6 months or so, since the startup we were working at folded. We clicked well when working together and we enjoyed talking about ideas. However, during the past few lunches, I've been mo…

>Friendship is really like any kind of relationship: you're expected to give and to receive. If it goes only one way, it will eventually stop going any way at all.

The whole area of transactional psychology is based on that idea. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transactional_analysis

Re: The Challenge of Making Friends as an Adult

#36

Post by alexqgb »

gruseom wrote: post #30
dannyr wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm older now and I have been going through the same thing. I made a lot of lifelong friends when I was in the East Coast. When I was in my late 20s, I decided to move out West. My friends were my support system back in the East Coast and now I don't have them. Starting over when you're older is hard. Most people my age have established their own circle of friends. It feels out-of-place trying to join an existing cir…

There's another factor. In my observation, people on the east coast make truer and deeper friendships than people out west. I'm a lifelong westerner and when I first started spending time in the east I felt, in this respect, like I had come home for the first time. People I met (socially, not on the street) would actually do things like make eye contact, listen to what each other said, and respond to it. They were no…

That may be less a West Coast / East Coast thing and more a California thing in particular. I say that because my family hosted a couple of exchange students from France who were really struck by the veneer of friendliness here, and the very real distance that people maintained beneath it.

Later, when I went to France, I found that there was an initial aloofness that I mistook for vague dislike. But after a while, this went away and what I found instead was a much more substantial and very real affinity.

Re: The Challenge of Making Friends as an Adult

#37

Post by mooreds »

I've found that joining clubs (either informal, like the climbing club I was a member of) or formal (like the Odd Fellows or Masons or Kiwanis) is a great way to meet friends. You still have to deal with the time issues, but at least you don't have tensions of work--and as a plus you get to meet people with different types of employment and age.

However, the main issue is that when you are in college and your early 20s, you tend have gobs of time to make friends--once you hit a certain age (or marital status or child status) other activities come first. Might as well celebrate the closeness with your family or your work achievements as kvetch about the difficulty of making friends.

I'm in my mid 30s.

Re: The Challenge of Making Friends as an Adult

#38

Post by jaems33 »

franze wrote: post #33
dannyr wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm older now and I have been going through the same thing. I made a lot of lifelong friends when I was in the East Coast. When I was in my late 20s, I decided to move out West. My friends were my support system back in the East Coast and now I don't have them. Starting over when you're older is hard. Most people my age have established their own circle of friends. It feels out-of-place trying to join an existing cir…

my solution: travel 1) you meet a lot of people while traveling (quantity) 2) you and them are out of context (and out of existing social circles) 3) all are a little bit more relaxed 4) you start pretty fast talking about things that are interesting without (social circle / insider) background information - you can filter them for quality (if they are interesting enough for do friendship follow ups) from the last 5…

I've met friends travelling but the problem is I ended up making friends in cities outside of the one I moved to.

Re: The Challenge of Making Friends as an Adult

#39

Post by tsotha »

I knew a guy who made a boatload of money off of the dotcom bubble. He kept doubling down and doubling down, then at right about the peak he told himself "I have as much money as I'll ever need if I cash out now. There's no reason to take any more risks." In other words, he timed it perfectly (based on his own situation - he wasn't genius and he would freely admit that)

So here he was, a multimillionaire who'd spent the last five years or so working and playing the market to the exclusion of everything else. He was one of those people who had unconsciously believed if he just had enough money he could find a way to be happy. When he finally had the money he realized relationships with other people are what make you happy. But at that point he didn't have any friends and didn't know how to make them.

He was, without a doubt, the most miserable guy I've ever met. He was always willing to buy a round or lend people money. He'd go to Vegas and pay for five or six people to go with him. So there were always people around. There were always women willing to sleep with him. But they were there for the money and he couldn't delude himself into thinking otherwise. The money actually added to the problem, because it meant even when he wasn't paying, people had a motive to hang around. So he became cynical and a bit paranoid.

Eventually he got into drugs and ended up eating a whole bottle of pills. I've always wondered if any of those hangers-on went to the funeral.

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