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I rebooted my social life

takes.jamesomalley.co.uk

71–80 of 433 posts

Re: I rebooted my social life

#71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we all acknowledged that all that "anti-woke"/"free-speech" stuff was a complete smokescreen Tell me you're in an echo chamber without telling me you're in an echo chamber.

What do you think about all the things going on under the current US administration which include but are not limited to: flag burning ban[0], retribution against law firms for supporting opponents of the admin[1], antifa being designated a terrorist organization[2], deportation of anti-Israel protesters[3], threatening broadcast licenses[4], or suing pollsters because he didn't like the results[5]? We're equating th…

The president is a person and can make whatever proclamations he wants. Sometimes people will even do what he says! But the way the system works is:

- orange man makes dumb obviously unconstitutional proclamation about flag burning

- most likely nobody does anything about it, but if someone does there is a law suit

- the courts are like 'lol no'

- back to status quo ante

Re: I rebooted my social life

#72
post #69

I've thought about starting my own community group, but I am pretty skeptical that I could find many folks interested in what I'm interested in. I think this is a real barrier to many. Any advice? To elaborate, in the US, existing groups tend to be narrow and uninteresting to me. In most places I've lived, it's basically a mix of sports/fitness groups, art groups, "tech" (i.e., programmer; traditional engineers like…

Personally, I've found that running clubs attract diverse groups and tend toward activities that create ample opportunities for smalltalk and meeting people with shared interests outside of the sport. This doesn't hold true for most other sporting activities, in my experience.

Interesting. I was a decent runner in high school, way back. I'm a cyclist now, but I found that cycling groups tend to either be focused on athletic performance or activism and I don't particularly care for either at this point. I'll have to try some running groups as there are a lot of local ones.

Re: I rebooted my social life

#75
post #12

Congrats OP, sounds super excited for his new social life. I live overseas and I’m very lonely. I’ve been told to join a group or club related to my interests so I can meet new people and make friends, but I can’t. It doesn’t feel natural to me to go for friend-hunting. And I’m very tired of meaningless, superficial connections and conversations I’ve had with most of the people from my surroundings. I feel my only fr…

The natural, and easiest, way to make good friends is to spend a lot of time with people. Some of those people will become good friends with no effort at all.

Given nuclear families etc. in the West, this is kinda hard as an adult. Happens automatically as a child and college student, though. My advice to you is:

1) Get a housemate or several. Better yet, join an already shared house. Forget about your preconceptions about whether you "can" live with other people or not. You aren't special, people lived together for ever.

2) Explicitly decide to work through this "doesn't feel natural to me" thing. OK, fine, it's gonna feel kind of awkward at first. By the 5th friend-hunt it won't.

Re: I rebooted my social life

#76
post #61

I've thought about starting my own community group, but I am pretty skeptical that I could find many folks interested in what I'm interested in. I think this is a real barrier to many. Any advice? To elaborate, in the US, existing groups tend to be narrow and uninteresting to me. In most places I've lived, it's basically a mix of sports/fitness groups, art groups, "tech" (i.e., programmer; traditional engineers like…

Funny, I've had the exact same thought, and doubts, as yours. I really dislike communities focused on a certain topic, as I really don't see myself as part of any one thing that defines me. If I were doing rock climbing, I still wouldn't enjoy talking about rock climbing the entire day with my rock climbing friends; my interests are much wider. Which is the reason I do not participate in any community on- and off-lin…

I relate very closely, having had the same thoughts over the past few years. Social clubs sound good in theory, but in my experience it's difficult to connect with people without a central activity or subject to act as a touchstone. It's a frustrating sort of paradox where the best social groups diverge greatly from their core theme, and yet the core theme is necessary to reach and maintain critical mass.

I think it's possible to get around the problem, but it would take just the right structure; there should be activities, but enough of a variety to have something for people from all walks of life. But also not too much of a variety so as not to appeal only to those interested in constantly trying new things. Perhaps a set of some baseline, fairly universal activities, with space for individual members to share their own hobbies and interests from time to time in a group setting? I don't know exactly, but it's something I've been considering for a while, and it feels like there must be an answer somewhere in there.

Re: I rebooted my social life

#78
post #65

Back in 2019, got to go to Hong Kong for a couple months for work and got to bring my family. I was about to turn 40 and realized that the place we were staying had a rock wall. In a somewhat "mid life crisis" spur of the moment decision, I decided to go buy shoes, a belt and a chalk bag (I did a lot of indoor rock climbing in college). We get there and the rock wall is a. closed and b. only for kids. Get back to the…

I have had this discussion with my wife, men need activities more than women to bond. My wife can make friends just by randomly running into other women at events or my daughter's activities.

The concept of a social cabin or "men's shed" has been discussed before on HN.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38158616

The phenomenon began in Australia but it has spread to other countries.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Men's_shed

Re: I rebooted my social life

#79
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was a brief period where ignorance reigned and Dan Brown was considered an actual historical writer. That drove a lot of book sales, when in fact Dan Brown doesn't write anything remotely historical.

I was reading Brown at like.... 12 years old. The idea that anyone legitimately thought of it as historical fact is hard for me to believe. Not impossible, though... Did people also think of National Treasure as historically accurate?

Probably. Dan Brown got a lot more credence than Nick Cruise though. People will assume that a historical fiction is based on real history. Its like when Hollywood says "based on a true story."

Re: I rebooted my social life

#80
post #5

> Hanging out with other humans is good – and if you can’t find a community… you can always build your own. I did just that, and built https://wonderful.dev It's based around jobs for devs, but right now it's just a place to chat about tech.

I don't think you will attract any competent "devs" with a platform that is locked behind a GitHub 2FA login. I am not going to create an account at Microsoft to use your platform.
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