Do you find it hard to make friends as an adult. Someone was recently telling me that they were having trouble making friends. They asked me how I did it. I responded that I don't know. I wouldn't say I have friends I just have a few people I randomly talk to. So I couldn't really give advice to them. I'm to awkward as it is. I thought this might be a hint that they wanted to be friends but I panicked I feel bad. So how did everyone else make friends as an adult?
I felt like friendships are pretty frail so I don't make as much anymore. But yes, it is indeed hard to the point that it took me a year yet I didn't even made any friends in school last year lol. Sometimes I too also wonder how I made friends as a kid. I do have friends online tho. Maybe I changed a lot compared back in the past.
I didn't make much friends when I was younger. I've always been awkward. I'm always impressed when little kids are best friends after 5 minutes.
making (and keeping) friends as adults is harder and requires more active effort from both participants than for kids. As a kid, roughly half your time is spent in educational facilities, meaning you can potentially spend time with friends for most of your childhood (including some time when you're not in school). As adults, you both have your own responsibilities and schedules, meaning the time you can spend together is greatly diminished. Not to mention, because you probably have different jobs, different family situations, etc, it can be harder to connect. Meanwhile as kids, you all experience things together at school. Even if you weren't there, you talk to a few people who were and know of it hours after it happened. luckily for me, I've retained a few friends from junior high and college for a decade or two by now, and I'm an introvert so I don't really need more close friends. I've seen the struggle though, and I can often sense a desperate need emanating from people my age. Anyways, I'm just blindly saying this (since I never bothered trying to get to new people in awhile), but you need to put in more active effort and make it known that you desire friendship. You need to do more than just agree with each other to hang out some day : pull out your schedules and write it in ASAP. Don't forget to maintain it and understand each others needs regarding the friendship. If you have trouble finding people, I'm sure there's meetup apps or sites for various group activities. So maybe you like hiking, join a hiking hobby group, and maybe you find one person you really gel with. And don't be shy or afraid to try making friends with people you have random encounters with. Maybe you almost collided with someone at a bookstore and had a nice 10 minute conversation before one of you has to go. YOLO and ask for contact info because you really enjoyed the chat and want to hang out again. Also, virtual DOES count, but imo it's harder to maintain unless you're both deathly desperate. Maybe it's just because I had my fling with virtual friendships in my 20s (which was still some pretty volatile times), but the amount of people ghosting and being ghosted was insane. Not to mention the drama because those were group friendships (something luckily you don't have to worry much about as an adult).
Hmmm, now that I think about it, making friends as an adult didn't come to my priority list. There are just some people I meet and we get comfortable talking to each other but they are roughly acquaintances. The friends I got now were the people when I was still in school. I have huge trust issues now so I can't see myself making new friends. Lol But based on my observations, most friendships made in adulthood are either too brittle or are as hard as steel. I would like to expand this but I am too lazy to type now.
Find people who share similar pastimes at your workplace. Enroll in hobby classes. Join a swing club.
Where is the option of "About as hard as it is to make friends a child/teenager"? Anyways, when you're an adult, it isn't harder to make friends, but it's harder to get into opportunities where you may make friends. When you're a child/teen, you spend a lot of time on school, and you meet a lot of new people every year, this is an environment that naturally pushes you towards making friends. As an adult, the same doesn't hold true. If you have a stable job office job, you'll probably be seeing the same people for years, and you may not necessarily get close enough to any of them to become friends... And if you work at home-office, you don't even have this much. In order to make friends as an adult, you need to push yourself towards environments that may allow you to make friends, like... I dunno, a book club, a hiking group, a chess club, a game store... Anything that has people with similar hobbies than you and that allows you to make connections with people. Or well... Get close to people online, I guess? I mean, it depends on your own view on online relationships and how much you actively care for them. My closest friends are people that I've only known online and that I never met personally... One of those people even helped me get out of a horrible time in my life when I was totally lost and borderline suicidal. Oh, and all boyfriends I've had started as Long Distance Relationships with people I met online as well. Been going strong with my current one for 7 months now~ But well, that's me. I know plenty of people in my family that don't care about online relationships at all and don't see any purpose in them... To those people, an online friendship isn't a possibility, because they can't really make bonds through online talk... So well, if they wanna make friends, they need to find places where people with similar hobbies hang out~ Ah, and of course, there is the matter mentioned by Anonmouse... You don't have that much free time as an adult. This means your opportunities to hang out with friends are less, and the amount of time you can spend hanging out together is also smaller... Maintaining the friendship takes more active effort from both parties because of that. In any case, the friends I've made as an adult are only online because I basically never leave home for anything other than going to doctors (I work at home-office), so I don't really have any way of making new offline friends as I don't have an environment that allows me to do so. I still maintain contact with my high school friends though~
I have a really difficult time making friends as an adult. I lost most of the friends I made when I was younger as well. It feels like with COVID and just since I don't go out much, I have no exposure to even try to make friends.
As adult, it's harder to find new people to meet since you're no longer grouped with random strangers every one or three year. So to find a friend - go to random offline group and join them. It could be religious, hobby, skill training, or whatever that you think you could handle
I think you have misplaced being an adult and being anti social or introverted. Age determines whether you're an adult, but you're activities isn't necessary to be changed. Super energetic socializers just get into the zist wherever they are...they buy every lottery and play till some of them become true friends. Anyway just try to be more positive and forthcoming, and most of all be perceptive...read the room.
idk, but i can't call my workmates friends, it's hard to befriend them since the only thing they cared about were gains and loses. They get threatened by small things. They can eat their positions.
Idk too XD people just randomly talk to me and then we become friends or at least acquaintance. I was sitting by myself on a school bench and this lady walked up to me and sit for a short while before proceed to ask what year I'm in and etc and i asked about what she reviewed for the exam today (exam) and she just gave me her note and we added on Facebook...i also don't know what happened
Yes, it is harder to make "real" friends as an adult. First and foremost it's because most adults are already married and have their own family. It's not only about time restraints, but also about the changed lifestyle etc. They are already fully occupied with their children, wife and old friends. Also depending on your position, you have to be more careful in choosing (false) friends, because adults can be more calculating.
Shen Comix: Number 2 seems so... Yes! yes! The last one seems to be the best answer!! Ps. You need a handcuff
Dunno, I wish I had a bromance for life. But either the honeymoon ended or I wasn't completely comfortable with candidate friend/s. Last time the other dude I thought was bro, got a girlfriend(which isn't a problem by itself) but they just started gaming and pigging out on delieveries(was disgusting coz they both got like 15kg each and were half covered slobs in pajamas when I visited). never leaving the flat(which I guess is better than just not leaving the flat but without gaming).
you don't actually make friends when you're adult, people just kind of being friends with each other because they're stuck in the same workplace