

Ask HN: How do I make friends? - shame

My story:
I had a few good friends in my college days, but since I left college and moved on to other places, I have no way of regularly meeting them anymore.<p>I don't go out very much. I know that to meet people you should go out and stuff, but I don't know where to go. I mean after my hectic office hours there is not much time to go tout and meet people. (I am good friends with people in my office, but cannot say that they feel the same way. I try to help them in any work they have and people tend to like me because of this. I don't know if I have any behavioral traits that alienate people.)<p>People say that it is near to impossible to make good friends after college. Is this true? What are your experiences?<p>I am really alone in a big city and I am desperate. I am ready to give up anything to get some good friends. Without at least a single person to care about me, I am losing my self-respect. Please advice me.
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mathgladiator
I ran into this problem, and I found that finding people to do stuff with is a
good place to start.

I treated it like an RPG and leveled up my social skills. For instance, you
can find people on <http://www.meetup.com/> You can do community events to
meet new people and interact with them. I also recommend reading (or in my
case listen to)
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Win_Friends_and_Influenc...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Win_Friends_and_Influence_People)

You can also date people by a number of ways, and I recommend craigslist
(where I met my fiance). If you go this route, then you will need the stamina
to go through 1000s of ads and tens of disappointments, but there are many
options. (I didn't want to pay any money, and I figured my significant other
wouldn't want to spend money either.)

The key to it is: Don't give up.

~~~
papa
I like this approach (the mental RPG game).

I'd also add that you can start with small steps. For instance, with a
coworker, see if they want to grab lunch one day or get some coffee during a
break. Making friends sometimes takes time. You need to see if you're
compatible with the person enough to be able to do stuff with them.

If you're a hacker or entrepreneur (which I'm assuming b/c you're on this
site), there are plenty of meetup groups from startups. This is always a great
way to find like-minded people.

If college was a great way for the OP to meet friends, consider a local
extension school or community college. Consider a class in some hobby you
always wanted to learn more about (photography? ceramics?).

Good luck!

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spooneybarger
I haven't had any problems making friends outside of college. Most everyone I
know hasn't had a problem with it, so I find the 'it is near to impossible to
make good friends after college' doesn't mesh with my experience at all.

If you want to make friends, find a way to do things that you enjoy that
involve others. If you like music, get involved with others in making music.
Like to code? Go to meetups for particular subjects that interest you and make
sure to go to the social part afterwards. Ditto for conferences etc. Like
reading? Join a bookclub. You get the idea, if you want to make friends, get
out there and meet people; the friends will follow from that.

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olegious
An interesting question, I would approach it like this:

1: what are your interests and hobbies? Go to www.meetup.com and join some
meetup groups associated with those interests- attend a few meetups and you're
bound to meet others that share at least some of your interests.

2: are you into any type of sports? if you are, join some adult leagues.

3: you can join an organization like "one brick" onebrick.org and volunteer
your time in the community, that way you'd get out, do some good and meet
people.

4: if worst comes to worst, post an ad looking for friends on craigslist! when
i moved to a new country and had my girl leave me, that's what i did and
quickly made some friends.

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Kliment
Well, I made a number of good friends at the local knitting circle. I made a
friend while geohashing. I made some friends by traveling around and meeting
up people I knew from online communities. Your best bet is to do stuff you
already like, see if there's a group in your city interested in that, and meet
up with them. The friend-finding is a side effect. Also, try having
conversations with random people, with no expectations.

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kevinskii
Hello, which big city are you in?

Perhaps like many other engineers, I can totally sympathize. I went through a
similar period myself for several years. Looking back, I now realize that I
held this incorrect perception that everyone else around me already had an
active social life, and that if I reached out for friendship I'd come across
as seeming desperate. Like people would think, "Why is this guy trying to be
my friend? He's X years old, shouldn't he already have enough friends by now?"
Then gradually I learned that many people around me were just as open to
making friends as I was, and that many of the folks who you'd think were the
most popular socialites are in fact couch potatoes with the same sense of
loneliness that you feel.

Be patient, it will get better. And there's nothing wrong with you.

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RiderOfGiraffes
Learn salsa.

EDIT: I found Pablos Holman, hacker extraordinaire, dancing salsa at the end
of one of his TED talks:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Kga-CHf-pU#t=11m45s>

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motxilo
One of the great things you can do to make some friends when moving to a new
location, is practicing any kind of team sport. This alone can make up for any
other socializing issue you may have, e.g. language.

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ApolloRising
Which city are you in? Knowing this would help people give you some advice.

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olegious
maybe i'm reading too much into your name, but this is nothing to be ashamed
of- people go through lows and highs, believe in yourself. you've made friends
before and you'll do so again, you just need to look at it like a process.

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legolandbridge
And be sure to pick your friends wisely...

