Getting harder and harder to make friends these days (spouse, person, children)
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I am in my late 50s and so I've lived through a different time when neighbors, co-workers, even family seemed to put a high value on friendships.
Now it seems no one has time for even casual, genuine conversation, much less making new friends.
Then you have to watch everything you say and how you say it so as not to ''offend'' the ''pc'' mindsets that dominate everything.
Forget joking and a sense of humor and joy in life. Those attitudes don't fit in anymore either. It's all so dull and serious now.
I've always found it easy to get to know people and make friends, but no more. It's become like ''work'' with little reciprocity, so I find myself withdrawing from others and just becoming more of a loner.
It's just gottten this way for me within the last ten years or so. I just find it all so discouraging.
My spouse and I sometimes say we feel like we live on another planet than the one we spent most of our lives on.
I am in my late 50s and so I've lived through a different time when neighbors, co-workers, even family seemed to put a high value on friendships.
Now it seems no one has time for even casual, genuine conversation, much less making new friends.
Then you have to watch everything you say and how you say it so as not to ''offend'' the ''pc'' mindsets that dominate everything.
Forget joking and a sense of humor and joy in life. Those attitudes don't fit in anymore either. It's all so dull and serious now.
I've always found it easy to get to know people and make friends, but no more. It's become like ''work'' with little reciprocity, so I find myself withdrawing from others and just becoming more of a loner.
It's just gottten this way for me within the last ten years or so. I just find it all so discouraging.
My spouse and I sometimes say we feel like we live on another planet than the one we spent most of our lives on.
Do any of you feel this way?
I am in my early 30's and feel this way. Its almost too hard to be people's friend nowadays. Most people would rather send a series of short texts or play around on facebook instead of calling you on the phone or meeting in person. I HATE texting but almost all of my friends will only answer if i text, if they answer at all. I live far away from my family and my friends now that so I place high importance on friendships but my friends almost never contact me. If i don't constantly chase them around or ask to do something i would never hear from them.
Yeah. I don't post too much here or anywhere else when reading the fine print of any TOS would show me that I'm out of bounds. Like, who wants to spend their life becoming an expert on tax code just to play ball with the IRS? I can't be walking around on eggshells to please everyone, it's easier to just go for a walk in the woods.
I gave up Tv when I moved out of my parent's house. Sometimes I think about pulling the plug on Internet too. Seems I have a lot of happy memories to keep myself amused all day long. Maybe I'm getting old and going nuts., Am I talking to myself again?
Looking back, people who I thought were friends were really acquaintances. It was no loss not to see or talk to them
anymore because it would have been a waste of time. I would be very interested if there were any studies out there on
social interactions and friendships today verses 20 years ago, especially with todays technology.
I am a very social person and enjoy meeting and talking to people (also I avoid talking politics or religion unless we are both
on the same page). It seems to me that many people are very focused on themselves and their social circle and really
don't care about meeting anyone new outside their circle. It almost reminds me of being back in high school.
I would enjoy conversations with all age groups & years ago people were more open to that.
Any organizations I joined, at first people would be friendly talk for 2 minutes and afterwards would return to "hang out"
with their original selected friends (again like in high school & that was a very long time ago).
The same was true with working. At the job there were friends but after work people would be too busy to
get together and if you left for another employer they eventually would stop contact. BTW, I was also busy and had
children but on occasion it would be nice to meet & chat outside of work.
It's not impossible to meet people however it seems to be more difficult to meet and speak to people who will also listen
to you and not go own only promoting themselves on how fascinating they are.
I am in my late 50s and so I've lived through a different time when neighbors, co-workers, even family seemed to put a high value on friendships.
Now it seems no one has time for even casual, genuine conversation, much less making new friends.
Then you have to watch everything you say and how you say it so as not to ''offend'' the ''pc'' mindsets that dominate everything.
Forget joking and a sense of humor and joy in life. Those attitudes don't fit in anymore either. It's all so dull and serious now.
I've always found it easy to get to know people and make friends, but no more. It's become like ''work'' with little reciprocity, so I find myself withdrawing from others and just becoming more of a loner.
It's just gottten this way for me within the last ten years or so. I just find it all so discouraging.
My spouse and I sometimes say we feel like we live on another planet than the one we spent most of our lives on.
Do any of you feel this way?
I have not found this to be true at all. I am in my early 50s and am still making new friends and maintaining many long-term relationships, some going back 35 years or more. I have about 25 people I consider close friends with whom I can share anything at all, and who will have my back in every case. Most of them do not even know each other!
The challenge is to go long periods of time without communication (I have many friends thousands of miles away from my times living overseas) and being able to pick right back up where you left off.
Just because we may not talk for a couple of years, we are still in each others' thoughts, and reconnecting is a special kind of pleasure.
Maybe it just has to do with picking the RIGHT friends in the first place--sticking only with people who really "get" you and share your values, attitudes and sense of humor (extremely important!)
As someone who has suffered from OCD most of his life, never been popular, had few friends over the course of my life, an introvert and now into my early 30's, been through years of counceling and medications, I am now planning on moving to a larger city to with people who love to do things that I wanna do so I can find new friends and relationships, I've learned a few things to improve my friend making status
1. Get out of the damn house. Find meetup.com groups online and go meet people FACE TO FACE.
2. Get rid of *friends* that arn't close on your facebook or remove their posts to your news feed. You will spend less time stalking and wasting time constantly being on facebook waiting to hear back from them.
3. If a friend doesn't wanna communicate with you, don't take it personally, just don't communicate much with them in return. Tell them your available and to get in touch with you for hanging out. Leave the ball in their court. If they continue not to serve it back, consider ditching them. I left a friend of over 20 years because he didnt' wanna talk, return calls or basically do anything anymore. Relationships/friendships are two way streets, its gotta be a give and take. If its only one, its not worth continuing
4. Do/find hobbies that put you in public places at the very least. You will feel better being surrounded by people at least rather then just being all "alone". Go one step farther and try new hobbies that INVOLVE people doing the same thing. That gives you the opportunity to talk with people about something in common, a great ice breaker.
If a friend doesn't wanna communicate with you, don't take it personally, just don't communicate much with them in return. Tell them your available and to get in touch with you for hanging out. Leave the ball in their court. If they continue not to serve it back, consider ditching them. I left a friend of over 20 years because he didnt' wanna talk, return calls or basically do anything anymore. Relationships/friendships are two way streets, its gotta be a give and take. If its only one, its not worth continuing
I don't really understand the problem of not being able to make plans to get together with a friend. Isn't it just a matter of making contact and agreeing on a time or place? They are not available when you suggest, then naturally they suggest another time, and so on, until you agree on a plan. Then you show up at the appropriate time and place and fun ensues. Repeat with that friend or another friend, as often as you prefer.
Am I missing something? Are we using the same definition of "friend"?
I don't really understand the problem of not being able to make plans to get together with a friend. Isn't it just a matter of making contact and agreeing on a time or place? They are not available when you suggest, then they naturally suggest another time, and so on, until you agree on something. Then you show up at the appropriate time and place and fun ensues. Repeat with that friend or another friend.
Am I missing something?
Yes, its when it happens to us introverts who only have a few close friends that we choose to involve ourselves in and those few are unavailable for whatever reason around the same time frame.
Extroverted people however, don't suffer from a shortage of friends to meet up with. Unless your introverted, you will never understand.
Yes, its when it happens to us introverts who only have a few close friends that we choose to involve ourselves in and those few are unavailable for whatever reason around the same time frame.
Extroverted people however, don't suffer from a shortage of friends to meet up with. Unless your introverted, you will never understand.
Come on now, what is to understand? If a friend is not available for a particular day you suggest, don't they then check their calendars and suggest a different day when they are available? (I just had this exact exchange with a friend via email a few minutes ago, and we agreed on Tuesday happy hour. It's been about a month since we saw each other and it is time to catch up for an hour or two.)
It doesn't seem like this simple scenario has anything to do with how many friends you have, as it requires just two people's willingness to actually spend time together. You know--what "close friends" do.
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