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If you spent your college years isolated and made no lasting friendships, is there still hope?? I've had debilitating social anxiety all my life and that didn't change in college. I didn't make anything past acquaintances in college. I commuted, so I just went to class and then came home. I understand that most people make their lifelong friends in college. Is it still possible to meet people after college?? I feel like everyone already has a solid social circle and wouldn't be interested in bringing someone with low social worth like me in. Am I hopeless?
My social life was good in college, because I lived on campus all 4 years except when I was overseas, then I had roommates. After college was the same. Once I was working and had my own place, I had roommates, met new people in the neighborhood (lots of singles with roommates) and met people at the local bars and venues we would frequent.
I have moved around all over the world and always ended up in neighborhoods with like minded people, wherever I was in life. Just put yourself in places where you see the same people again and again and friendships grow, as long as you remain open to, and enjoy being around, people
Location: Huntersville/Charlotte, NC and Washington, DC
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Originally Posted by prosk8er
If you spent your college years isolated and made no lasting friendships, is there still hope?? I've had debilitating social anxiety all my life and that didn't change in college. I didn't make anything past acquaintances in college. I commuted, so I just went to class and then came home. I understand that most people make their lifelong friends in college. Is it still possible to meet people after college?? I feel like everyone already has a solid social circle and wouldn't be interested in bringing someone with low social worth like me in. Am I hopeless?
Nope. I was a commuter student myself but met friends after college mainly through meetup and getting into music festivals (EDM in particular.)
I had really good social life in college but after that I was stuck in a small town for my first job & I was miserable. People at work are pre-occupied & cautious so its not easy to make friends at work. You will be lucky to find a friend or 2 at workplace who will leave their guard down & feel comfortable talking freely with coworkers/friends. I started making friends outside work by joining a gym & taking some classes. I saw the same faces frequently & we had something in common to talk about (like the class instructor, gym attire, quality of gym, etc.) so it was easier to make friends there. You can try different hobbies, activities that interest you & take some classes locally like pottery, painting, cooking, hiking, book club.....whatever interests you that involves a group of people. Usually in groups there are one or 2 talkative people who organize events & the rest follow them. I have friends who are not comfortable in crowds & the only way to face their fear is to hangout with a crowd frequently until it becomes a habit. All you need is to connect with maybe 5 good friends because life will get busier & you wont have time to catch up with everyone. Focus on keeping yourself happy. Its not necessary to be talkative or popular to be happy. You can go solo to any place & still have a blast. Travel to new places, take up photography, write a blog & connect with people online if that's more comfortable for you. Don't push yourself too hard. Just indulge in some fun activities & people will gravitate towards you. When you talk about something you are passionate about, you become interesting to other like-minded people & that's how you make friends.
It's such a pity that you didn't take the opportunity, while you were in college, of seeing a free therapist, which most colleges seem to have.
But of course it's possible to meet people after college. In fact, some people do have close friends from their school years, but with most people, eventually they switch more to later friends.
Is it fair to guess from your post that you're probably in your early 20s? You'll be meeting people at work, first of all. But before any of that, you have to get past your anxiety. A lot of people turn to medication, which personally I think is a mistake. In my opinion, you need to deal with the anxiety and get past it, not drug yourself for the rest of your life. So you can read some books and maybe take some informal classes that will help you along the path of socializing. You'll be acting "as if." You'll act as if you're confident, upbeat, friendly - even if that's not the way you're feeling inside.
And you will also work at increasing your "social worth" (nice phrase) by dressing as if you're self-confident and walking as if you're self-confident. Then you'll make an effort to make sure that you're reasonably well-informed, so that if you're standing with some people discussing something, you won't feel embarrassed about feeling dumb. Then you'll learn to accept the fact that sometimes you'll accidentally say something dumb, and learn to laugh it off.
And then you'll make some little efforts to find people with similar interests, maybe by joining a few clubs or groups - a running group, a book club, a political volunteer group, a cooking class, whatever might be fun for you, so that you'll enjoy it even if you don't make friends.
So go start making a few lists about how you'll approach all this.
If you spent your college years isolated and made no lasting friendships, is there still hope?? I've had debilitating social anxiety all my life and that didn't change in college. I didn't make anything past acquaintances in college. I commuted, so I just went to class and then came home. I understand that most people make their lifelong friends in college. Is it still possible to meet people after college?? I feel like everyone already has a solid social circle and wouldn't be interested in bringing someone with low social worth like me in. Am I hopeless?
I have a Muslim middle eastern friend who I think is primarily friends with me because that race and religion is quite unpopular now and he doesn't have nearly the amount of friends he wants. The guy is one of the most charismatic people I know and quite the extrovert and yet goes to movies alone now and then. He just asked if I wanted to go do something sometime when were both staff writers for the same community college newspaper. I had no interest in spending time with him whatsoever. We'd hardly even spoken before he'd asked if I wanted to go do something sometime. Also, I was a good four years older than him. I didn't tell him I didn't want to go do something though because I didn't want to hurt his feelings, so we went to The Science Center, which was a lot of fun. Join lots of organizations if you can.
I recommend behaving like that guy did. It's okay to be irritating. It's okay to hang out to hang out with eighteen year olds if you're thirty, although I'd avoid anyone not graduated from high school. It's okay to hang out with fifty year olds if you're 24. I don't know if you're male or female, but if girls get creeped out by you, so long as you didn't do anything to deserve it that's their problem not yours. Just lower your standards until you find people to spend time around.
Also, that friend of mine was strongly considering joining an organization for train lovers for awhile. Everyone there was above sixty, and he knew nothing about trains. He was about 23 at the time. I joined an anime-watching club when I knew nothing about anime just to have people to spend time around for much the same reason. I still go to a bonfire once per year with one of them. If all you want is people to spend time around...they don't necessarily need to be people like you.
It's such a pity that you didn't take the opportunity, while you were in college, of seeing a free therapist, which most colleges seem to have.
But of course it's possible to meet people after college. In fact, some people do have close friends from their school years, but with most people, eventually they switch more to later friends.
Is it fair to guess from your post that you're probably in your early 20s? You'll be meeting people at work, first of all. But before any of that, you have to get past your anxiety. A lot of people turn to medication, which personally I think is a mistake. In my opinion, you need to deal with the anxiety and get past it, not drug yourself for the rest of your life. So you can read some books and maybe take some informal classes that will help you along the path of socializing. You'll be acting "as if." You'll act as if you're confident, upbeat, friendly - even if that's not the way you're feeling inside.
And you will also work at increasing your "social worth" (nice phrase) by dressing as if you're self-confident and walking as if you're self-confident. Then you'll make an effort to make sure that you're reasonably well-informed, so that if you're standing with some people discussing something, you won't feel embarrassed about feeling dumb. Then you'll learn to accept the fact that sometimes you'll accidentally say something dumb, and learn to laugh it off.
And then you'll make some little efforts to find people with similar interests, maybe by joining a few clubs or groups - a running group, a book club, a political volunteer group, a cooking class, whatever might be fun for you, so that you'll enjoy it even if you don't make friends.
So go start making a few lists about how you'll approach all this.
I didn't take medication for my social anxiety disorder, but I may not have a strong version of it. My doctor said I could take it, or not back when I was quite young. It did cause me to act quite odd at times though. I remember thinking I could befriend a girl in the library at a university by asking if she wanted a root beer. I hadn't spoken to her before. I merely asked if she wanted a root beer. I had no idea why she might be put off by that. My thought were something like: Maybe it'll be a conversations starter.
I think you gave good advice...but I don't think the OP should wait to solve the social anxiety that he or she has had all his or her life, that is supposedly debilitating, because that problem may never change. Mine did, after working as a cashier for three years and joining a college coed community service fraternity...but whereas I see myself as charismatic to the point of having near mind-control powers compared to my prior social skills, other people still tend to perceive me as shy and socially awkward. The difference is I have upgraded from intolerable unspeaking arse in their minds to shy and socially awkward. Sometimes I can be truly charismatic, but that depends on the situation.
I would recommend that the OP go out and try to socialize before he or she attempts to solve the anxiety, because the anxiety may never go away. Maybe the socialization will help with the anxiety too. It certainly did for me.
I was never that sociable but I let go a little in college and made quite a few friends. NONE of them were lasting friendships after graduation, however. Same goes for work. I've met all of my current friends through my husband.
I feel like everyone already has a solid social circle and wouldn't be interested in bringing someone with low social worth like me in. Am I hopeless?
First of all, stop thinking of yourself in that way. If you don't think you're worth anything, no one else will, either.
Making friends does get harder as you get older. If it's important to you, you'll have to work at it. And it is a lot of work. Join clubs, take classes, join meetup groups, join hobby groups, talk to strangers, make the effort to reach out and call people. This may increase your social circle, or it may not. There are no guarantees.
Then one day you'll realize you only ever had about three real friends, and that's all you need.
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