When you’re a kid making friends is as easy as saying “Hey, you wanna be my friend?” They say yes and BAM! You’ve got a new friend.
When you’re a teenager, you’re all stuck in the same miserable places like school and parents houses, so you bond together in rebellion.
In college you are learning together and finally have the freedom you’ve always desired! You bond by sharing new experiences and exploring the world.
And then you graduate, get a job, have a family and become busy. The limited free time you do have can’t be spent on hanging out like you used to. People move away or grow apart. You find yourself suddenly feeling lonely and you have no one to call. No one who can come over and hang out. Hopefully you have family or a spouse you can confide in, but not everyone does. Sometimes it’s just you.
But it doesn’t have to be. You can have friends again. It just might be a little different than before. Here are 7 ways that you can make friends as an adult.
1. Get to know your coworkers better
If you have a full time job you’ll end up spending about 40 hours a week there with the same people. If it’s a career that you don’t plan on leaving any time soon, then it’s actually important to build good relationships with your coworkers/colleagues. If you’re going to be seeing them everyday for years it’s good to get along with them and even better if you’re friends.
Try inviting your coworkers to join you for lunch if you have the same lunch time. Or invite them out for drinks after work. You can casually bring up a place you’ve been wanting to try and ask them if they want to go with you.
If they invite you somewhere, take them up on the offer. Exchange numbers for work purposes but don’t be afraid to text them something funny or encouraging once in a while.
And if one of you leave the company, stay in touch. Get together to catch up over lunch or invite them to a party or outing. It does take some effort which leads us into the next point…
2. Make effort
Adults are busy. You can’t just play all day like you did when you were a kid, you’ve got responsibilities now. This means you have to make more effort to make friends as an adult.
If you invite out a friend and they can’t make it because they are busy, don’t give up right away, try again. If they keep blowing you off then that could be a sign that they just don’t want to hang out but, if they make effort to reschedule then that’s a good sign.
Lots of us are introverts which makes this easier said than done. Come out of your comfort zone a little bit and make an effort to get to know someone you find interesting. Invite them to come along to something you’re already doing or to something you’ve talked about doing. Even just suggesting ‘Hey, we should go hiking together” is a good set up and a good way to see if they are even interested. If they are interested they will also make an effort back. You should not be the only one making effort in a friendship, it’s a two way street.
3. Join something and stick to it
One of the best ways to meet and get to know people is to join a club, class, church or group of some sort and keep going on a regular basis. Consistency is key here, you aren’t going to really get to know people if you only see them once every couple of months. And make sure to give it a fair chance. If you go once or twice and aren’t really feeling it, maybe give it at least a month or two. Once you start to see the same people and get to know them it might make a difference. If not, try something else.
The great part about groups or clubs is you get to sit and talk to people who have common interest and get to know each other. You’ll have a chance to connect and maybe even find other common interest which might lead to exchanging numbers and hanging out outside of the group. Groups and clubs tend to last longer than classes which might only be a few weeks or months long.
There are tons of ways to find a group, club or class. If you are part of a church, that is a great place to start as many have weekly bible studies and ministries that are very welcoming. If that’s not your thing then try something activity based like painting, writing, sports or book club. You can find some through your local library, community centers, colleges or Meetup.
Another great way is to start volunteering. Find something your passionate about and you’ll end up meeting people who are equally as passionate as you.
4. Reconnect with old friends
It probably feels like you don’t have any friends sometimes, especially if you don’t live in the city you grew up in. But, when you really think about it, people who used to be your friends kinda still are. If you called them today you’d probably be able to have a good conversation and catch up with most of them. If you do live close by you can have lunch together and talk about the good old days and how much your lives have changed.
Sometimes you realize that you drifted apart because you no longer have common interest. Other times you realize that you have more in common now than before. You’ll never know if you don’t reach out and reconnect.
Social media makes it super easy to reconnect with old friends. Just send a quick Facebook message to someone you haven’t talked to in a while. Liking photos and post doesn’t count, you have to reach out a bit more and actually talk to them.
5. Be open
Sometimes we tend to brush off people who we don’t think we won’t get along with, when if we actually gave them a chance we might realize that we actually like them. Just because they might not seem like the friends we pictured or used to have doesn’t mean that we won’t get along with them and end up becoming great friends.
Friends will come in all shapes and sizes and it’s good to have a variety of friends. No one person can fulfill all your needs. Some friends are great to talk to but not so great for going out with. Some friends are great at making you laugh and others are great at giving good advice. Having different friends with different strengths is a great thing because you’ll be able to call different people for different situations or opportunities.
Spend time really getting to know the real person and don’t judge by appearances. You might be pleasantly surprised.
6. Be yourself
Nobody wants fake friends. Remember being in high school when everyone was trying to be someone they weren’t? Oh, that’s still happening in your life today? Yeah, unfortunately many people pretend to be someone that they aren’t without realizing that they are actually only hurting themselves in the long run, especially if you are trying to make friends.
Being fake will catch up with you after a while. You won’t be able to keep up with the person you’ve created and people will be able to tell that you aren’t being authentic. You might feel like you have to keep up with trends you don’t really care about and you might even go into debt or end up depressed from trying to impress people.
The worst part about being fake is you’ll never have real, true friends because you never showed them your real, true self. Once the real you comes out (and it will) then your “friends” will probably disappear because you aren’t who they thought you were.
Do yourself a favor and just be yourself no matter what. No one is perfect and everyone makes mistakes, that’s what makes us human. It’s in these mistakes and shortcomings that real bonding happens. Having someone to talk to about anything is extremely valuable and will help you out greatly during times when you just need some help. If you have to sugar coat things then you’ll never really feel that bond that you feel when you pour out your heart and soul to someone and they still care for you afterwards.
A fake friend won’t be able to handle your “drama” and will probably slowly fade from your life. Real friends will be there for you no matter what, especially when times get tough.
7. Make time
Most adults have busy schedules. Between school, work and family, who really has time for friends? It’s easy to turn down invitations because you’re busy or tired and a true friend will understand. However, if you constantly don’t have time to hang out or talk on the phone, eventually your friend might stop trying so hard because they are tired of being turned down. They will probably feel like you just don’t like them or don’t want to hang out. People make time for things that are important to them.
If making friends is important to you then you need to make time for friends. Even a couple hours a week is probably a decent amount of time. You can spend an hour catching up on the phone with an old friend and another hour grabbing lunch with a coworker. If you are too busy to do these things then deep down making friends might not be that important to you.
I get it, you have a career now, you have to stay healthy, you have kids who need your attention, you’re taking night classes, all of these things are great and an important part of being an adult. But, just remember, true friends are extremely valuable and just making a little bit of time for them can greatly improve your relationship and make sure that you don’t lose them.