How to get a friends circle after college?

[River Lion]

My ask is simple. I want friends. No care for what they do as a career or if their attractive or whatever, no ulterior motive. All I ask is that they are in the same age bracket as me. I am 26.

I tried meetup.com but every gathering there seems to be for people in their 40s or higher. And it makes sense, to be honest. People in their mid-20s don't use meetup because they have no need for it. These people already have social circles they belong to from their college days, and if John the Socially Normal wanted to go on a hike he'd go with his existing friends not some "Hikers Meetup" from the internet.

I've heard this advice of "explore your passion". I am interested in many things like cooking, hiking, scuba diving, etc. but I don't see how this can make me friends. At most I can make casual acquaintances with the dive shop owner, but he will not be my "friend" in the sense that he'd invite me over to dinner at his house to watch the superbowl togtether.

It seems people are entrenched in their own social lives and me, as a lonely man trying to enter their circle, just isn't a welcome sight.

I'm not so socially flawed that I struggle to talk to people, I made casual acquaintances here and there. Like John from the grocery store or Bill from the library. But again, these are not "friends" nor are they a "social circle". A social circle is a group of friends who all know and connect with each other and can do stuff together. Like to go to Vegas as a group of 7. That's what I want.

 

[Finished]

You're kind of asking for the equivalent of a mail order bride. You can't just go get a group of friends unless you are a very special individual. If that were the case you would already have lots of friends. You have to start of as acquaintances, co-workers, or participate in some kind of shared activity. Then once you pass the smell test others will get closer to you. Then you have to be a friend to them. Then they will invite you to gatherings with their other friends. Making your way into a friend circle takes time, effort, and shared interests. You need to provide something that the others want or need. That's why others keep telling you to go do what you enjoy and you might make friends.

However, if you still think that's all Bullshit then you can strap on your extremely outgoing personality and target groups in public. Find a group you think is good and burst into the circle with something that they will want to hear. You'll obviously have to spy on them a little bit first. For instance, if you are at a bar and some guys are throwing darts you can start playing with them. Then tell them they are really good and purposely loose. Then buy them all a round of drinks. Keep making them feel good while you are around them. Then one will say, "Hey man! You're okay." Then you say, "Yeah, you guys are cool too. What other bars do you guys go to?" ............ more bullshit conversation goes here ........... Then you ask if they have a boat, or go dirt biking, or whatever. Talk about the things you enjoy doing. Maybe they think that's cool or enjoy doing those things already. Then ask if you can meet up with them to do one of those activities as in, "we should hang out." But, act like it's no big deal if they say yes or no. If and when you do meet up with them again bring stuff with you to share like food and drinks. It's amazing how many people are persuaded by that kind of crap and free stuff.

Or, if you are into drugs skip everything above and just tell people you have drugs. Then you'll have lots of friends and can get lots of sex too as long as you're willing to share.

 

[River Lion]

You're kind of asking for the equivalent of a mail order bride. You can't just go get a group of friends unless you are a very special individual. If that were the case you would already have lots of friends. You have to start of as acquaintances, co-workers, or participate in some kind of shared activity. Then once you pass the smell test others will get closer to you. Then you have to be a friend to them. Then they will invite you to gatherings with their other friends. Making your way into a friend circle takes time, effort, and shared interests. You need to provide something that the others want or need. That's why others keep telling you to go do what you enjoy and you might make friends.

However, if you still think that's all Bullshit then you can strap on your extremely outgoing personality and target groups in public. Find a group you think is good and burst into the circle with something that they will want to hear. You'll obviously have to spy on them a little bit first. For instance, if you are at a bar and some guys are throwing darts you can start playing with them. Then tell them they are really good and purposely loose. Then buy them all a round of drinks. Keep making them feel good while you are around them. Then one will say, "Hey man! You're okay." Then you say, "Yeah, you guys are cool too. What other bars do you guys go to?" ............ more bullshit conversation goes here ........... Then you ask if they have a boat, or go dirt biking, or whatever. Talk about the things you enjoy doing. Maybe they think that's cool or enjoy doing those things already. Then ask if you can meet up with them to do one of those activities as in, "we should hang out." But, act like it's no big deal if they say yes or no. If and when you do meet up with them again bring stuff with you to share like food and drinks. It's amazing how many people are persuaded by that kind of crap and free stuff.

Or, if you are into drugs skip everything above and just tell people you have drugs. Then you'll have lots of friends and can get lots of sex too as long as you're willing to share.

This is actually a very helpful post! I'm not charismatic enough for the middle paragraph, but I do agree that I just need to start the slog on the first paragraph. It's just so easy to be discouraged, because EVERYONE around you has a friends circle from high school or college. And you don't. And that sucks.

 

[Finished]

I hope you can muster enough in you to actually make a real effort to get into friend groups. IMO, you should try doing the second paragraph stuff. It's good experience and will help you in many ways. The trick to being able to do it is play a character other then yourself. Treat it like an acting job. Come up with different roles and didn't scripts. You should even dress differently and possibly comb your hair different. Become a new person called John Johnson, Rod Pecker, or whatever. Then be extremely outgoing. You can allow yourself to do that because it's not really you. You are playing the role of someone else. It's a game. So, when someone treats your character badly it won't matter because it's not really you. So, have fun with it. It will allow you to realize that doing that kind of thing really isn't as scary as you think it is. It will help you build confidence to use in your real life. That's what all the con artists do, especially politicians. But, instead of using it to do evil, use it to make friends, gain confidence, and have fun.

 

[TheRealCallie]

As an experiment, I might agree with Finished, but only if it's just once or twice. If it is successful, you may feel you always have to pretend or if the experiment works and you do gain a friends circle, you may feel you have to keep up the pretense and not be who you actually are. That would be a chore in itself and it would likely slip and the group of people may feel like you lied to them (which you did) so not want to be around you anymore.

Plain and simple, you likely want friends who will accept you for who you are. I'm not saying you shouldn't work on yourself, because I feel everyone should. There is always room for improvement regardless of who you are or what issues you might have. So being yourself is paramount to finding the right group of friends.