What goes wrong when trying to make friends...

a) No-one can tell the difference between being shy and being deliberately solitary / withdrawn. They feel very different on the inside, but from the outside they look pretty much the same. Its not sensible to assume that people don't care, when they don't know.

b) It's not an admission of defeat to join societies or group activities of any sort. Plenty of people do this just to meet people, with the added advantage that you may have something in common to start with. Most groups have a kind of centripetal force to them which may mean it looks like there's a close-knit clique: but certainly with university societies, for example, the rapid turnover of students involved means you can will look like part of that clique (from the outside) just by staying around long enough.

c) Doing things -- anything -- is better than reflecting on things, if you're unhappy. Mark has often mentioned teaching himself to cook as a therapeutic activity, for example.

d) If you expect too much from people, you will often be disappointed.

e) Think about your diet -- most of my depression at university I now reckon was due to food. (I know you commented somewhere that all you eat at university is toast.) Because I had a wierd diet, I could only eat foods stuffed with sugar when I was in the university. This meant my energy levels and mood would go crashing every afternoon and leave me unable to work properly or assess my situation in a proper perspective. Avoiding fizzy drinks could be a part of dealing with things. (Getting fit this year has also been a blessing, but I think you refused to contemplate this on one thread...)

f) There are generally more people feeling the way you are than you think (this is a general 'you' as well as meaning you, Graham). But because everyone has evolved their own coping strategies and no-one likes to let other people see them feeling weak, it's often hard to realise this. But it means that it's worth becoming the person who arranges things, rather than someone who wishes other people were asking him to go out. Don't presume that everyone else is far too busy having fun to want to meet up. But also, don't be disheartened if some people are too busy. They're probably not having the wild social life you imagine, but working at c) or e) or working, or recovering from working.

I agree with this... when I was sitting in the pub with you at the ILX booze-up the other week (this is intended in the nicest possible way) I barely heard you say a word over the several hours we were all there. Obviously I've read your messages and so forth and knew that the very fact you were there in the first place was proof that you were making an effort, so I assumed you were naturally very shy as opposed to just plain anti-social. A lot of other people may not be able to make that judgement, especially people who don't know you from Adam. You've got a lot of interesting things to say... maybe you should try saying them more often. I know its can be very, very difficult, especially if you're shy, but you will find that it won't get any easier if you don't make those initial moves.

For the record, I'm pretty sure the majority of people here like you.

Of course, I don't know Graham especially well so if any of this is trite or insensitive or just plain wrong then I apologise in advance.

the reason things have been hard for me recently is not to do with this, although this hasn't helped (the last one has been a hammerblow). and i have been wondering about 'friendship' and what it means. to me, it is very very important, and i am very (too?) serious about it. not with everyone, and i let it happen gradually, and only a few people become very close friends. but for me the potential is there.

now to say this is all very well when you are in a good situation, as i was in leeds, and the first couple of years in london, because you're are a positive person and have enough to make you light and fun. But when you lose it, and it becomes more important, it becomes harder. IE - the more you need your existing friends, the more (some of them) will back away, And the more you need new friends, the harder it is to make them. i 'knew' this before, but now i'm discovering it 'for real'. after i lost my house, and ended up in a hostel, i needed *more* to keep me up, but the more you need it the more you push it away (people can think "mentalist"). its a very difficult situation! if you let people know how things are, you make things harder because it matters more. even if you don't, its apparent in your body language, in your mannerisms.

people have to 'want' to be around you, you have to make them want. but how? what is it about people you like that makes you like them? can you display those qualities?

i'm dealing with some of these things myself right now, i've other problems to sort out first, but the loss of the main people that made living in london fun has changed london for me, and, to a certain extent, i am going to have to start over.

i met 2 really cool girls recently at a gig, and we had a nice time and it was fun. they emailed me too, i replied, but that was it, no more. i would have liked to have met up again or at least emailed, but i can't force it. i'll probably meet some more people next time i go out as well, and the same thing may well happen again. but you can't force it

i'm not sure i wanted people on here to know some of this. oops!

I'm not sure what it was that made me begin to crawl out of my shell, though some voluntary work I did certainly helped my self-confidence. I tried to be more pro-active in making friends, and especially to learn to listen to them. There aren't many good listeners around, its an art well worth cultivating. I did some evening classes (I was unemployed for a long time) and realised many of the friends I made often felt just as awkward about themselves, were just as shambolic as I was/am. Many just hid it better.

There are no easy answers Graham, though I think Alex's points are well worth printing out, but please don't think that whatever your going through now is permament and inevitable. It isn't.

Pretending to be something you're not for the sake of impressing others is a rub strategy (though maybe a normal thing in moderation) but what I'd say to the above is that there's a BIG difference between being a naturally quiet person and being a self-consciously shy one who wants to say things but has a block about getting started/saying the right thing/hating the process of smalltalk etc. I know both kinds of people and the former are a lot easier to be around. I can sometimes still be the latter myself at times and it does my head in.

Just try to get to know a few people at uni. I'm glad I made a few good good friends at uni rather than knowing a whole crowd of people.

Errr, I can't really add anything else that hasn't already been said.

Cue mark s: "last time I actively went out of my way to make a friend I got plasticine all over my blanc-de-chine t-shirt"

sometimes I think about what I'd do if I moved to a strange town and had no friends there. I reckon I would so the kinds of things people have already said - join clubs and societies and stuff like that and hope to meet people with shared interests.

I'd also be tempted to move a popular interweb discussion board from a rub server to a grebt one, so that everyone on it would think I was G*R*A*T*E. Then I would post Fancy-A-Pint threads and people on the discussion board would come and have a pint with me and be my friend.

From the FAQ- Personal threads. If a thread is started discussing a registered user or their actions, that user has the right to ask for it to be deleted or locked. The thread does not have to be an attack on the user. This does not apply to threads users start themselves and later regret.

- part of the problem is that there's a massive disconnect between how you are online and how you are in real life. This isn't your fault but it means people (especially people who haven't themselves been shy or who dont get how you can be shy offline but not online) wont understand you when they meet you because they'll be expecting something different.

- part of this problem is your voice: it's very very quiet and high. Sorry if this seems like really stupid or intrusive advice but have you thought of speech therapy or voice training? The only time in my life I've ever been much teased was over a speech defect I used to have and it really helped to get it sorted out. What's happening now I suspect is that you're working yourself up to say stuff and participate and then people just aren't hearing you do it.

- finally, another problem is that when you do go out it's in large groups, at Fancy A Pints. These can be pretty disasterous for shy people - I've only been able to handle them recently and still totally clam up in some circumstances (big parties, work do's). Try doing things with smaller groups where there's less social pressure. For instance find a film you want to see, suggest going to see it - that way you have a bit of ice-breaking time beforehand, a long period where you don't have to be making a social effort and a readymade subject for drinks after. Or a gig.

ok graham, whatever.

I suspect also that you don't realise how shy or insecure other people can be. I think I can often come across as quite extroverted most of the time, but deep down I am someone whose mother said a thousand times was worthless and that no one would ever want me, all through my childhood, and my basic assumption is that nobody ever wants anything to do with me. This makes me unlikely to instigate any moves towards friendship, because I always expect to be rebuffed. I think that there are quite a few people who feel something like this way.

I love having people to have fun with or talk to when I need to, and I try to be there for them as much as I can, but when I feel they're dependent on me to keep them happy constantly (because they have no hobbies/other friends/close family/whatever), it's way too much pressure. When you screw up and make yourself unhappy you deal, but when you make OTHERS unhappy it's guilt, guilt, and more guilt. (I am also a more hermitish person than most teenagers, so maybe I just don't give what I'm supposed to as a friend.)

It is sad and no fun when other people never call you. I hope someone does. Good luck.

Then ILM came along and now I have met 'strangers' (even though we 'talk' throught he board) and it's been good. It's quite difficult to start conversation sometimes and so on but it's nice to talk. I met Martin and mark s from london and several ppl from toronto and it was really nice.

So if you're in a situation (like an FAP for example) when you're likely to be meeting people who you'd like to become your friends, try and go in there in a positive frame of mind - don't dwell on it beforehand, don't worry about it, put on Atomic Kitten or whatever CD and jump around the room or whatever to psyche yourself up. Make sure you're on a high when you arrive and you'll find talking to people a lot easier.

I think I'm talking abstractly here now and not necessarily about Graham, but I hope it helps.

I'd also repeat some points others have made: it's worth making an effort to do things with people even if that's a bit scary and in groups and stuff it's worth making conversation even if that feels fake because the other person will be so grateful.

And: don't worry too much, occupy yourself with other things like drawing or computers or study or whatever else because it makes you feel better when you are getting things done, and you won't regret that it in the future, but you might regret sitting around worrying.

Also you are drifting oblique again, and going passive aggressive resentful because we aren't following you: if you think people are not addressing the actual problem, state it more exactly. Tell us what we're missing. You were lecturing people on missing the concept of hyperbole yesterday: if "ever" isn't hyperbole then let us know how and why.

I think the application of that FAQ point should involve asking a moderator whatever the situation, i.e. if somebody posts a thread about me then I should ask another mod to delete it rather than do it myself. That way the suggestion of a posting hierarchy is avoided.

END ADMIN POINT.]

I have no idea what you mean when you say "more" or "acquaintances".

"Acquaintances" = people I just kind of see around. "More" = Seeing them deliberately. Sara last year pretty much amounted to an acquaintance I was around a lot.

By "ever" I do mean ever, and there is a big difference between this and moving to a new place where you don't know anyone, or whatever (I'm 19 if you don't know). This summer I got a couple of text messages asking how I was from Rebecca (non-Low-fi), and that is the only example of "more" I can think of ever (She's very friendly and I hadn't actually spoken to her much before, so she isn't really a friend yet).

[OTHER ADMIN POINT - I am not a moderator, I am someone grumpy with an SQL command line, so please don't make me think I am one by asking me to edit stuff. Thank you]

Mod-er-a-tor(n): Someone grumpy with an SQL command line.

Something else that occurred to me - which may be helpful or useless or stating the obvious but what the hell. One thing I think friends hardly ever do is talk about whether or not they are friends - if they do start doing this then it probably means they're about not to be. So I think one pitfall you might fall into, especially if you've never had friends, is worrying about whether you're a friend of someone or not and then talking about it to them rather than talking about whatever 'friends' do talk about.

I have spent sooooooo much time by myself this year, which is a huge change from last year when I lived with lots of good friends. What it's made me realise is that sometimes even though it sucks really bad at times because it feels like I am all alone, I actually really needed to be by myself and that "everything was happening for a reason" blah blah.

I guess I believe that you can grow and learn stuff about yourself more when you're alone. Sometimes you need to get comfortable with yourself before you can really give anything to other people.

I think my way of getting comfortable with myself is to hit rock bottom, and this year has provided some great rock bottom moments. I got into a lot of sticky situations, created all sorts of scandal, drank myself into many a stupor, and all the time I was doing it, I was secretly pleased that nobody was around to stop me. I felt like a lone adventurer and even when I was in my bedroom crying my stupid eyes out, I was secretly thrilled at all my romantic aloneness. haha actually why am I speaking in the past tense, I am still doing all that stuff.

But I think maybe because I am older I can handle being alone more. If I was your age doing all this stuff surely I would be in the nuthouse by now.

Speaking of being a nut case from the nuthouse, my shrink always says that if you are going to have a nervous breakdown you should at least have an impressive one, the best nervous breakdown anyone's ever seen!

Sometimes you can't control how many people are around you, just use that time to be selfish, create your own philosophies, learn about yourself, learn to luuurve yourself, learn to have arrogance, learn to not care what anyone thinks, whatever. I think isolation can be liberating, but you do have to keep remembering that it's not going to last forever. A good way to remember that is to think to yourself: Nothing lasts forever.

a) It puts the responsibility for being friends with them on other people: this means one can avoid responsibility. It is easier, and far less scary, to feel neglected than it is to actively go out and get in touch with people yourself. Yes, ringing someone to invite them for a drink IS terrifying, because you risk rejection. Or you risk *feeling* rejected if they happen to be busy, or tired, or not communicative and say no. But there is no chance of friendship without risk. Trying to will people to coming to you just does not work.

b) A related issue: it's just not fair to other people to expect them to do the running. Yes, it can be exhausting, mentally and emotionally to take the risks the whole time, but people generally in my experience fall into their own personal coping strategies for avoiding loneliness and are only too happy to respond to someone taking the risk to ask to meet them. But by having issues with people that they don't even know about, there's a danger of putting a whole lot of weight onto what may be casual / trivial encounters.

c) Which brings me to a third point: it is far too easy to assume that everyone is really good friends with each other because they interact in certain ways, but the chances are they don't think in such formal terms. The danger of unhappiness is that it is easy to polarise your view of the world into a) people who have normal lives and don't understand and b) me, with my problems. This is unhelpful, as people have been pointing out, because it means putting up barriers to communication rather than opening them. Part of learning to live in the world, with other people, IMHO, is learning to live with the contingency and casualness of the world. No-one really sits down and says 'Now we're going to be friends': you spend time with as many people as you can, in whatever capacity that is, and after a point, you realise that you have a lot in common, or are beginning to rely on each other. But you can't MAKE this happen. High expectations will put people off.

Here's the personal stuff: I was unhappy at university, and am still sometimes unhappy, because I assume(d) that everyone else was away somewhere having fun, whenever I was not. I figured everyone had these great friendships that I wasn't part of, and there were lots of things going on without me. I tried joining societies, but they were unwelcoming and (apparently) hostile. Things picked up when I changed my attitude: rather than expecting to make friends, I learnt that by hanging around -- in my case, at the student newspaper -- you bump into other people hanging around, end up hanging around together, or whatever. An ever-evolving network of apparently casual contacts builds up to be a social life.

I've started off all over again in a new town once since then. It was absolutely terrifying. But I did the same thing, and it worked. I met people and had learnt to be pro-active in asking people to do things with me: sometimes folk said no, sometimes yes. But funnily, it was only after a year, as I left town, that I realised which ones of my acquaintances were really my friends -- which ones I would want to stay in contact with. It wasn't the ones I had spent the most time with either. I'm starting again in a new town in a few weeks. I'm scared again, but I know I'll run into people the whole time -- working in a university you can't avoid it -- and I'm not expecting to suddenly make a new network of friends. Perhaps when I leave, I'll realise that I *have* made new friends, but I know it's not possible to make people your friends: acquaintances become friends, but it's a long process.

Graham, I hope you're feeling slightly better about things today. There are people on ILX -- and elsewhere -- who know to some extent what you're going through, even if no-one can understand it totally (and that too, is just a fact of life). But no-one can make unhappiness just go away, even one's friends, and it's unfair on folk to expect them to be able to do so. (Not that you want us to wave a magic wand and help you out). Everyone I know who has faced any form of depression or unhappiness has just had to learn their own ways of coping, and that's a slow process, but it has to be an active process. Just waiting for things to improve, or people to come to you, will never work, I'm afraid. Hope this is helping, tell me to shut up if it's wide of the mark...

God this is all so horribly reminiscent. I remember almost sending a letter to a schoolfriend (well, I hardly ever saw them outside of school) once saying almost exactly this. Looking at them from the outside, it's easy to assume everyone else is some kind of super efficient social machine but people can become expert at hiding their insecurities and fears you know..

People used to assume I was just aloof or superior, when really I was just desperately trying to think of a way to make contact and in the meantime didn't want to look awkward. Other people I know are insanely chatty as a nervous reaction when they're uncomfortable with a situation.

Let it be clear that this is an observation of life's irony, rather than any kind of judgment on anyone at all.

Well yeah, but as I'm sure you know this isn't really a paradox, as there's a difference between being friendly and being someone's friend.

It was kind of his inevitable ironic fate since the very first post in this thread.

I was not there, but I have heard this story. It is rather depressing and not suitable for posting on the internet. If your life is really empty without it, mail me offlist and I will eventually mail you my recollection of it.

And at least he got off his arse and WENT to a FAP. Anyone who tries deserves some reward.

And EVERYONE is trying to meet new friends freshman year so you can be more obvious about it than you can later in life.

Curt1s, it gets better. My freshman year, I was a drunken emotional trainwreck with only a few friends that I could call 'friends.' Not until the second semester of my second year did I meet people that I liked (and grew to love) and loved me back. At this point, all these people are still in my life, and I'd say we are more 'dear' to each other than ever. *PAUSE* ^^SHOUT-OUT TO MY STAR-FRIENDS^^

My advice:
- do not listen to sad boy music like the Smiths all the time, only some of the time. otherwise, it is a turn-off. no one wants to be friends with a sad suzie. right?
- lfam & rosemary are right: if yr school has a radio station, become a station member. if i hadn't been digging through CDs and records for my first two years of school, i wouldn't know half as much as what i know now. also, i wouldn't have met many people. not to mention i would be unemployed. but seriously, some of the best times of my entire life have been spent with my close friends, on the air.
- do you like to bicycle? take bike rides with people.
- try to get out and go to events. even if they make you (and me) anxious, they are often worth it, and a good way to meet like-minded people who might be friends.
- finally, while life on the internet can sometimes be more fulfilling that 'real' life, it is best to stop comparing.

good luck. also, where do you go to school, if you don't mind my asking?

ack sorry for bringing it up. i thought enough time has passed. my bad.

This is really OTM.

The Georgia Institute of Technology. Mostly male, and most people are either geeks or Greeks, which is a bit off-putting. I am planning on working at the radio station here - the training session is in a couple of weeks.

people aren't turned off by shyness, they're turned off by manipulative bullshit and extreme neediness.

People notice this? Uh oh.... :)

This was me in my first week, except it was Xiu Xiu. I think you're better off.

Also: consulting the journal I started that week reveals that I got happy in about six days. You're going to be fine eventually, if not very soon.

I would have, although I can't remember if I did or not.

Isn't there a chance you would have been doing something else, and whatever that was would have introduced you to a bunch of people too?

Also I was friends with plenty of "sad suzies" as you put it, in college. I thought they were hottt.

This all depends on the location. In my town, if you go out on your own, you're frowned up as being a loser/freak or whatever. People will just look at you or pretend you're not there. I have done this, not to make friends but because I wanted to see the band and didn't care if I was alone or not.

i was exaggerating. some of them were not hott to me, but i did have a kind of fascination with teh gothy girls, who tended to be much less embarrassed about being gothy and "darkk" than the boys did at that age. which was kind of thrilling to me somehow.

It, err, helps if you only try to be friends with people you really DO like v much -- otherwise, yes, you have to pretend too hard at the charming part, and that's just slimy. And boring.

also, i would have made friends in other ways, but music is sort of what i do/ what i did. so it made sense for me. dig?