BlueSoul Posted December 20, 2007 Posted December 20, 2007 I haven't made a friend for a year and 4 months. Since the start of college many of my close friends go to other colleges and I was the only one going to another. Since then, I wasn't confident. Usually when I was younger kids would just go up to me and that's how I made friends. I expected this to happen at college, but nothing happened. When I look at other of my classmates that went to my school they have friends, new ones. But me, I'm just a lonesome. I thought my excuse for not making any new friends was that I was alone because my friends don't go to my college, but that wasn't the case. Everyone made friends whilst they were in the same situation as me, but really I didn't know how to make friends. I REALLY DON'T KNOW! I've tried many methods, but none seemed to work at all. I would have to watch others and see how they formed new friendships. Now I'm in my second year of college in a new course. Thought I've acknowldged every mistake that I made form the previous year and hoped that this time I make new friends. But again, failure triumphants. Am I cursed or something? How did you people make new friends?
bogota Posted December 20, 2007 Posted December 20, 2007 What kind of level of the friendmaking process are you struggling with? Do you never find yourself in the sort of situations where you can make friends? Do you find it hard to start conversations? Do you find it hard to turn an initial conversation into a friendship? I'm not so good at answering the second two questions. But I think I can answer the first question - I've always found it easiest to make friends when I am in cooperative working situations. For example, doing volunteer work, in a club, or working on a research project. Outside of those kind of situations, when you have a network of friends you can make new friends through that network. Let people know that you'd like to meet their other friends, and if people invite you to "mixer" type events, be sure to say yes!
Author BlueSoul Posted December 20, 2007 Author Posted December 20, 2007 What kind of level of the friendmaking process are you struggling with? Do you never find yourself in the sort of situations where you can make friends? Do you find it hard to start conversations? Do you find it hard to turn an initial conversation into a friendship? I'm not so good at answering the second two questions. But I think I can answer the first question - I've always found it easiest to make friends when I am in cooperative working situations. For example, doing volunteer work, in a club, or working on a research project. Outside of those kind of situations, when you have a network of friends you can make new friends through that network. Let people know that you'd like to meet their other friends, and if people invite you to "mixer" type events, be sure to say yes! Yes, I found it hard to start conversations with worthy people. I had that trouble since my very first day of college, and the beginning of this year's. It just seemed that there are no one of my type that I can associate with. From the past I've always end up with stupid, awkward, annoying, over-exagerating people as my only adquaintances. It's just not fair, What am I doing wrong for people to repel me? Is it my face? My height? Hair? Body image? WHAT THE HECK IS IT THEN!
bogota Posted December 20, 2007 Posted December 20, 2007 Well it's probably not your face, height, or hair. There are people in the world who would try not to be friends with people based on their physical appearance, but you probably don't want to be friends with those people anyway. It's probably just that you haven't developed the conversational and social skills you need. I'm not the world's most brilliant conversationalist, so I can't give you a whole lot of tips in that regard (and it's not like there are hard and fast tips anyway). Mostly what you will have to do is just try! To become a good conversationalist you will have to just try striking up conversations. It will turn out badly sometimes and you will just have to accept that in advance and then keep on trying. There are some books you might want to try reading; I never found them helpful but you might: How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie for example. Also, as an aside: generally, treating people well, giving them the benefit of the doubt, and having high expectations for people will help you make friends. Nobody's perfect all of the time. Why are you judging the people you're with as "stupid, awkward, annoying, over-exagerating people"? You can either accept people as who they are or move on and find other people. It's not healthy to stay in one place and get progressively angrier.
Author BlueSoul Posted December 20, 2007 Author Posted December 20, 2007 Well it's probably not your face, height, or hair. There are people in the world who would try not to be friends with people based on their physical appearance, but you probably don't want to be friends with those people anyway. It's probably just that you haven't developed the conversational and social skills you need. I'm not the world's most brilliant conversationalist, so I can't give you a whole lot of tips in that regard (and it's not like there are hard and fast tips anyway). Mostly what you will have to do is just try! To become a good conversationalist you will have to just try striking up conversations. It will turn out badly sometimes and you will just have to accept that in advance and then keep on trying. There are some books you might want to try reading; I never found them helpful but you might: How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie for example. Also, as an aside: generally, treating people well, giving them the benefit of the doubt, and having high expectations for people will help you make friends. Nobody's perfect all of the time. Why are you judging the people you're with as "stupid, awkward, annoying, over-exagerating people"? You can either accept people as who they are or move on and find other people. It's not healthy to stay in one place and get progressively angrier. Well the fact is they are. They were all on bottom set classes and gained few C's. I never saw anyone form my school friends with those kind of people, and I was really suprised that people still act like that in college, especially in my current position. You want to know how I found it hard to makie friends? The first day of college (this year), I was transmitted to a new course will a ton of people I didn't know (except for one, and he used to be a close friend from year 7). I didn't make conversations because I didn't know anyone. At break, I always walk down to the shops to buy some food until class started. About a week later, I see people in my class talking to other people and formed new friendships, including my old classmate. I found that confusing to grasp and comprehend of how they managed to talked and make new friends. I'm just really confused. People keep telling to start a conversation to make friends. I had done that before and nothing worked. Same method to other people and it worked for them. This is where the confusion comes from.
dramababe Posted December 20, 2007 Posted December 20, 2007 Its really hard to make friends in college...trust me I felt the same way. The thing with my school is that there are a total of 1400 stuents, really small so everyone knows everyone adn you go through classes with the same people..sort of like High School. So i made friends because I was always with the same people. I think you need to maybe suggest study groups, that way you get to know people..you can try that!! Just talk to people, I know its hard but its part of life!!
bogota Posted December 20, 2007 Posted December 20, 2007 I've been there man... my first year of college was painfully lonely. Like dramababe says, it's not a curse. It's not because there's anything wrong with you. It's just that you haven't acquired the skills yet. These skills aren't magical or difficult to obtain, it's mostly just a matter of feeling comfortable with people. It sounds like you feel like an outsider. This is a bad cycle to be in, because the more you feel like an outsider, the harder it is to jump back in. What might help is kick-starting things by putting yourself into a situation where you're an insider by definition. There are a lot of situations that this can happen in; as I mentioned above, there's volunteer work, clubs, group projects. You might also want to look into things like jobs; the people who work at the dining halls know everybody else who works at the dining hall and half the people who come to eat there. If you smile and treat people decently, people will remember you (not all of them, maybe, at first, but some of them).
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