How to find your best friend at any age? 5 ways

The reasons why your best friend is not with you now can be very different. Perhaps you moved to another city, but all your friends remained the same. Or after marriage she became so immersed in family life that she lost all her close friends. Sometimes the problem arises due to a change of job. After all, if it is easy to make new friends during your school and student years, over time the situation changes significantly. With age, our circle of contacts becomes closer, and new acquaintances often simply have nowhere to come from. Are you now doomed to loneliness? No! We will prove that you can find true friends at any age.

Read also: How to become an interesting conversationalist?

Looking for a girlfriend on the Internet

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Imagine, you can meet not only men on social networks. Look for groups and communities that interest you. Register on the thematic forum. Most people are open to new communication. With some you can remain “virtual” friends, and with others you can continue to communicate live. This method of finding friends is convenient because you can find out in advance about the interests and hobbies of a stranger. Publications on your personal page, photographs, videos, and reposts help you create a detailed psychological portrait.

Read also: Getting ready for a friend’s wedding: 10 tips

Part 1. “How can I make people like me?” or I MYSELF as the correct filter

Your own personality is the filter through which you pass people.

Most equate the questions “ how to make friends ” and “ how to get people to like you .” But the question is - what? Do you want to please everyone? Hardly. You definitely want to please people with whom you would have mutual understanding and mutual interest, with whom you would build a relationship that could be called friendship. And here it is important:

Decide what level of relationship you need. To do this, you should have a good idea of ​​your interests, the degree of trust that you are willing to give to your friends, roughly imagine a list of things, affairs, topics around which you are ready to be friends, and imagine the picture of the world in which it would be interesting for you to communicate with friends .

Let me give you an example. Let's say you believe in some kind of higher power or at least deny randomness in most cases. You believe that a person can do a lot in life on his own and everything depends on the person himself. And a new acquaintance, for example, constantly tells you about cases, that someone was “lucky” and is looking around for those to blame for their troubles.

A reason to think about how you will deal with this person? Although, it would seem that you ride bikes together or go to concerts of a certain type together.

It's not just about common interests, it's more about (and even more so) how you both perceive these interests, what you feel, and do your perceptions coincide, can they complement and enrich each other?

It is also very important how freely you and the person can feel free, relaxed, and understand that you are not being evaluated, but accepted for who you are.

People who experience a lack of communication often forget about themselves and how they will feel in a new relationship. Obsessed with the question “how to please people,” they try to impress everyone indiscriminately and adapt to the conversation of any new acquaintance. And then they find themselves in incomprehensible relationships, sometimes with elements of exploitation, and complain that “they were betrayed.”

Most likely, a person would hardly behave this way towards you if he had the same worldview as you, he would have similar principles. But the trouble is that, being carried away by the topic of “how to get new people to like you,” you probably forgot to check it to see if it meets your needs.

Often a person in such a situation “pinches” himself - he does not openly show his beliefs and tastes, opinions and passions, he is afraid to be himself. And he gets a “result” - everything that was not voiced, manifested and indicated is thought up by new acquaintances according to their concepts and principles.

A lot of advice from the Internet also “helps”: “smile more often”, “don’t talk about your problems”, “listen more than you talk”, “be interested in the person you’re talking to...”

But everything needs a reasonable balance. Of course, it is not fun to communicate with a person who, even if he speaks little, is still concerned with only one topic - “how do I look in his/her eyes? Does he/she like me? Then the interlocutor does not feel resonance and attention, even if you actively pretend to pay attention. And it’s not fun to communicate with someone who talks only about himself, without letting you get a word in edgewise.

But another distortion is not at all desirable. For your own benefit. It is difficult for another person to communicate with you if you behave like a car without side lights on a dark road. Your interlocutor is seeing you for the first time or has seen you only a few times, or you have talked on the Internet several times. And he also wants to know who is in front of him. He wants to decide whether you are interesting to him or not, whether he is interesting to you.

And for this there is only one way - to express yourself, your thoughts, feelings, attitude towards some things raised in communication, to express your opinion.

Most people are afraid: “What if I start to actively express myself, and my interlocutor won’t like it?” Well, if you don’t like it, it means this is not your person. And this still won’t be fixed anytime soon. Therefore, there will be no friendship in any case, even if you actively adapt to his interests and opinions.

By getting too carried away with the question of “how to please people,” you risk forgetting about yourself so much that your newfound “friendship” may end up being of interest only to your new acquaintance. Because it was built and adjusted by you for him. But there was simply no room there for your preferences and interests.

And don’t think that your interlocutor will easily give it to you after he likes you. If in these first steps on the path to friendship you did not prove yourself, but did “what is convenient for the other” - why would this other refuse your attention, the desire to please and his own convenience in this regard?

Man is a self-centered creature by nature. If you start adapting to someone else all the time, this other person will definitely get used to using you on an ongoing basis, and no one may even notice your expectations of reciprocal attention. After all, you put yourself in this position!

Suppose you remain silent and agree with an opinion that is not close to you. You don’t get into an argument or express your feelings. And the interlocutor, based on this, can create the illusion that you agree with him. And then act based on this.

As a result, the situation becomes more and more unpleasant for you - a view of things, a style of communication, is actually being imposed on you, perhaps your boundaries are being violated, but you remain silent?

It all ends with use, as a rule.

If you are too carried away by the question of “how to please people” and deny yourself the right to be yourself, and have not defined your boundaries, principles and preferences, you may, consciously or not, be involved in any tasks in which others need help. And if you continue to “yes assent” and not argue, then sooner or later you will become a “six”, no matter how sad it may sound.

Let's move from theory to practice, find situations where you could “feel” your boundaries, understand how ready you are to express yourself and observe what prevents you from being yourself.

Task: how to find friends

Try to be yourself with people with whom you already have contact, but superficially - for example, work colleagues, familiar neighbors of your house, someone with whom you regularly communicate on minor issues.

You can say what is in your thoughts now, what feelings are currently possessing you and about what. Sincerely express what really interested you in your interlocutor, even if it is a new sweater or beautifully painted nails, try to express what you are really pleased to see/hear from him.

Share new information that excites you - even if it's news from the Internet. Study the reaction of your interlocutor, try to understand him, but do not “yes assent” just to please him. Try not to focus at all on whether the dialogue is building or not, whether you like it or not - just be yourself.

The most important thing is to shift the emphasis from “how am I being assessed?” to “does the interlocutor’s reaction suit me, is it interesting to me, would I choose him as a friend?” The question “would he choose me?” — it’s better not to ask questions at this stage at all. The goal of this exercise is not to make friends (yet), but to be yourself.

If the interlocutor considers you an eccentric, he would in any case do this if he got to know you more closely, because he saw you for who you are.

And he didn't like it. And he won’t like you for who you are in the foreseeable future. Simply because you are too different for possible friendship. If you try to please him, then he will be friends not with you, but with some of your roles. Which you yourself will sooner or later get tired of.

Extend this experiment to as many people as possible.

Try not to get attached to the result - if there is contact, then it will work out. And no means no. It was just an experiment. And your relationships with colleagues will most likely remain just as superficial if they don’t work out.

Or maybe you will actually find a couple of promising options. It is important to realize yourself in this contact, to realize your value. And see how people react to your opinion and your inner world.

This does not mean at all that you need to delve deeply into your personal experiences and tell your heart’s secrets. But I think you are able to express your opinion on some issues that just “caught your eye.”

In the second part we will talk about strategies for finding new people.

Subsequent parts of the training on finding friends are available only to registered site members. Registration is free (registration form below right).

Good luck!

Training “I don’t communicate much. Part 2: How to Meet People and Express Your Emotions »

Training “I don’t communicate much. Part 3: How to get rid of the fear of rejection »

Training “I don’t communicate much. Part 4: How to build boundaries in relationships and learn to say “no”

If you have any questions on the topic:

Renewing old friendships

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Another advantage of the Internet is that it allows you to retrieve old contacts. Perhaps you had a best friend at school, with whom you stopped communicating when you went to different universities. Or they quarreled out of stupidity. Social networks help you find lost friendships and start over. If you were once interested and fun together, maybe it will be no worse now?

Read also: 13 reasons to say “thank you” to your big sister

Looking for a friend at work

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At your new workplace you don’t know anyone. This can be fixed! Start communicating with colleagues with professional topics. After some time, you will be able to understand whether your new friend wants to communicate with you. If you get along, very soon the conversations will go beyond discussing purely work matters.

You can never have too many friends!

Still from the movie "Friends"

It doesn’t matter how old you are - 20 or 40, the question of how to find friends worries people at any age. For example, you may move to another city where you don’t know anyone and begin to experience a lack of communication. Or you might just want to expand your circle of friends or find a like-minded person who shares your new hobby.

Regardless of the exact reason you decided to go on a search, how exactly it is customary to find these same friends for adults is usually not discussed as often as, for example, searching for a girl for a relationship.

But since a true friend is just as important as a great girlfriend, today we want to tell you where to look for buddies, and, most importantly, how to then turn them from just acquaintances into real friends?

Looking for a friend with similar interests

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Surely you can devote at least 40 minutes a week to your hobby. Sign up for a club or course that interests you. It could be anything - sewing, knitting, cooking, sports, makeup. This way you can easily find other women with similar hobbies.

Read also: How to become a creative person: learning to think creatively

Looking for a friend where we often go

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Every person has places that he visits regularly. For example, a certain beauty salon, library, exhibition center or even a consultation for expectant mothers. It's also easy to make new friends there.

Read also: Five types of women you should not take as friends

How to make a good impression when meeting someone?

To start a friendly relationship, it’s not enough to just introduce yourself. You need to follow the right communication tactics. Here are some useful tips.

• Try to be proactive, open and friendly, but not intrusive - this is intimidating.
• Demonstrate responsiveness and a desire to help.
• Don't force things. If you have just started communicating, you should not immediately indulge in revelations about your personal life and share painful things. Everything has its time. For now, you need to get to know each other better.
• Don't be selfish. Friendship is built on understanding, mutual assistance and trust. If you expect exactly this kind of behavior from your new girlfriend, be ready for all this yourself.

Be friendly

The first impression largely determines whether a person will continue communicating with you or not. And the most important thing here is facial expression. Think about the people you see every day in a store, at the airport, or in line for documents. If a person is frowning, frowning, or not smiling, you are unlikely to want to exchange a few words with him. He just doesn't look friendly, although he very well could be.

A good-natured smile or simply a polite nod of the head lets others know that you are friendly and open to communication.

Another indicator of openness is the ability to listen. Most likely, you have something to tell, but do not forget that friendship is a mutual process, so do not focus on yourself and listen with interest to the other person. This could very well be the start of a wonderful friendship.