Anti Loneliness Club

Want to know a secret? I’d really like to have more friends. For most of my life, this was never something I struggled with – until I turned 30, moved out of London and back to my home city.

This shift means I’m much closer to my family, but hundreds of miles and an expensive train ride away from my core network of pals.

Since I’ve moved, too, many of them have retreated into coupledom. Now I see “we” rather than “I” in their WhatsApp updates, a semantic shift that tends to mean less time available for mates and more for meeting in-laws and mortgage advisers.

The answer to this predicament, of course, is to make new friends. But that’s easier said than done when even admitting that you’re in need of pals feels horribly exposing.

Somehow, being open about looking for romantic love feels socially acceptable, even laudable.

But confessing that you’re lacking platonic relationships? It sounds weird, cringe, a bit suspect.

And that’s despite the vast swathes of research suggesting that strong friendships are vital for wellbeing, and a predictor for longer, healthier lives.

Then there’s the truly awkward bit: actually making the effort to meet new people and, horror of horrors, trying to solidify a promising encounter into a future friendship. “Will you be my friend?” might work for seven-year-olds, but doesn’t cut it for me at 32.

I don’t particularly want to end up enacting my own gender-flipped reboot of I Love You, Man, the 2009 movie that sees Paul Rudd go friendship hunting after realising that he has no one to fill the role of best man at his wedding.

There are plenty of apps, events, Instagram communities and groups, all designed to facilitate connection. And yet I often feel a stubborn, cynical resistance that stops me from signing up.

Will it be squirm-inducingly awkward? What if there’s icebreaker games? What if all the people at the friend-making event are secretly judging me for also attending the very same event?……..

https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/making-friends-adult-advice-b2685117.html