On the heels of an amazing girls’ trip last weekend, I’d like to share an excerpt from my upcoming book (publish date TBD). This section is from Chapter 11: Go To That Event By Yourself and it’s all about making friends as adults and why those friendships are so valuable.
In this chapter I talk about how a major turning point in my life came from going to an Alumni Happy Hour for UW-Madison’s Computer Science Department by myself and how it helped me reconnect to a long-lost favorite professor AND get a side-gig developing and teaching the Computer Science Capstone.
Work Friendships Are Not Real Friendships
One of the most jarring things I realized after retiring from full-time work two years ago at the age of 41, is that most of the “friends” I thought I had through my job were not real. Some of them were, of course, and we’ve kept in touch and see each other often. But, some of the people I thought I would see the most and who were my better friends at work have completely fallen off the map. People at the office can feel like friends because you’re in close proximity every day, but how many of them would make room for you in their lives once you leave that job? Not many, it turns out.
Our Lives Depend on Friendships
Did you know that you’re 67% more likely to die when you are battling cancer if you are lonely? That’s what the American Cancer Society found out when they did a 2024 study. Even those of us who don’t have cancer have shorter lifespans and higher chances of dying if we aren’t well connected with family and friends. In Chapter 11, I spend quite a bit of time talking through the data of why friendships are so darn important. Friends are not just fun to have, they are necessary to have.
Why Is It So Hard to Make Friends As An Adult?
If you feel like making new friends as you’re working full-time, caring for family, and filling your time with (hopefully) other fun activities is really hard, you’re not alone. Lack of proximity, time, competing priorities, moving, and fear of rejection all make it harder for us to make and keep friends as an adult. Being “friends” with people online isn’t the same as having deep relationships with people in person. It’s better to get out there and make memories with someone than it is to meet for coffee and tell someone what you’ve been up to.
At long last, here’s the book excerpt. Direct from my current draft:
How To Make A New Friend
So, I’ve been asking myself lately, what is the best way to meet friends as an adult? I’m no expert, because I’ve had plenty of missed opportunities in my life, but I can talk about the research and what my own successful experiences have shown me.
Consistency
There is a whole body of research that points to the fact that seeing people regularly allows friendships to blossom. As early as the 1950’s a study by Festinger, Schachter, and Back showed that frequent, low stakes interactions (like seeing each other at yoga or a weekly mom’s group) are more effective at building trust and relationships than one-off long sessions (like a single afternoon volunteering with someone). That frequency plays a real role in whether your interactions develop into something more. Weekly seems to be the right threshold. Scheduling a weekly run, a walk in the neighborhood, coffee, or taking a class with someone is a very effective way to turn them from an acquaintance into a friend.
Number of Hours
Consistency may be the best way to reach this next one too: number of hours. As mentioned in the earlier section, it takes roughly 50 hours of time together to move from acquaintance to casual friend, 90 hours to reach friend status, and over 200 hours to become close friends. So, what better way to accelerate the process than to have a default activity in which you see someone at least weekly. In the same research study, which was done by Dr. Jeffrey Hall of the University of Kansas, Hall found that if a relationship doesn’t turn from acquaintance to casual friend in 3-4 months (roughly how long it would take to form this casual relationship if you saw each other once a week), then the relationship often ends up stalled, possibly forever. There seems to be a critical “window of opportunity” before the novelty wears off and you’re stuck in the acquaintance zone. Dun dun dun.
Joining Groups
Given the above research, finding a group of people who have similar interests to you that meet on a regular basis, can be a critical path to making friends. Not only are there, by default, people in the room that like the same things as you, but you have a regular meeting time, place, and activity that can facilitate a budding friendship.
Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community was written in 2000 by Robert D. Putnam, a Harvard Political Scientist. In his book (and in a subsequent documentary produced by one of his students), he outlines the sad decline of social capital and engagement in organizations across all types of American life. It seems participation in groups like the scouts, Rotary, religious organizations, knitting circles, and bowling teams peaked after World War II when our pride in the American ideals was also at an all-time high. Ever since then, our participation rates have been on the decline and our connection and understanding of others in our communities, particularly from groups that are quite different from our own, has also declined. One way to stitch back the fabric of our communities, Putnam says, is to join more groups and make time for those groups not just because they help us find friends, but because they make our communities stronger and more open to diverse ideas.
Starting Groups
Likewise, if you can’t find a group to join, you can start one. One of my friends recently started a hiking club, specifically for people who want to go out into the forest and hike in capes. Yes, capes. Kind of a half-cosplay, half-outdoor pursuits group and she put it out on Facebook and told all of her friends. Even if no one else joins besides a core group of her friends, she’s still seeing them on a regular basis. And honestly, the group is so niche, that if you find people willing to hike in capes, you can bet they’ll likely have other things in common with you (role-playing games, fitness, even sewing). Starting your own group and hosting events with them on a regular basis can be another great way to find your future friends.
How To Be a Joiner
At the end of this chapter, I offer some additional pointers on how to be a “joiner”, someone who finds the groups of people who are doing the things you love and participates.
What Do You Think?
So, what do you think? Do you find making friends to be as easy as it was when you were a kid? Leave a comment about your experiences or what you think of the excerpt.
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