Making friends is hard. Making friends as an adult when you aren’t in school surrounded with people (aka potential friends) is even harder. For a long time I thought I wasn’t good at making adult friends, but recently I looked around and realized that not only had I successfully made adult friends but I had made a lot of friends from a lot of different places! To be honest, the most important thing about making friends as an adult is to realize that everyone is likely feeling the same way–it’s like freshman year of college in a way.
The first (and probably most intuitive) way to make friends is at work. I made a lot of friends through my previous job because I made a specific effort to make friends. First I bribed people at my new job into talking to me by making cookies and keeping them at my desk. I sent out a message to my team that I had cookies at my desk so they had to come over and talk to me in order to get a cookie instead of just sticking them in the break room or kitchen. I invited people to eat lunch with me and to grab a drink after work. I joined the office recreational kickball team, which was probably the best way to make friends. We walked to the games together, played the game (or at least cheered on the team), and then went out to celebratory drinks after. Being on the kickball team also helped me meet people outside of my department. I also tried to say yes to everything I was invited to. Just saying yes and being at social events (even when I didn’t really want to be there) helped me connect with people.
The second thing I did to make friends was join groups that I actually already belonged to. I joined the alumni club for my sorority (hi DC Pi Phis!) and I joined a Facebook group for women who were doing the same workout program I was doing at the time. Reaching out to communities I already belonged to was an easier way to meet people when I first moved to DC because we already had something in common and something to talk about. I signed up to host a monthly mingle for the DC Pi Phi club which did two good things–it forced me to show up at the event and it allowed me to choose the location so I knew I’d enjoy myself!
I think the biggest thing was that I tried to stay open to making friends. I was excited when friends from college came to visit and introduced me to their friends who lived in the area. I reached out to women I wanted to be friends with on social media (hello sliding into Twitter DMs). I went to college alumni happy hours and happy hours that the financé‘s graduate program threw. And mostly, I put myself out there and straight up told people that I wanted to be friends with them. It feels needy and embarrassing but every time I tell someone I want to be friends with them they’ve responded well and have immediately made me feel less weird.
I hope you all can make adult friends that turn out to be as wonderful as mine are!
xoxo,
J
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