To find it almost impossible to move from being friendly with people to being friends?

[RessicaJabbit]

So, I always feel like people are friendly with me, but we're not friends.

They'll stop and chat etc at school drop off, around village, at work etc and all that

It's really hard when there's people you know only met a few months ago or whatever,and they're merrily chatting about how they had great fun at x place together last night, or the group of colleagues all went to a bar the other night, mums at the school,who happily discuss going for a coffee after drop off in front of me.

I have tried inviting people to events/pub/walks whatever, with kids in tow if they want a distraction etc but generally they don't respond or come along. I have done this in the Year 1 group chat, face to face etc. other people invite the larger group,and we go along and then discover that oh so and so are going to their house after to play etc.

It makes me a bit sad, my SIL for example, has a whole host of friends they're always going over each others, on holidays, days out etc. but if we invite them out or over, they're always busy etc. a new colleague joined in October and already is invited out on nights out etc...

Now yes, I get it... the problem must be me ... But I don't know what it is that makes me not really have friends.

Not at all.

I'm not saying I should have dibs it anything. Just an example if where people who previously never met have made friends, they've moved firm friendly to friendships.

I'm just wondering why I can never seem to achieve that 😞

I relate - never made any NCT, school mum or work friends. I'm friendly and I like people but I guess I have fairly esoteric tastes; I don't watch things most people watch and I'm not generally into things that are popular. No shade on any of it, just doesn't doesn't interest me, so maybe that makes it hard to bond with a lot of people, but then every now and then I do find a weirdo who wants to be my friend somehow! I'm in my 40s but I think, other than my husband's friends, I've only made 2-3 friends myelf since university.

It must be frustrating wanting to connect but finding it challenging. I'm the opposite - I am very sociable, talk a lot for a job, have a wide circle of friends, but often seek solitude and crave being off grid!

Interpersonal skills are innate but can be learned. The way of interacting with people, responding to subtle cues, showing interest, being open, etc., are all behaviours that can be adopted with practice. Perhaps try a social skills coach to see if you find it valuable.

@RessicaJabbit

I’m just wondering why I can never seem to achieve that.

I cant know for sure obviously because I don’t know you. I’m assuming you haven’t pissed off someone in the group.

But nine times out of ten in these situations in my experience it is because people are trying too hard and it shows. People can smell desperation.

You need to learn to accept that friendship is something you can’t control and allow it to develop organically (or not as the case may be).

A lot of the friendship groups between these people are situational and won’t survive. They don’t really impact you: you need to learn to care less (and fake it until you make it if you need to). Let them happen, let it wash over you. Over time you will make real friendships but you won’t if you project (consciously or otherwise) the idea that you’re “owed” friendship. You need to become very zen about it. The less you care, the easier it will be.

I think some counselling probably would help: it sounds like it’s becoming a bit of a fixation and you might benefit from independent help in reframing it.

I think where you're going wrong is that you're going for quite a scattershot approach. You're founding board game groups, asking the whole Year 1 chat out. You then end up busy organising and not actually forming relationships with people.

You need to focus in a bit. Pick someone you actually think you've got something in common with, then invite them out for a coffee. Stop going big, and start trying to form friendships one on one.

It might just be you looking from the outside.. people might see you as the social one with lots of friends for all you know if you are striking conversations on the school run. I thought this about another mum but turns out she's as unsocial as me!

I think sometimes you just click with someone and sometimes you don't. It doesn't happen often with me so i just go with it. I've managed to get a few close friends over the years and we don't see each other often but it's enough for me. I'm sure i project some kind of vibe that puts off most people but I've accepted it now what can you do 🤷‍♀️

I think sometimes you also need to be a bit ‘pushy’, which is not the same as desperate.

People probably aren’t deliberately excluding you - so ask if you can go along - not to someone’s house obviously, but the bar outings etc. A cheery ‘that sounds fun mind if I come along’ will probably be all it takes. Wallflowers and martyrs don’t make friends.

I’m not sure I agree with this… never chase friendship or love as the old adage goes. No one appreciates someone forcing their way into an event or relationship.

Leave it. Keep inviting people and organising things. Be friendly and open but don’t push. It will come to you.

I can really relate to this. I often found myself wondering how x and y are suddenly besties when I’ve known them separately for years and not managed to advance beyond the acquaintance stage. I’ve always felt, especially in groups of women, that there are a load of unspoken rules that I don’t know or understand.
The advice seems to be contradictory too, both make the effort to reach out and say yes but also don’t come on too strong or seem desperate.
What was freeing for me was to realise that I didn’t like everyone either and that finding a few good connections was better for me than being in a big group. As a few PP’s have said, try to find people with whom you have something in common and let it build up organically.

I agree with @Thepeopleversuswork — this is not the way to make friends. There’s a big middle ground between inviting yourself to other people’s private events (not clubs, or things open to new members) and being a ‘martyr’ or ‘wallflower’.

I'm sorry to hear you're having a challenging time with this OP.
In relation to the groups you've joined, are any of the activities things that are genuinely meaningful to you? I ask because in my experience, the move from friendly to genuine friendship is a result of a sense of personal connection - finding something that both of you relate to and so can relate to each other.

FWIW I don't think it's that common to find genuine friendship. I quite like people, in a general sense, and I find it easy to get on with most people and I can hold a conversation with pretty much anyone. But I rarely find people with whom I feel a real sense of rapport. For me this usually comes from a shared sense of (slightly off beat) humour - it doesn't appeal to everyone.

By contrast I don't tend to bond with people over activities/interests eg sports, or restaurants, or books, or politics or TV shows - I have some interests in those areas but they don't light me up to talk about them, so I'm not particularly excited when I find other people are interested in them too. This seems to be out of the ordinary though; I see plenty of people form close friendships after finding they have a passionate mutual interest in a particular sport or particular genre of music or craft skill or other hobby.

Anyway - I think all I'm trying to say is, make sure you find out what YOU are interested and passionate about, eg what lights you up when you talk about it, or what personality quirk makes you really feel a connection with someone when you find they have it too. Then join groups or have conversations that can lead you to find out if other people share it.

@D3vonmaid

The advice seems to be contradictory too, both make the effort to reach out and say yes but also don’t come on too strong or seem desperate.

I think its a distinction between what you do and what you expect to get out of what you're doing.

Inviting people to things and organising things is always good. You're maximising your network and creating a sense that you're a proactive and friendly person. There's no downside to that whatsoever.

Where people get into difficulties is in the expectations they take from this: you see this a lot in the "school mums" threads: people feel they are entitled to friendship because of certain situational circumstances (their kids are at school together or they organised a kids party or whatever). I'm not saying the OP is doing this but she does seem to feel at some level that other people having splinter friendship groups is a rejection of her. It's not: it's just life and she needs to make peace with this.

Ultimately I think its about state of mind: it's about having confidence and having a sense of who you are. If you're pushy but do it with panache and a strong sense of who you are I think you can style it out. But the OP is coming from a position of insecurity and I think in her case it won't come across as confident, it will come across as needy. When you feel socially vulnerable its never good to signal to others feel that you need them. Better to be aloof than constantly tagging along to things in the hope that you will be tolerated.

I've said it before but the less you appear to care about making friends, the easier it is to make them. Appearing sociable, friendly and organised is good. Appearing to constantly want to be creating friendships out of thin air is not.

Totally relate op, especially the bit about discussing meet ups in front of me. I’m nd so I think I probably give off a weird vibe or something. Lots of acquaintances, but I never quite make the grade.

I am just the same. Lots of interests, join groups of various kinds and am friendly with lots of people but no close friends. I think my last 'proper' friend I met at a toddler group but we moved 500 miles away and I haven't seem her for years. I don't have anyone I can just say, 'hey do you fancy doing x' with. Meanwhile others involved in the same groups are meeting up, going out and seem to have forged real friendships. I know its me but sometimes its hard isn't it?

Sometimes I'm a actual ninja lol they're discussing a problem that I can solve at work, and literally forget I'm there, and will email me later to ask for help 😕

I've just kind of accepted I don't 'click' with all that many people, but when I do, I click well.

Annoyingly, too often when I meet someone I think I could get on with they turn out to live miles away and/or the other side of London so it's hard to casually arrange a meet up. And now social media is actually not social at all and just a load of algorithmic guff, most people aren't posting on it anymore, so that's not an option.

I think you may have misjudged the OP here. She isn't saying they can't be friends outside of the club or that they have to include her. What she is saying is that time and time again she feels that she is missing out despite following the advice to join club and be sociable. This pattern seems to repeat itself for the OP and that she never seems to be involved in one of the spin off groups that evolve outside the club.

It's hard seeing it (from personal experience I know) and it's hard to keep on plugging away and not knowing how to make the outcome a little different.

@prisonerofallisurvey

I think you may have misjudged the OP here. She isn't saying they can't be friends outside of the club or that they have to include her. What she is saying is that time and time again she feels that she is missing out despite following the advice to join club and be sociable. This pattern seems to repeat itself for the OP and that she never seems to be involved in one of the spin off groups that evolve outside the club.

I get that and I don’t think the OP is being deliberately controlling: it’s a question of mindset. The reason the pattern is repeating is that the OP expects to “get something” from the stuff she is doing, she doesn’t get what she subconsciously thinks she deserves and she becomes frustrated. That then creates negativity which others are picking up on.

Its perspective. I think its become a bit of an automatic thing and she needs counselling to break the cycle.

I completely understand where you’re coming from OP - I have exactly the same experience of becoming friendly with people, but very rarely reaching the stage of actually being friends. A lot of the advice here is contradictory; you have to be proactive and make an effort to check-in with people, but you shouldn’t try too hard and should let things develop organically … actually there’s some truth in both; it’s good to make an effort but you have to accept that it often doesn’t help much.

As I’ve got older I have hobbies and volunteering activities that mean that I have people to hang out with, so I’m not lonely day to day. And I’ve come to accept that it’s often difficult to move things beyond that, and to rely on my own resources. I wish you luck.

There are different levels of friendship.

Acquaintances that you only know from the school gate or because they are friends of friends, or colleagues at work.
Friends that you only meet at hobbies and groups.
Friends that might invite you on a birthday night out, hen night, or baby shower to 'make up the numbers'.
Friends who you might go out with in a group of three or four, evening or daytime, to do an activity or just drink, because they like your company.
Friends that you actually go to have a coffee with one-to-one (this is a BIG step up from all the previous levels)
Friends who invite you into their home (not such a big step up if you have young kids and meeting in a baby-proof house is just easier, more of a big step up if there are no kids involved).

Then, a huge step up, are the "real" friends, that you can go to with personal issues, that you open up to on a deep level, that you know intimately.
Very few people are blessed with more than one or two of this kind of friend over a whole lifetime. Many people never have such a friend.
Don't expect to make this kind of friend, ever. If you find you do have such a friend, thank your lucky stars and look after them well.

What sort of level of friendship are you looking for?

How do you know all these people from board gaming became friends at the group and are doing all these things together?

Did you stop doing the gaming group? Why not just invite sone of them for drinks or something? It does seem strange they are seemingly all mates now but have excluded you.

That's not what I read.

The group exists and is successful, a number of people is meeting there.

And, some of thosee people started to meat outside of the group as well, forming a smaller groups with higher friendship level, and talking about their other meetings.

So the OP has a working gaming group, but (some of the) other people found personal friends there. And that's not wrong as such but a bit sad, when the OP doesn't find it that hard to find a social group, but would like some new personal friends for herself.

OP I can relate to this. Making new friends as an adult is difficult. I don't think anyone finds it easy.

So it's ok to struggle with it, but don't give up.

Ok, look, I think in order to have deep meaningful relationships you need to show vulnerability. Something that goes beyond superficial chit chat and general pleasantries.
You need to let people see your messy house, you need to call with problems, and you need to be able to reciprocate this.

This included, in the past month alone, lending my car for a few days, looking after a hamster, calling someone to let my dog out when I was delayed at work, having some fruit dropped off outside my door, texting my neighbour ‘I had this bottle opened for 3 days, want a glass, it needs drinking’.
Would I do any of this the minute I met you? Of course not.

Someone told me I have my shit so together, it’s intimidating, like they would lose face in front of me if they came and admitted they’re struggling. It’s called something these days, in my days it was called ‘get on with it’. That’s what I learned growing up, that’s what I did. And it was a very lonely place to be.

Fair enough if it is that. I can't really say why the members of the group would be actively shunning OP's offers of meeting up? I guess you can't force things.