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I love hearing people talk about their lives and what they are figuring out. I live in the South now, and I already talk way too much in spirals even for the East Coast, so I have to drop a real anchor or else I may miss some important things that people slowly give away as they talk here.
In moving to a new place or having fewer friends I get really overwhelmed without noticing it when my head and all my thoughts are the only strings of questioning that go past pleasantries and small talk. This is the main danger I believe of going somewhere where you only really know yourself well, and most others are the upmost form of stranger. I never really need to unload my thoughts as much as I'd just like to hear about the inside life of someone else, thats company. Going to NA/AA meetings is one of the best ways to spend time listening to others, I also go to a Buddhist meditation group and Church where I can listen and sit next to people, and the best part is you can never be part of the pass/fail system of a relationship with these groups! A very literal "meeting," you show up, listen, and get to know someone for a moment, but you never have to answer anyone! You just be with people, and after you fold up the chairs and go on! I think that listening with nothing before or after is awesome.
Mar 7, 2025
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this is beautiful. i love listening but needing to respond stresses me out so I tend to avoid people entirely. need to find more environments for just listening.
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Join groups. Not paid classes. I think people often show up to paid classes with a friend or two, and are just generally more focussed on themselves and their little project considering they literally gave up money to be there.
Instead: Find something like a community garden, a co-op supermarket, a mutual-aid volunteer group, an arts collective, the board of a local hospital or community center etc. People show up at these things alone...and if they show up with a friend, it is unlikely they BOTH will like it and have the time and desire to keep showing up. If you like it, and show up 2 or 3 times, you will get to know the other people who keep showing up! I feel like I am describing this poorly, but I have made meaningful connections with people in these settings and never from a bar or an event meant to meet people. Also, maybe we are different, but I am more interested in someone who takes time to put themself in this setting than someone who is at a bar at 2am. Quirky people are cool.
Other thoughts:
- Agree that consistency is key. I've read before that connection comes from being spontaneously in the same place at the same time over and over (not from planning rigid hangouts and putting them on your calendar a month out). I guess this manifests by becoming a regular at a cafe or a library branch or a park or joining a group like the ones above. Keep your eyes up and talk to the people who also show up over and over. (It's mot easy, I need to start doing this, I have many people I see over and over and chicken out about talking to.)
- I sometimes target people I want to get to know....lol. Did they mention in passing they want to try X meal at Y restaurant? (Regardless of how you started talking). Great I'm gonna text them in 2 days from now and invite them to that plan. From putting in 0 effort to making friends in college, and paying for it, I now realize you need to be aggressive sometimes about asking people to plans, and those who are open and available and sociable will say yes, and maybe they'll ask you to hang next time!
- The root of this is just talking to 923789 people and figuring out who is awake alert and attentive, so you have to find someone who isn't obsessed with their status quo, and who is willing to sit down at lunch with a stranger and shoot the shit. Circling back, I have found these people via community groups.
I was really excited to think about this ask because I think people take close connections of all types for granted sometimes. Hope I said something worth anything.
Mar 16, 2024
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Advice I’ve only barely taken myself, but see if your city has an Insight Center or other group like that. Mine does a combination of traditional meditation and outings to botanical gardens and the like (did one of those in the summer and really enjoyed it). Shocked, people who are into meditation are very kind and you’ll likely make connections (some centers even often affinity group meetings). Lol, typed after deleting a whole thing about running groups after re-reading your post (most of the night ones are mostly drinking, so super beginner friendly if you did want to give that a go ever, always make friends in those spaces).
Mar 7, 2024
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a coffee shop, running club, pottery class, karaoke night etc.
Whatever thing ur into. Go to places where you can do that thing regularly.
Eventally and usually pretty organically you will begin to make friends with people. People who you probably have alot in common with because you already have a shared interest. Yay!
I moved to a new state about a year ago knowing no one. I joined an improv class and now I have a whole network of people that I never expected to know. From that network you'll meet other people and so and so on.
Feb 3, 2025
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Movies for fun. Some of my favorite movies are ones that could never be 'high concept' or whatever it means when you are trying to make something of greatness or idk intellectual...? Mister Lonely, Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call, all fan remakes and original Batman movies (see The Black Bat), Five-O and every thing on Tubi's "Black Independent Cinema" collection, all of Wang Po's movies, anything that isn't quite as genre as B-Movie, but someone's commitment to making the movie they knew was good. I think people call this category "post-irony" where the creator takes something which is not serious very seriously, but only because they love it. Many foreign film industries have a home for these silly ones built into their orthodox canon, Bolly/Nollywood or Taiwanese film, where it's okay to make a movie about Baby Police in a way that is Legit but also Because Movies Are Fun. But in the US no one watches comedy movies because people act like they are in comedies, rather than take the sillyness seriously. Landing jokes versus playing. Campyness rather than drama and bombastic glory. It feels so good to take pleasure in the fearlessness of many "silly" movies daring to tell stories that are neither subtle nor smarter than a good time.
Mar 7, 2025
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I can't have a beer because I am an addict, but I like thinking about one in the way that Kūkai (Japanese Buddhist guy) uses like, mandalas. I think?
I'm not an alcoholic, but NA says I'm better off not drinking, and in general I find that how much I love drinking one beer makes me more sad when the second tastes gross or I am sleepy, because drinking beer is amazing and so wonderful. I love how beer tastes and feels, but it is also about the freedom of the occasion. Having the idea of a beer. Saying yes, I am going to have that beer. Smiling. Picking out a beer. Buying a beer. Cracking open a cold one. That is how you greet the best of days.
Kukai did this whole ten step (I kinda remember it being 13....) about visualization of "states of the mind" or jūjūshin, "ju" meaning like "abode" or "dwelling," I'm not gonna translate shin because its like pre-Buddhism Japanese and its saying like "true" and "God-like" in reality so just let me lie to you and say it means "mind" which it doesn't but it can't really mean anything to you or me. god. anyway. It's this very drawn out practice of creating these mind palaces and mansions that are so intricate and real that you can experience them as almost more real than the world around you, samsara to them. Then you put a deity in the center eventually until you can feel that as real, then you swap out the deity for yourself. I could be lying this is all from the dome. But this is what created those awesome mandalas, which are more like mind palace floorplans. All of this is to say that I am beginning the accidental process of visualizing a mind-beer, which has let me continue to enjoy beer by thinking about it and all of its joys, while not drinking it. I really recommend this, even if you do drink beer.
Mar 7, 2025