Introverts - how did you make friends? How do you strike convos?

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Introverts don’t make friends. Periodically, an extrovert decides to make an introvert his friend. There is no other way.

I don’t

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We know that introversion doesn’t mean shy and doesn’t create loneliness right?

In fact, introverts enjoy alone time.

All of my adult friends and partners I made through work.

Don't confuse introversion with shyness. If you are shy, tell that judging doubtful inner voice to stfu for a bit so you can make some friends and go out and do something you enjoy doing in the real world. Also, try getting away from screens for a bit (like full detox). I found that helped me. Good luck 🍀.

I haven't made an IRL friend since high school. I have some very close Internet friends I met through the intersection of gaming, Twitch, and discord tho

My strategy has been to become a regular somewhere. Hang out in a coffee shop, go out dancing every week, find a local game store. Find a structured social environment and just say hi. The more you do it the easier it is.

Only new friends I'm making now are new coworkers.

Have a hobby that you have a passion for. And something that you have to get out of your house for. (Yes i mean not video games, not that video games are a problem, i love playing video games).

It gives you something to share with other people, making it way easier to strike a conversation, and makes you go out there, multiplicating opportunities in a somewhat controlled environment (the social circle around your hobby).

I go to meetups occasionally. Stuff like book group, trivia, etc. The extroverts talk to me.

Have the other person bring a computer, then you can talk to eachother in person through the computers

Sort've like a face-to-face interface

Figure out what you like to do. Become comfortable with the fact that you like that thing. Go to places where people who also like that thing hang out. Talk about that thing. Then find someone who likes the thing who you feel comfortable spending time with. Spend time with that person. Now you have a friend.

I compliment people a lot.

Poorly 😝 but seriously, for me I've taken on low maintenance sports like pool and Frisbee golf which are good for socializing with like-minded people. To meet new people I try to push out of my comfort zone and make comments and compliments in ways that I like from others

I only make friends when someone randomly talks to me and they keep talking to me. I never venture out on my own.

I pretend the other person is a bigger introvert than myself and so to help them out, I say hi first.

Right now, trying to reconnect/stay in touch with a couple good, old friends. (How have you been? We should hang out sometime soon!) I also have work friends since we have a lot of regular contact. (We talk about weather and day to day lives and work and TV) And I make internet friends with similar interests as me on tumblr and discord. (I send them nerdy stuff I see that reminds me of them and we talk about it.) I am hoping to get involved with some kind of activity group to meet new people but have been struggling to commit the time.

Find someone on social media with similar interests. DM them every other day or VC on discord.

I'm still a hermit tho. Only time I meet these people is if I happen to be travelling to their city.

I consider myself a social introvert. My current circle is my brother-in-law (obvious how we met) and a dude who was the librarian at my school. But we met because another coworker kinda got us talking.

I usually find friends buying old junk off Facebook marketplace. Im interested in old lawnmowers, small engines, honda ATC, go carts, mini bikes, antiques and tools and such. Usually the seller is a bit of a weirdo too, so they'll take me on a tour of their collection and we'll be friends. Then they might come by and ill sell them something, or let them borrow or have something, or trade. I guess we are friends idk

People sometimes walk up to me and before I know it they consider us friends. I don't get it but it's happened all my life. 

It’s starts with me finding someone that I want to be friends with. Then feeling out whether or not I think it’s a good match.

Then I VERY awkwardly ask them to hang out. I swear I didn’t used to get this nervous when asking a girl on a date in high school.

At this point I try to be more blunt with it and, after getting to know them a bit, suggest that we should be friends and hang out sometime.

I find it easier to meet and interact with people who share common interests that excite me. One way for me was joining different book clubs (see if there is a Silent Book Club in your area!) Most everyone there is also introverted, so there's comfort in that.

I don't.

I've made friends through work, school, hobbies, church, daughter's classmates parents. Basically the same places and many of the same ways extroverts do. I just balance it out with alone time. I don't even necessarily dislike socializing. It's just that a little goes a long way and I prefer smaller groups or one on one.

Mostly through The Simpsons quotes. If they get them we have lots in common.

I don't. Somehow, people start talking to me first, like at the store or back in college in the elevator.

I have so many secrets from random ass people too

Most of the time, it’s being found by an extrovert.

We can have friends? Well I'm missing out..

Jump in. When you're awkward, say so and move on. Just keep putting yourself into situations you don't love. Jump.

Jump.

I joined a gaming club.

I play Dungeons & Dragons so I found a gaming club that does meet-ups in my town and started attending the events and being social. I came reliably and on time. I brought snacks. And I just tried to be nice but not weird or pushy.
And I offered to help out when necessary. Someone was moving, so I helped them move some boxes. There was a board game night, so I showed up with some games I liked.

As a result, I quickly grew my social circle in just six months and have some good friends of varying ages.

That's the best way. Find an activity you like that is done in meat space and find a club or group that does it. Or find something you might like and do that.

Hit the rock climbing gym and go bouldering at the same time every week and chat with the regulars. Join a chess club. Take an improv class. Volunteer at a soup kitchen.

Just get out and do it on a regular basis.

A cool thing that happened in Sacramento was that an Introvert Meetup started up in 2022. It's still going strong with a monthly main meetup and smaller, member-run meetups each week for different activities like trivia at bars/breweries, movie nights, music shows, etc. We've developed a strong core of friends and regular members in the group and always see new faces at each monthly meetup.

We're also pretty inclusive, so it's not just for introverts. We have plenty of ambiverts and a few extroverts to keep things interesting and fresh. Our age range is early 20s to 40s (mainly because most of our meetups are at venues that serve alcohol).

So organizing something similar would help immensely!

I dress kinda weird and it makes people more likely to start a conversation with me. once the other person starts I'm okay. still kinda awkward, but the kinds of people who usually talk to me are also kinda awkward so it's okay

Drinking helped me. But I was so shy during high school that by senior year I had become mute. So I had to do something. Drinking during college, as well as knowing someone in college from my same high school who was in one of my high school classes, helped me. She needed friends and I did too. We drank together and became best friends. I’m very grateful for that experience. Also, I wouldn’t recommend it now cause of fentanyl, but back then Molly was safe and that really helped me to overcome my social anxiety.

Oh my poor fellow, I've given up on that many years ago. I've made two friends in the last 20 years and we no longer talk pretty much

I don't really make friends, I make activity associates that I am cordial with.

Find commonalities in conversation and jump in if a group clearly isn't giving off 'we want to be left alone' vibes.

Find a hobby that puts one into a group or public. For some that's rec sports, others do gaming related things, even orgs like Toastmasters or volunteer groups can flex conversation muscles and introduce new people into your life that could be friend material. From there it's usually 'hey want to go get coffee sometime' or following the parts of the group that go to after-event things. Rinse, repeat. Collect group chats and contact information like Pokémon.

Some have religion to fill in this need - I tried it for a bit but the particular church I was going to (related to my BF at the time) just didn't quite click with me.

Having diagnosed social anxiety/depression though, I get it's hard. If it's overwhelmingly feeling impossible, may want to pay a doctor a visit just to rule out there's nothing medical causing the issues. CBT helped a lot for me and can/doesn't have to be supplemented with medication at one's personal choice.

I wouldn't mind some new friends to party with in online games, as far as real life, though.. I'm good.

I value my privacy too much, and people seem to be a burden on my psyche when I mingle for too long, so I tend to cut corners to avoid what I can, including small talk conversations. Useless "how's the weather" chatter annoys me so much.

It's like a huge weight off my shoulders when I leave a friendly event and get in my vehicle to drive home.

If I do by chance befriend someone it's usually over a shared interest and conversations strike up naturally because I'm in my comfort zone.

I play in a band. Without those guys I wouldnt go out much. But I meet people by playing gigs.

Either extroverts adopted me into their friend circle, or I hung out with odd people (one of whom was a pot dealer back in high school, though I never bothered with drugs, was just a cool person). Nowadays, I find myself even more of a hermit, and I'm honestly fine with it. Anyway, as for the people that I did end up friendliness, they usually had something in common I'd strike up a conversation about (shared music, video games, or books). One of my World of Warcraft buddies is a guy from one of my old jobs who wore a Tesseract shirt to work one day.

I live in a small town and regularly went out for underground events that usually had a small crowd. They started to recognize me and talking to me. Later I was invited to perform at these small local venues and more people started to recognize and talk to me.

I have the same two friends from childhood who are sons of my parents' friends. We moved to the town I was told to go and knock on their door. That was twenty-eight years ago. I had other friends, but those friendships ended.

My two friends that I've known for the majority of my life, through them bring in new people to our hangout days otherwise it's while at work I'll make friends with my co-workers, I don't have the energy or desire to try and make friends other ways.

F-f-friends?

I just put myself in a social situation and choose not to think too much about it. I'm a much better listener than talker, and most people really appreciate that.

You become an extroverted introvert. You "force" yourself to go to social events even if you don't want to. Value quantity over quality in the beginning and then refine it when you have the quantity.

I don’t, I have enough people in my life, any more would consume my me time too much.

I made most of my friends through school up through college.

I made a couple new friends through roommates when I was renting.

I made a few more through friends of friends. Ironically, the most I made as an adult was during covid, when we all invited friends from different friend groups to join us on Discord for Jackbox games. When covid wound down, most of us met in person.

In a sense, you could say I do just enough to find opportunities to make friends, and when those opportunities pop up I take them.

I can talk to people just fine; and if people try to get to know me, I am a really good friend. But the problem for me personally is that it seems like being a good friend makes people upset nowadays, so I’m often dropped as a friend for “being too nice” or “caring too much”. Like, you panicked to me for hours about a doctors apt; of course I’m going text you good luck about it.

Online shared interest groups where commenting on pictures turns to finding people with similar mindsets, and that leads to the occasional message with links to other stuff that has to do with said interest.

Pure happenstance. The last new friend I made was a co-worker I met when I shifted positions within the company and we bonded over being fans of the same movies and TV shows. That was at least 3 years ago.

I haven’t made any friends. Problem solved.

At work, I walk up to the new techs and simply say, “What’s going on. I’m… if you looked at the profile pics of who you’re working with, I’m the Joker.” Then I’ll make a joke about someone that’s in earshot so they can reply with their own joke, letting the new person know it’s a relaxed environment and weirdness is welcome.

For complete strangers, usually a compliment breaks the ice. Not about physical appearance but something they’re wearing or doing.

What are friends

I go do stuff that I’m interested and that’s a very easy conversation starter - talk to the other people there about the thing we’re doing. I’ve made lots of friends this way as an adult.

Example: Running clubs. You can ask people how long they’ve been running with that group, do they run with any other clubs, are they training for any races, what was their last race and how did it go, where do they live, did they grow up here, etc. And then ask follow up questions or respond with your own answers. Most clubs also end with going for coffee or a beer or whatever and you can continue the conversation.

Consider introversion a set of habits and a frequent condition rather than a lynchpin of one’s personality. It would be much healthier for people to see themselves as tending toward introversion rather than as an introvert, thereby precluding things like making new friends via the self-imposed label. It would be like calling oneself a depressed or a content. We are too prone to labels and it holds many of us back.

Videogames and discord

My rule is that if I'm invited or asked to do something social I'll give it my best shot even if I despise the thought of it. Usually don't regret it.

small talk, observe and learn about people by being part of a conversation and by doing so you find out if that person is interesting and worth 5 more minutes of your time. Being a well rounded, intelligent being who has an eclectic mind helps as well when running into extreverts as they can talk about any random topic of things and if you know a little something about everything you can join right in and unlock doors.

As you can probably guess I am a rather gregarious introvert. I like talking to people as much as I don't like too. It's not that I would rather not talk I would rather just sometimes be alone inside my own mind literally minding my own business without having to involve anyone else. But then a day goes by and I am a social butterfly chatting with every human I come in contact with.

The last point I make in the 1st paragraph is the most important IMHO because it can help bridge that gap past small talk with anyone. I hate American small talk, unless it's with elderly people. They get a free pass. (oddly enough, it's there gen's fault we do it lol) Also being able to pick up on social queues and adapt to the conversation can help too. But some people can be hard to read and I have a co-worker who it took me a literal month to get a read on him because he was just a 1 dimensional good ol' boy redneck. He was like a tv with 3 channels and I needed more to watch lol. How did I crack that fried egg? randomly talking about college basketball after he pulled out his phone to check his sports bets.

I guess I mostly met some through work and other friends from when I was younger. Also, I've found that I normally have to initiate conversations when out and about if I want to.

Well you see, when I was 7 I was not an introvert. So I just stuck with the friends I made then.

Being introverted doesn’t mean you’re piss poor at socialization or avoid the public. As an introvert, I can converse with any personality type in any type of environment with zero issue. I strike convos by saying hello and freestyling topics like a normal person.

Truth be told, Some of y’all “introverts” are just insecure cowards with social anxiety.

Drugs

Wanna fuck?

No...that never works.

Why?

That's the best part

I don't

We don’t 🤷🏻‍♀️