Growing up I didn't really have any friends. So I thought if I change something about myself maybe people will like me. I was brought up Jewish orthodox so I decided to become secular maybe I'll make some friends, at least there's more opportunities being they're the majority. I also did therapy just in case that would help.
It hasn't seemed to have helped. I've heard that its best just to be your self. But that means talking it through with people to find it out. It depends who you talk to, you get a different outcome. I can't please everyone. But I want advice, I want to hear different people's opinions. its up to me what I decide.
Maybe I'm being too cautious like not getting a tattoo or dying my hair blond (thay say blonds have more fun).
So how does one make friends?
The same is true for me. I struggled to make friends when I was a kid. As I hit my teens it started to matter. I did make friends at secondary school, sixth form and university. What happened afterwards is that I had depression and withdrew. With maybe one exception I learned that virtually all of them were "false friends". Only one stayed in touch by phone thtough these years and we catch up on and off.
The truth is that it isn't your fault. In a sense that is very depressing because you can think people don't want to be your friend, but in another way it can be liberating as you don't have to care about whether people like you or not. I won't pretend that is easy but it is very useful when you realise how irrational people are, how superficial their judgements are of people and how quickly their opinion of a person can shift based on what other people say about them.
There's is a stigma round isolation that without freinds you don't have value. This isn't true and overcoming it is the secret to learning to love yourself in a healthy way. I think to be honest we are all very individualistic and so place quite a low value and low effort on relationships. Our society places a very high value on extroversion because it is how we "market" ourselves to others. But these relationships are very poor (I remember my popular freind being surprised when I was concerned about his drug habit-which was surprising especially given he had many girlfriends). So Being popular is like being in demand in the market place and is a way to achieve status and is tied up with self worth : in the end it's not the number of friends you have that matters but how good those friendships are. Would you prefer a dozen bad friends who don't care for you or having just the one who sticks there neck out for you?
Introversion has value but it is less visible and therefore less marketable as part of an "image". The myth of the troubled loner is in some ways a reflection of a society which demonises people for being in touch with their emotions and recognising the conflicting unconscious signals that a society of inauthentic people give off. (There is a meme for INFJ's on the Myers-Briggs personality test which has the kid from the sixth sense with the tag line "I see fake people". It's funny because it's true.)
It is true that friends come and go but it does seem incredibly easy to loose touch, even with social media like Facebook. (I realise virtually all of my Facebook traffic was outwards).
The thing to realise is that how we think about relationships affects how we feel. If we think friends are scarce, we feel insecure, needy and dependent: but if we realise that loneliness is actually an illusion you can open up and feel more comfortable being yourself. The fear of rejection is usually worse than being rejected itself. If you love yourself and enjoy your own company and find creative ways to spend your time, you'll actually be easier to be around when you do meet someone.
Perhaps not what you want to hear but maybe something helpful will come out of it.
