21 ms·

Why 30 is the decade friends disappear

• Lonely30s 10y ago
  I'm 34 and am going through a very rough patch (for me) right now. I feel like I literally have nobody to turn to for help. It's so hard. I've never been able to make friends easily, and the few I have made seem to have been easy for me to get because they're already so social and likable. So I end up not being a primary focus. :(
  • Lonely30s 10y ago
    It makes me wish I (cliche!) knew then what I know now. I'd have picked (and hopefully been able to recognize) better people to try to follow so I could have lasting relationships. The only person I speak to with any regularity from my high school days isn't somebody I feel I could call with this, and they live four states away anyway.
    • fowlerpower 10y ago
      Kind of sad you had to answer your own comment. Listen, you know, as long as we're alive we can change things. Go out to a bar meet some strangers. It's never too late to make some friends. My problem has always been time. Just don't give up, we don't need hundreds of good friends just a few. Even one or two are better than none.
      • toothbrush 10y ago
        > Listen, you know, as long as we're alive we can change things. Go out to a bar meet some strangers. It's never too late to make some friends. My problem has always been time. FWIW i've had consistently low success with finding friends at bars. Mostly i find people i chat to aren't there with an open mind to getting to know people, at most it'll be a quip here and a joke there, but ultimately they're with "their crowd". YMMV. > Just don't give up, we don't need hundreds of good friends just a few. Even one or two are better than none. I totally agree with this sentiment, though.
    • gcb0 10y ago
      You are replying to yourself on hacker news at saturday night. I hope you are at least sitting at a bar reading from your phone. Otherwise you are not even trying. cheers.
      • voltagex_ 10y ago
        I don't think it's healthy to rely on alcohol, even if it is the "social lubricant". On the topic of being outside (the other thing you implied in your comment), it can be more difficult for some people than others. If you find it easy to go out and make small talk, consider yourself lucky.
    • zemvpferreira 10y ago
      If you live in either SF or NYC, I'm happy to go out for coffee and a conversation some time. I can't promise we'll be best friends, but we can sure have a try ;)
      • Lonely30s 10y ago
        I appreciate that, zemvpferreira. I'm in Denver, though. Thanks for the offer.
        • nitrogen 10y ago
          This may or may not help you at all, try augmenting short winter days with a very bright sunlight spectrum lamp. It's no substitute for a nice coffee with friends, but it can still help keep energy levels up.
        • sakopov 10y ago
          I'm also in my 30s, in Denver and struggling with the same problem. I moved to Denver 2 months ago and realized something rather painful - I haven't actually made new friends in over a decade. It's always been difficult and I've been comfortable with a few folks I am close with. The problem is now they're not here and I just can't seem to take the next step with people I meet and move past the acquaintances stage. Anyway, if you'd like to meet sometime for coffee or something let me know. I'd be happy to chat :)
          • Lonely30s 10y ago
            Thanks, sakopov. How do I contact you?
            • sakopov 10y ago
              Hey there, my email is on my HN user profile page.
            • rgbrenner 10y ago
              I'm also in Denver and happy to meet up. My email is in my profile. (Anyone reading this is welcome to email me too.)
    • smnplk 10y ago
      I hope you do find some new friends. And remember, you have to be a bit of a stoic if you want to preserve friendships and make them last longer.
  • pimlottc 10y ago
    I know how you feel with that last bit. There's a few people who are very important friends for me but if I'm honest about it, I'm not sure I'm even in their top 10. Don't get me wrong, they've each done wonderful things for me and I treasure their friendship but sometimes I feel I'm not a very high priority and I'm not sure they realize how much I depend on them. Asymmetry of interest can be a major strain on a relationship; unfortunately it seems true symmetry is a near impossibility.
  • deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  • user837387 10y ago
    I'm the opposite. I have too many people in my life. I've been trying to go full hermit but somehow I always get pulled into stuff by friends/family. And I'm an introvert.
  • commenting 10y ago
    I know what you mean. Fond memories of days long gone, but only rare contact with old friends. I consume myself with work because I literally have nothing better to do. Both my parents died recently, this year and last. I miss them both immensely. And I've never been close with the rest of my family. Lonely times in these 30s. Lonely times indeed. I'm sorry for your lonely troubles too.
  • nom 10y ago
    Very few people are able to become friends with someone on command. It doesn't work that way, making friends is something that 'just happens'. I have to note that I'm everything but social. Social activities are so exhausting for me that I often end up actively repelling people. But I still have no trouble making friends and it happens more often than I'd like, even friends I can talk to about everything, not limits. If you want somebody to hang out with and just talk about stuff, that's pretty easy. Look for the group/scene that shares your hobby and interests and communicates on your wavelength. It's easy to talk about your interests and they will listen. However, if you are looking for someone to talk to on a deeper level, that's more involved but I think it's not _that_ hard. Try to be honest with someone who resonates with you and talks on your wavelength. Tell something about yourself that you normally wouldn't; chances are they will respond with something personal too. Before you know it, you've found a good friend. It takes time though. Sorry if I made it sound too easy, I'm just relaying my experiences. But I'm pretty sure that you should never ever try to force friendship, it doesn't work. Try and error is key here.
  • zvrba 10y ago
    > I feel like I literally have nobody to turn to for help. In my experience, almost anyone you already meet casually (work, gym, library) will try to help if you reach out and start talking to them about what's bothering you. (I'm living in Europe, maybe it's different in the US -- dunno.) Even if they can't directly help you, talking about stuff helps. Reaching out is the hardest part though. Choose the person you feel most comfortable (or least uncomfortable) with.
  • alistproducer2 10y ago
    I feel you. I'm in my early 30's too and have felt just the way you describe.
• fowlerpower 10y ago
  The crazy thing is that working in a tech startup I feel like I've lost more friends than any other part or time in my life. Long hours (which have paid off and I have no regrets about) have caused me to become distant and not reach out to friends. At times turn down friends when they want to have causal drinks or just meet up. Now that things have calmed down a bit at work I find it challenging to just reach out to my old friends and rekindle those friendships. I try but it's not the same. I thought this was normal. I think it's important to be vigilant and not lose our friendships. This reminds me to try harder, I think without friends and people life isn't as enjoyable.
  • asdfasdfa11112 10y ago
    Now 34. For me, realization that group interactions were not what i like. I used to have e.g. 64 friends, i would hang out with 8 at a time. Now, I maybe have 8 friends, hang out 1-1. Can't have more and actually know them. Depth, not breadth. That is my 30s.
  • hodgesrm 10y ago
    I had the opposite experience. My best friends are from work and I made all of them after 30. We've been hanging out now for 25 years. (Just had lunch with them on Friday.)
• FLUX-YOU 10y ago
  >In the final years of my 20s, I learned how easy, and how lonely, it can be to keep to yourself It's not that bad, honestly. It's probably better to choose activities which have a higher engagement between two people for actually forging close relationships. Most of the stuff mentioned puts the focus on something else (preacher, yoga instructor, movie). Those things don't leave time for adding bits to an ongoing conversation. You don't learn anything about the other person doing those things with them other than the fact that they like to do those things. For nerds, D&D, table-top games, card games, etc. succeed here. It's pretty difficult to not interact with other people doing those things even though the focus is not necessarily the other person.
  • shados 10y ago
    That last part is key. When i entered my 30s, is when I went from being a loner (I had been a loner all my life, by choice) to being "my calendar is always full" social. Mainly because I started mixing table-top board games and role play in the mix. 2 board game nights and one tabletop RP session a week, all with different people, ensure you see a lot of people. Then every time you see those people, they always end up suggesting extra (often unrelated) things, like going to a movies, a party, going for dinner, etc. Makes for one busy (and fun!) life. I do also live smack in the middle of a very densely populated city, right by a primary subway station, so most of my friends live within 15-20 minutes. That doesn't hurt.
    • cableshaft 10y ago
      Same. Started going to board game nights (and other meetups) and eventually that turned getting invited to more social events that I can really keep up with, especially since I need time to myself to create things and unwind. But I do my best to maintain those friendships as much as I can. I just hosted a Halloween/Housewarming party a few weeks ago that had almost 40 people RSVP. I would have struggled to get 5 people to do the same 5 years ago (I had more friends than that, but they were very flaky).
  • messel 10y ago
    Right on. 42, happily married, close friends have mostly moved away. Long time gamer here. We play remote (roll20) and I meet new friends regularly to chat/bs for a few hours per week
• sotojuan 10y ago
  I'm only 22 so it hasn't hit me yet but I don't feel bad about only hanging out with my girlfriend. I know it's not the best thing to do but after work (where I get along with coworkers very well such that it feels like hanging out sometimes) I just want to read, do some personal programming, and watch films in my bed. Every now and then I'll see someone during a weekend but aside from girlfriend things I have a strong desire to be alone[1] whenever I get free time. [1] Not literally alone but doing something by myself like study an algorithm or read a book.
  • cortesoft 10y ago
    Why is it not the best thing to do? Introverts like my wife and me (and it sounds like you too) don't need a ton of extra socializing to get our fill. If you don't feel lonely (and I don't, after a fun work environment and hanging out with my wife), then you shouldn't feel bad about or obligated to change your routine. You aren't a hermit, so enjoy your alone time as much as you want! Don't let someone else's need for more socializing make you feel like everyone should need that.
    • VLM 10y ago
      If you combine your post and the GP and the article itself, there is an interesting insightful result that culturally we indoctrinate our youth such that only extroversion is acceptable behavior and introversion is morally and ethically wrong perhaps worthy of clinical chemical intervention and definitely worth of derision. However, at some point in their lives, most introverts take the red pill, say "F that" to the intensive cultural indoctrination, and move on with their now very happily introverted lives, they smile while reading a book or meditating or doing their hobbies or whatever floats their boat. Some take that red pill before they graduate and have a rough time in school for obvious reasons, others might not take the pill until they're retired, but "most introverts in our society take the red pill, WRT to introversion, in their 20s" is a tolerable disprovable scientific hypothesis that leads to a lot of very happy introverts in their 30s and up while simultaneously resulting in a lot of bewildered lonely extroverts in their 30s freaked out wondering where everyone went to and how will they survive without their vampiric victims, er I mean "friends"? So lets say 15 years ago sotojuan's girlfriend for social / cultural reasons was intensively socially culturally pressured into playing soccer with the article's author or maybe they would have been in girl scouts together or cheerleading it doesn't matter in detail, the point is they were together as kids because society forced them together for various reasons, making the article author very happy (and probably not making sotojuan's girlfriend very happy, but culturally introverts are hated, as much as white males if not more, so there's no problem there) And now because someone took the red pill, sotojuan's girlfriend is assumed to be happy hanging out with sotojuan resulting in the article author being very lonely "uh, isn't the girl scout troop leader supposed to assign me a partner?" "Hello, coach? Wheres the rest of my team?" "I'm living the way society says I'm supposed to live, now why is the other half of the contract not being enforced to make me happy?". Because the women involved are not 10 years old anymore, the original article author can either be sad, or get drugged up, or work a whole heck of a lot harder than she's ever had to work before, or take the red pill herself (can people convert themselves to/from introversion or extroversion?). Something interesting to think about... nobody likes to be told to toughen up or work harder, so this explains the intense discrimination against introverts... At age 13 it seems to serve no purpose other than to psychologically torture innocent kids, but it actually does have a purpose when bitter extroverted cat ladies get lonely and angry in their 30s or whatever. The "mean girls" of the 2000s movie are going to be lonely bitter cat ladies in the 2010s or 2020s unless they effectively indoctrinate their cohort against introversion. True, that kind of action is about as likely to succeed as "praying the gay away" in other words they're pretty much doomed to fail, but certain failure never stopped a true believer from doing something dumb before nor will it ever stop them in the future.
• JohnKacz 10y ago
  I have a wise older friend who is fond of saying, "Our attention is our most valuable asset." Sometimes, depending on the setting, he will add that in our culture it has been stolen. I certainly often feel like I'm in a losing battle to keep my attention on what is essential. I've had 3 close friends move away in the past year. There are and handful of new people I've thought, "Hey, I'd like to be friends with them." Each time one or both of us don't seem to have the time to connect or if we do it's once with a "We should do this again soon." Still looking for answers I guess.
  • thesagan 10y ago
    Competition for attention among personal relationships seems to be growing thing in my life. Makes me a bit resentful sometimes. It's been especially harsh these past weeks.
  • ethbro 10y ago
    Step #1 for making new friends: both people silent their phones and drop them on the table, face down
    • danudey 10y ago
      I've taken to doing this whenever I go out, whoever I'm with. I'm always on call at work so I can't just ignore my phone, but having it face down and peeking every now and then to see if any of my notifications are slack or texts works quite well, and anything important goes to my watch anyway. I find this really helps me be present, especially given I have ADHD and have a hard time focussing at all.
• sverige 10y ago
  Not sure why the author "actively resists" having her spouse as best friend. My wife and I have known each other since high school. She's the only one from high school I still talk to regularly, and she is definitely my best friend. We're in our 50s. She has always been more social than me, and struggles to make female friends. I'm not sure that it works as well for her as it does for me, but the casual acquaintances and handful of friends I've had since hitting my 30s have been enough for me.
  • davemo 10y ago
    The quote in context is: "Husbands and wives may allow their partners to fill the role of best friend, letting other relationships fall by the wayside (something I’ve tried to actively resist)." It seems the author is advising against forsaking other relationships and placing the entirety of the burden to supply all of our friendship needs on our significant other. I think there's wisdom in diversifying our relationship portfolio the same way we do with investments.
  • solitaire_asdf 10y ago
    > She's the only one from high school I still talk to regularly, and she is definitely my best friend. We're in our 50s. I wonder if this is a generational thing, I've kept in touch with a few high school friends, and none of them are married in their early 30's. In the past decade I've forgone serious relationships for studies and work, and I'm alone at 31. It's sad in some ways, but at this point I'm more afraid of a bad partner and financial ruin than taking a chance at a happier life.
    • sndean 10y ago
      > I'm more afraid of a bad partner and financial ruin than taking a chance at a happier life. Just curious, what would cause financial ruin? Dating being expensive, etc? Or divorce?
      • theparanoid 10y ago
        Divorce
• iliketosleep 10y ago
  i reached a point where i realised that my friends were more important to me than i was to them. it was a horrible feeling, but i couldn't blame them.. they were all getting married and having kids - after which my friendship was waaay down their list of priorities. one of the benefits of being in a relationship is to have somebody to whom you're at the top of the list for. friends just cannot be counted on as much, a realization that only hit me after age 30.
  • 77pt77 10y ago
    > one of the benefits of being in a relationship is to have somebody to whom you're at the top of the list for Not true. If this were true sexual attraction would not be the primary driver for relationships. That's why you don't see heterosexual people marrying same sex people just because they are great friends and at "the top of the list". Relationships (romantic) are primarily sexual affairs. The whole "top of the list" thing is a recent western "invention". Edit: I guess you can also say they are economic affairs, but there is always a sexual/reproductive element involved way before friendship
    • Blackthorn 10y ago
      I think that point went rushing way over your head. The key words you missed, even though you quoted, are "one of the benefits". Not "the only benefit" or "the most important benefit". Also this leads into some pretty important marital advice that just because you're at the top of someone's list doesn't mean you should stop trying to keep yourself there. Gotta put that effort in!
    • iliketosleep 10y ago
      > If this were true sexual attraction would not be the primary driver for relationships. i think we need to distinguish between long-term and short-term relationships. sexual attraction might be the primary reason why a man and woman initially get together, but it's not necessary the reason they stay together for years or even decades. relationships evolve, and in the end, long-term relationships are built on a lot more than sexual attraction.
    • 10y ago
• smnplk 10y ago
  It's Sunday 4:12 am and I'm watching UFC alone :)
  • bbcbasic 10y ago
    Take out the UFC bit and it sounds perfect!
  • eliben 10y ago
    I wouldn't feel so bad about that... UFC 205 should be amazing
• tootie 10y ago
  Had first kid in my early 30s. Stopped hanging out with friends. Never been happier. My biggest regret is how much time I wasted on friends in my youth.
  • rosstex 10y ago
    Everyone's different!
  • cortesoft 10y ago
    Right? I could not relate to the author's need for friends at all. I am mid-thirties, married with a young kid. The best thing about meeting my wife and moving in together is no longer having to go hang out with friends to get my social fix. We are both introverts, and don't need lots of 'hanging out' time with friends. We work, we come home and hang out with the kid, and spend some time together talking and planning our life. Then we spend whatever extra free time we have enjoying our alone time. It is wonderful. I mean, I have friends. I play online games with some friends from highschool, I play basketball once a week with some friends from college, and we occasionally get together for dinner with coworkers and their families. We visit with family 8 to 10 times a year. I have no time and no need for the sort of 'hanging out' the author talks about. I think a key tidbit the author mentions but doesn't focus on is that she is a military wife with a husband on deployment and no kids, and it doesn't sound like she has an office job (sounds like she writes from home for work) Of course she would get lonely then! Between work, wife and kid, and other family, I feel like I get plenty of socialization without needing more friends.
    • nommm-nommm 10y ago
      >I play online games with some friends from highschool, I play basketball once a week with some friends from college, and we occasionally get together for dinner with coworkers and their families. We visit with family 8 to 10 times a year. This sounds like a very active social life to me.
  • ionised 10y ago
    I'm sure your former 'friends' would be thrilled to hear how much of a waste of time you considered them to be and how easily you were able to cast them aside.
• nwordsam3 10y ago
  > New research recently found that starting at age 25, we lose more friends than we make each year. No you dumb bitch, for most people in some cohort they will lose more friends then they gain, but this cannot be applied to any individual. I made plenty of close friends in my 30s, much more than my 20s. If you want more friends in your 30s adjust your lifestyle out of something average. Unlike money and careers this one is rather simple and accessible to most healthy people.
• readme 10y ago
  It's important to realize that the research mentioned by the article is just that. It's not going to be applicable individually to everyone. There are people who make brand new best friends, when they are in their 30s. It's just uncommon.
• sndean 10y ago
  At least for me, I've found that in order to maintain friendships I need to see the person at least once per month. (Go get drinks or something.) If it goes more than a few months, then we pretty much stop talking. Is that ~1 month timeframe normal? Just curious what other people think. Looking back, recently, there's been a few friends where I say to myself "I really should've hung out with them that weekend," because now we're not talking..
  • cesarbs 10y ago
    One of my best friends lives across the world in the southern hemisphere. Another lives across the Atlantic in Europe. Some weeks we chat online almost every day. But sometimes we'll go 2-3 months without communicating at all. When we touch base again, the friendship seems as great as ever. To me those are the best kind of friends :)
  • thex10 10y ago
    I don't know if it's 'normal', but I share the feeling. My timeframe might be shorter. It's my opinion that the more extreme manifestation of this need for frequent contact arises from a lack of emotional object constancy[0]. Unfortunately I've found no strategic way out so far... > This is because of my ineptness at maintaining object constancy. I always struggle to feel loved by a person unless they are in the process of demonstrating it to me - I just can't feel it unless I'm seeing it, touching it, or hearing it. Otherwise I feel totally disconnected, and potentially abandoned. [1] [0] thoughtsfromj8.com/2015/01/15/object-constancy-adult-version/ [1] bpdbunny.blogspot.com/2013/01/bpd-object-constancy-or-why-i-love.html?m=1
• elktea 10y ago
  It's because your cities are bad. Wait, let me explain. Around 30 is the age people start having a bit of financial independence and put down a mortgage on a place in the suburbs, move, and start a family. Noble and normal goals, except that in North America (and other anglosphere countries) the suburbs are hugely spread out and isolated from the city and other people not in your immediate street. What are the chances your friend group all decide to live in the same suburb, let alone the same street? You're already spending most of your free time driving to and from work, how much do you time do you have left after meals, kids and shopping to spend more time driving to your friend's suburb to hang out?
  • rubicon33 10y ago
    Have to agree here. My anecdotal experience? Had a bunch of friends after college, all move to SF for work. Three years later, they've ALL moved across the country to find work in less expensive areas, living in Suburbs.
    • Xcelerate 10y ago
      Haha, this is kind of my plan. Just finished grad school and will probably end up in SF or somewhere similar for a while. But my girlfriend doesn't like big cities and wants kids in a few years, so I imagine we'll move back at that point. Unfortunately, at a personal level, I find cities much more entertaining and enjoyable to live in than suburbs (having grown up in the suburbs). But maybe that's just me.
      • rubicon33 10y ago
        Your situation is, more or less, exactly like mine lol. Right down to the fiance not liking cities, but me liking them very much. Quite a pickle to be in, since I know it means we'll end up in the burb's eventually and I'll likely have a midlife crisis.
        • Xcelerate 10y ago
          Haha. It is indeed a pickle. Both mine and my girlfriend's families live in the South, which means eventually the only (world) city I'll be near is Atlanta, which isn't exactly a tech-haven at the moment.
• gina650 10y ago
  There is a Y Combinator company called Simbi (YC S16) that has a pretty cool mission, is a fun way to meet people & be a useful/caring friend at the same time. I think they are onto something because people want more than just a life full of emotionless transactions. Just interviewed the founder https://soundcloud.com/user-925097294/simbi-ceo-11116-316-pm https://soundcloud.com/user-925097294/simbi-ceo-11116-316-pm & the #1 poweruser of the site https://soundcloud.com/user-925097294/simbi-poweruser-mike-wietecha https://soundcloud.com/user-925097294/simbi-poweruser-mike-w...
• andreiw 10y ago
  For everyone the "30" comes at a different age bracket...it's fine to have noticed, but ultimately...does it matter? Socialization is not the end goal of our existence. There is no value to try too hard to make new connections for the sake of making connections, nor to be faning the flames of connections that had naturally been grown out of. People change. Sometimes they change together, but most times they don't. Instead of forcing friendship, just enjoy the memories of what was good at the time when it made sense. I have a feeling that for some people the thought of being alone with your own thoughts is the most ominous and scariest thing to imagine. that is what really needs to be addressed.
  • deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  • 77pt77 10y ago
    > Socialization is not the end goal of our existence Any idea what it is? :) > I have a feeling that for some people the thought of being alone with your own thoughts is the most ominous and scariest thing to imagine. that is what really needs to be addressed. I've noticed this also. People are terrified of their own company and will do almost everything in their power to avoid it.
  • kareemm 10y ago
    We are social animals. Close social ties are one of the biggest predictors of happiness. I'll just leave this here[1]: > The upshot of 50 years of happiness research is that the quantity and quality of a person's social connections—friendships, relationships with family members, closeness to neighbors, etc.—is so closely related to well-being and personal happiness the two can practically be equated. 1 - http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/raising_happiness/post/happiness_is_being_socially_connected http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/raising_happiness/post/happi...
    • htns 10y ago
      >We are social animals More like murder-anyone-not-from-our-low-double-digits-headcount-community animals ;) The way the phrase is popularly used is an equivocation.
• kentlyons 10y ago
  This old story seems relevant: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4247488 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4247488 "three conditions that sociologists since the 1950s have considered crucial to making close friends: proximity; repeated, unplanned interactions; and a setting that encourages people to let their guard down and confide in each other" If anyone is up for an app/company to address these issues, ping me.
  • simonsarris 10y ago
    Coffee houses solved this since the 1600's, not every solution needs an app. The solution probably involves the opposite: put down your phone in public places and engage people. I've made most of my friend/circle by going to the same coffeehouse consistently.
    • kentlyons 10y ago
      I totally agree about engaging with the real world and it not happening (directly) through an app. However, in my experience having spent a fair bit of time in the same coffee shop: proximity is easy; repeated unplanned _interactions_, not so much. Maybe there are regulars, but there is nothing about (my) coffee shop that led to regular interaction. Nor is there something to let their guard down. Maybe a coffee shop is a good setting (or maybe another is better), but I think something more is needed to hit these criteria beyond just random luck.
  • marmaduke 10y ago
    Seems like an app would be antithetical to first two conditions?
• 77pt77 10y ago
  I'm not speaking in personal terms. Who I am or my experiences are almost irrelevant. What I stated is such a fundamental reality that the fact that it is routinely dismissed is borderline delusional.
  • ux-app 10y ago
    > What I stated is such a basic reality that the fact that it is routinely dismissed is borderline delusional. In that case, 15 years into my relationship we're still blissfully delusional ;)
    • 77pt77 10y ago
      Are you an heterosexual in a relationship with someone of the same sex? Are you an homosexual in a relationship with someone of the opposite sex? If no then it's irrelevant to this thread. It's not about you nor me!
  • dang 10y ago
    We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12941879 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12941879 and marked it off-topic.
• zw123456 10y ago
  IMO, as you age, you become more self actualized and do not need the validation of peers, acceptance of others becomes less important and you find that you have more confidence to be independent and start to enjoy solitude more. At least that is my experience (fyi, I am 59).
• mb_72 10y ago
  Seems to me some geographic map of interested HN posters + contact info might slow and even reverse this 'friendship loss'; HN 'friendship dating' if you will. People posting here already would have a lot in common, and even if an ongoing friendship doesn't eventuate it's always interesting and inspiring talking with others in your field of expertise.
• hackuser 10y ago
  Another reason that I think friendships diminish as people age: People become much more concerned about status and the value brought to the table by people they associate with than they do about friendship per se. We split up into social classes more. Rarely do you see the executive making friends with the dry cleaner, or hanging out with their friend who became a landscaper. They dine with people they can do business with and who enhance their status, and if they still talk to to the landscaper, they don't invite them to socialize with their executive friends. I don't like that social segregation, but it's a reality.
  • Illotus 10y ago
    Well I've found the more likely reason there to be that unless you still share hobbies it is pretty difficult to have stuff to talk about. Other than the old times.
  • tehwalrus 10y ago
    While it may be true that there are strata of social activity, I don't believe it is generalisable that everyone "dine[s] with people they can do business with". Most people's social interactions are much less formal/utility driven in my experience.
  • gaius 10y ago
    Rarely do you see the executive making friends with the dry cleaner, or hanging out with their friend who became a landscaper It used to be quite common in both London and NYC to see a banker and a street sweeper or a cab driver, chatting over a fag outside an office building. One of the unintended consequences of widespread smoking bans is that this interaction stopped.
    • Symbiote 10y ago
      That can't be directly due to smoking bans, since smoking outside buildings is much more common after than ban than it was before it. I reckon it's more likely because of smartphones -- all three people are more likely to fiddle on a phone than cross the street to talk to the other smoker.
• shoefly 10y ago
  Places like school make it easy to connect with people you like. Same if you work in a large social environment. Leave this space and everything changes. As soon as I left college and got a job in tech, I was surrounded by few people of my age and gender.
• supercoder 10y ago
  I joined a group sex club and have met loads of friends through that past 30
  • marvin 10y ago
    I did that in my 20s before meeting my fiancée. Would be a great place to meet friends with similar interests again if we gave it priority (also on the platonic level, surprisingly).
• mwfunk 10y ago
  Totally anecdotal of course, but I think as people get older they also tend to appreciate alone time a little bit more, while other forces in life (family, career) start making peaceful alone time that much scarcer, if not nonexistent. By "alone time" I just mean time spent doing something on your own, apart from friends/family/significant others. It could be creative activities like writing or hobby projects, or it could just be quiet time spent reading or playing video games. When I was a kid I sometimes just didn't know what to do with myself if I was alone, so of course I sought other people out all the time. As an adult, it feels like the other way around sometimes. Work/family/social obligations are just relentless, and sometimes what I really cherish are the quiet moments away from it all, where I can just relax or reflect or do nothing at all. A big part of the reason why it's so nice is because it's so rare, whereas in childhood being alone can feel intolerable, so children naturally seek out others to interact with.
• droopybuns 10y ago
  I'm 39...so here is some perspective: If you decide to have kids, you will sacrifice everything for your spouse and children, and have very little left for yourself. It is totally worthwhile. You will chose yourself and solitude over scrambling for friendship. If you decide not to have kids, you will still be incredibly busy, however you won't have access to your friends who do have children because of reasons outlined above. I am in category A. My ideal vacation involves going to a country alone where I don't speak the language for two weeks. The best part is coming home to my wife and kids. Friendship becomes more rare as you age because your friendships don't have the desperation of youth. It was always rare to find people you truly relate to. When you get older, you almost don't have the option of wasting your time with people you don't relate to. It's awesome.
  • mancerayder 10y ago
    Your category B speaks to me exactly. I'm a couple of years younger than you. Well put!
  • wasted_intel 10y ago
    Completely agree on the time wasting bit. With kids, your free time is precious, so your tolerance for bullshit (which comes with most friends) wanes. With the exception of those rare, close friends to which you relate so well, it's hard to justify the effort for ones to which you don't.
  • alistproducer2 10y ago
    I agree. Once you have kids, especially when they're young, you don't have the time to sit around on the couch with the boys. I came to terms with the fact that I don't actually want friends anymore. I want relationships based around common interest in tech, politics or a hobby. Other than that, I'd rather be alone.
    • VLM 10y ago
      "don't have the time to sit around on the couch with the boys" There's a lot of binary thinking in this thread. First of all the article is weirdly misleading where the cheezy intro picture (cheezy as in giant intro pix are so 2011 and its not 2011 anymore, although the stock photo itself is a bit cheezey) is mom with a "Waltons"-full or "Bradys"-full herd of her own small children, but the article clearly states she has no kids and is waiting for her biological clock to ring off the hook or something. Maybe this "I'm bored" is mother natures evolutionary way of subconsciously motivating women to start squirting out kids. One thing that is unarguable is the editor who picked out the intro pix didn't bother even skimming the article. When my kids were infants and toddlers I had a pretty good excuse to burn a ridiculous amount of time on IRC and discussion groups and multiplayer games, which were kinda the social media of their day. But that only lasts a couple years and now I socialize more than when I was single! Kids often participate in scouts, church, after school clubs (Vex Robotics, etc) and especially sports. Theoretically at least a small part of the rationalization for making (forcing?) kids to do that stuff is to teach kids how to make friends and socialize, but it hardly stops at 18... There's two couples specifically we hang out with constantly during soccer season because our kids play, and another couple hangs out with us at every basketball practice and everyone hangs out together and basically tailgates at baseball. My wife became friends with a mom at a "kids learn how to cook" class and they're always talking and my wife got her friend's daughter a job where she works etc etc etc. My daughter is on a bowling team and has made a friend on the team and no my wife hangs out with her mom quite a bit. There's a lot of fake sounding rationalization about parents "forcing" their kids into activities and I think a much more practical realistic explanation is the parents don't really care if their kid is making lego robots or baking cookies or playing sportball, the parents just want a couple hours a week to gossip and eat junk food and maybe tailgate or maybe everyone goes to the restaurant afterwards, or just hang out and watch the game together or whatever. And with respect to the increase in kids programmed activities and decrease in kids ages, no 2 year old ever asked their mom for ballet class or toddler yoga or WTF, but plenty of moms and dads of 2 years olds want to hang out with other parents. The purpose of ballet class and modern dance class is for the moms to hang out, and likewise cub scouts is basically the dads want to hang out together, oh and in both cases the kids do something to stay mostly safe and out of trouble as a secondary thing. I'm happily married longer than I have kids so this doesn't directly matter to me, but I've observed that some of the local single moms think the sole purpose of scouting is to provide a meat market of single men for them, oh and the kids learn to tie knots or something to stay out of the way. If people have nothing else to gossip about, they'll start on that topic...
• niftich 10y ago
  The article recounts several anecdotes that hint at causes but stops short of authoritatively declaring a set of reasons (and answer its own headline). But the key point seems to be that social settings like high school and college result in the acquisition of most of one's friends, and as that group of friends goes their separate ways and people settle down to focus on themselves, work, or starting a family, there are fewer settings to get to know new people. But this is an unsatisfactory conclusion -- if every new family, every fresh-on-their-own adult, every new arrival in town within the same age and peer group experiencing the same social decline, why is this phenomenon so widely unsolved, and not self-correcting? My hypothesis is that cultural changes have caused interactions with strangers to be largely perceived as unwelcome. When interactions do occur and aren't immediately dismissed, they're mentally filed as one-off events not requiring a follow-up -- talking with the person next to you on a plane, or striking up a conversation in the store. There is a wide continuum of behaviors and interactions between courteous banter and harassment. This isn't the usual lament about how people don't talk to each other; this is the lament that people don't talk to each other because we don't want to be bothersome to others, even if sometimes we wouldn't mind being talked to. The fact that 'friend dating' is now a real phenomenon, where people explicitly consent to having a mutual conversation, potentially pre-selected by interests and appearance, lends credence to this hypothesis.
  • SapphireSun 10y ago
    It's easy to make friends. You just need to regularly encounter the same (not unlikable) people in a relaxed setting where you aren't beholden to each other. The problem is that we spend most of our time at work or with family. You have to go to a regular social activity or that won't happen. Of course, you also have to open your heart to the possibility as well.
    • antome 10y ago
      Precisely this. A common piece of advice I hear for people entering a new city for a new job with no one you know around, is to regularly engage in some hobby/activity that brings you in contact with mostly the same people. That could be a baking class, a cycling group, a board-game club, or all sorts of other things. There are a surprising number of possibilities if you actively seek them out.
• beefman 10y ago
  This article is light on content and the headline is misleading, but the issue discussed is real. I'm convinced the explanation is biological. Same with interest in music. Of course I still like music, but occupying myself for an hour doing nothing but listening to music whilst staring at the album cover -- not any more. I came of old age (I'm 39) right around the time music was also declining in our culture generally, so there's a bit of confounding there. Music is simply not as important for today's young men and women as it was for my generation. But there's still the old trope about dad's albums in the garage (mine are CDs), so I think the biology part is real too. Kids don't like music that much either, nor do they form deep best-friendships. These are phenomena of adolescence, likely related to fertility. The ease with which ordinary relationships take on deeper meaning for teens and twenty-somethings is also one reason it's hard for old-heads like myself to work at startups. We just don't mesh in the company-as-family zone as easily. Age discrimination is real, but it's also a bit of a two-way street.
• ajmurmann 10y ago
  The article mentions a dating app for female friends. Anyone know of something similar for men?
• deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
• meddlepal 10y ago
  My dad when he was about 60 once said beyond your SO there is only business partners and acquaintances. I didn't believe him at the time but he's been very right so far. I try to keep my acquaintance pool large but my connection is shallow to all of them.
  • ionised 10y ago
    I'm living proof that what he said doesn't apply to everyone. I have five people that I consider true friends and they have been true friends since I was a teenager. My life would be much poorer without them. My SO is not a replacement for them.
    • nommm-nommm 10y ago
      I'm married and I agree with you. I couldn't imagine my life without my close friends.
• alistproducer2 10y ago
  Friendship is an opaque, organic process. No one understands how to "make it happen." So it pretty much becomes a numbers game. The more people you are in steady contact with, the higher your chances of that process taking hold. Before 30, people are in institutions that provide this kind of environment: school. Work can provide it as well, if you want it to. A lot of people aren't comfortable with trying the process there because, unlike school, it's really hard to avoid someone if things go sour. For this same reason there's usually a little taboo around workplace relationships. Then there's the knock effect of having a couple real friends in our youth: all their friends become our acquaintances and maybe even our friends. The numbers game at work again. All these acquaintances make our social circle feel a lot bigger than it actually is. This is what makes the drop off after a certain age so hard. When we look back, it felt like we had so many friends, but most of us really didn't.
• noonespecial 10y ago
  Perhaps we spend the first 30 years of our lives trying desperately to convince ourselves that we're not alone... and the rest of it trying to be.
• RyanOD 10y ago
  When I was growing up, I was very fortunate to live in a small midwest community and have a very strong group of close friends. I've since moved west and rarely talk to most of them. Texting has helped us stay in touch, but the reality is, we just don't prioritize talking with each other over work, family, etc. We just don't. And that's okay because these friends...our true friends, never go away. We never lose them and they never lose us. We're bound by the many memories we shared - both good and bad. Memories that will be with us until the day we die. First loves, tragic deaths, school dances, snowball fights, fist fights, video games, D&D, last days of school, songs, first cars, etc, etc, etc. After 30, I just don't believe we're "losing friends". Maybe we're not hanging out as frequently, but that is far cry from "losing". True friendship never dies. Don't believe me? Grab your phone and make some calls this weekend.
• beenfired 10y ago
  For counter example, I'm in my mid 30's and have more friends than ever, have a more active social life than ever, date more than ever, and generally am having the most social, most enjoyable decade yet. X is the decade that Y happens is a bullshit hypothesis that everyone is the same. FTS.
• magicfractal 10y ago
  I thought it was interesting that all the match making apps for friends mentioned are for women to make friends with other women. I wonder if guys are just too proud for this.
• drdre2001 10y ago
  Wow, this thread has made me realize that I don't actually have any friends (I'm 20 btw). I just have acquaintances, and I realize that I actually like being alone as long as I entertain myself. Anyone else like me out there?
  • DCoder 10y ago
    You're not the only one who feels that way :)
  • clarry 10y ago
    I love being alone, but I don't like being lonely. That is to say, life would probably be much better if I had friends I could occassionally meet up with and more often stay in contact with without physically meeting.
• adim86 10y ago
  I think this might be a cultural issue... let me explain. I am originally from Nigeria and I just turned 30 but I went to college in the US and ended up living there for 10 years. I have lived in 4 different cities there and have traveled around the US a lot while I lived there. One thing that struck me immediately after college was how hard it was to make friends. Secondly, I realized a lot of friends I made did not have old friends. Growing up in Nigeria, I still have friends I talk to from elementary school that I catch up with from time to time and still share a deep connection. I have friends from high school I intentionally travel to see and they visit me as frequently as they can and in college I made life long friends who I talk to every day now. Maybe it was the circle of friends I had but with my American friends, it was unusual for them to have friends that ran that deep. They rarely mentioned people from college and I knew of only one person that regularly maintained a friend from high school. After college, they seemed to be only able to make acquaintances and found it hard to make REAL friends. In America, I feel people are quick to label things that they do not perceive as "normal" interaction and write it off. Like someone randomly approaching you at a grocery store can easily be seen as creepy or weird. A stranger or acquaintance sharing emotionally charged information can be seen as overbearing/burdensome and so on and so forth. Basically, anything outside small talk and a logical approach gets red flagged from my experience. This is not the way things are in some other countries around the world. Individualism is a strong part of American culture, which can encourage people to create the best version of themselves, but it also leads to loneliness as we start to self-actualize. My parents in Nigeria still regularly hang out with friends from elementary school and high school and college. They share their ups and downs and life changes and they are still making and losing friends and they are 60. This is not strange in Nigeria. Countries who have a communal culture do not suffer from what this article is about, they have their own problems but making good friends, or the ability to are not one of the problems. If people opened themselves up to things that are different from them, were open to serendipity and supported strangers and acquaintances emotionally when they can, they would find friends in the strangest of places.
  • koevet 10y ago
    As an Italian living abroad, I can relate to your experiences (I'm not US-based though). I still have friends from elementary school, which I talk to regularly. I live in the German part of Switzerland, which is not exactly the friendliest part of Europe. I got here with my family, and I couldn't speak the language and didn't know a soul. So, as I'm into photography, I started a meetup group in Zurich and started organizing events. Now the group has 1000 people in it - mostly expats - and I have more friends than I need to (joking, but sometime I have to deflect invitations to dinners etc. to be with family).
• shadyrudy 10y ago
  Louis CK captured the weirdness friends after 30 in season 3 episode 3. This episode captures the awkwardness of starting up a new friendship between two adult males. If you haven't seen that episode, you should check it out.
• craigds 10y ago
  It is possible to make friends after 30, and it's very much worth doing. You have to be patient though, as friendships aren't made overnight. I'm a moderate introvert and find it difficult to talk to people and especially to turn casual acquaintances into friends. I turned 30 last year and about the same time realised that I didn't have any close friends in the same city any more, apart from my wife. Spending time with my wife is awesome, but I realised I really missed spending time with other people, and doing other activities (e.g. video games, snowboarding or cycling) that my wife isn't really into. I decided to find a compatible person and try really hard to become good close friends with them. I found an ideal person at a friend's party shortly after who had very similar interests, was in a similar life stage, and who I could easily have thought-provoking conversation with. For about six months I carefully cultivated a friendship with him from a distance (so as to not scare him off), attending parties he and his wife were at, inviting them round for barbeques with other people present etc. My wife was supportive - as an outgoing person with lots of friends of her own it was difficult for her to understand how it felt to run out of friends but she was happy to come along and help me make friends. For a long time I was the only one making contact, and he would be polite and hang out, but never suggest things to do or invite us to their place, and I had to wrestle with the idea that maybe he has enough friends and doesn't really want me. Eventually we pushed through this stage though, and recently he has begun to initiate contact and I'm getting the sense that he's really enjoying hanging out with me, which is amazing. We've continued to have really meaningful and resourceful talks about all sorts of things (kids, politics, work, other friends, house renovations, ....) which both of us clearly really enjoy. We're still in the early stages of our friendship but it seems like it's going somewhere. We're not yet at the stage where we could comfortably hang out "doing nothing", but probably not too far away.
• tuna-piano 10y ago
  How many of your neighbors do you know? In many places in the world I've been (generally poorer than the US) - it would be absolutely insane not to know, and talk often with your neighbors. In the four or so places I've lived since college in the USA, I don't think I've more than introduced myself to a neighbor. I posted the below before, but still think about it a lot. "As time went by, the settlers from Europe noticed something: No Indians were defecting to join colonial society, but many whites were defecting to live in the Native American one." The passage shocked me, as it is extremely surprising, and speaks to the core of our societal growth over the past few hundreds of years not leading to maximum happiness. The passage is from this David Brooks column (which I think is definitely worth the three minutes to read): http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/09/opinion/the-great-affluence-fallacy.html http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/09/opinion/the-great-affluenc... The core thought is that people trade up for comfort (including privacy), but that they lose out on the overall bonds with other people that are what really makes us happy. One extremely clear choice: Do you work from home (more comfy) or an office (more social)? The work from home choice seems extremely relevant to me. Is it actually bad for happiness in the long term to do something that's so much more comfortable (no commuting, no dressing up, feeling of being at home, etc)? When I think about the best times in my own life, they were the times when I had a close group of people I lived and hung out with (college, summer camp, etc). I assume it's the same for many others reading this. So why do we not live more like that into our adult years? Originally posted here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12299621 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12299621
  • Immutant 10y ago
    In the late 90's my dad started to telecommute. Never large to begin with, his circle of friendships started to die off and he stopped really going out and engaging with the world. He'd wake up early and go to work and honestly it was kind of sad to see him in his home office intermittently working and then watching news and refreshing webpages. His view of the world dwindled down to input from mainstream media and his imagination rather than real interactions and unexpected experiences. His life was just a cloistered, insulated routine. Two years ago he got laid off after well over a decade of working from home (HSBC) and had a nervous breakdown and had to be hospitalized because his comfortable life came crumbling down and he had spent so much time not building his defenses and resolve to face any kind of life uncertainty. He's ended up a frustrated, lonely, newly-divorced, angry old man who a few days ago voted for Donald Trump. The only positive thing to note is that in the last few months he's started to drive for Uber and he's actually gotten out into the world actually meeting strangers in interactions that aren't strictly premised on transactions (like you have when you buy groceries or get your tire changed). Since then he's even gotten drunk with a lady his age when she invited him into a bar he drove her to. He's got a little pep in his step for once.
• tehwalrus 10y ago
  I've made plenty of friends in my late twenties at work and postgrad with people who are also computer nerds. Seriously, just being able to complain about how Python is broken today over a coffee was a gateway into hanging out to watch rugby (I had forgotten that I used to do that until a colleague suggested it.) One thing I am terrible at, though, is remembering to keep in touch with old friends. I don't use Facebook anymore, my twitter feed is full of complete strangers, so actually noticing/remembering about old friends enough to invite them to meet is hard! I can't bring myself to actually put a calendar reminder in to "talk to so-and-so". I have no idea how the author manages to call a friend on the phone to talk about random things.
• Kiro 10y ago
  For me the reason is simply that I don't want new friends. I'm perfectly happy with the few close friends I have even if I only see them occasionally.
• jokoon 10y ago
  As someone in his 30s who is still having bits of social anxiety, I deal with it the same way my parents deal with it: by just starting small talk by finding meaningless things to say or ask to strangers, and trying to make the conversation last. Being politically correct and trying not to offend is also something you must do with strangers, or at least be polite and non-aggressive with your opinions. I've realized that my own social problems are in fact much more widespread that I would think, and thus if you understand those problems, it makes it much easier to handle them and live with them.
• tuna-piano 10y ago
  One interesting and potentially good development: Co-living. Apartment building with your own bedroom and shared common areas. I have no personal knowledge, but I hope it works and could definitely see it catching on for those in their 20s and 30s. http://www.wsj.com/articles/inside-londons-largest-co-living-development-1478794347 http://www.wsj.com/articles/inside-londons-largest-co-living...
• Lucadg 10y ago
  I also think that both capitalism (or better, consumerism) and government (with its need for control) actively push us to isolate yourselves. A divided society is easier to sell to and to control. So, while we need to actively find and nurture new friendships (and we mostly don't) these forces actively want to keep us separate. I know it sounds like a conspiracy theory, but it's pretty obvious to me.
• yaantc 10y ago
  The book "Algorithms to live by - The computer science of human decisions" [1] has an hypothesis on this in the chapter on explore vs exploit. It is that in the early part of life, we focus on exploration (extreme case: young kids), which includes meeting lots of new people and having many friends. Then as we age, we focus more on the "exploitation" part: focusing on what we liked best. This leads to reducing the circle of friends to a reduced core of very good friends. Of course, it would be reductive to only consider this angle (e.g.: having kids tends to reduce quite a lot social activities, and often happen in this age range). But it's an interesting perspective, and the CS part of it may resonate with the HN crowd ;) [1] http://algorithmstoliveby.com/ http://algorithmstoliveby.com/
• binarysolo 10y ago
  And this is why you need hobbies -- >50% of my friends are from my hobbies, with work/school/misc friends rounding out the rest. Also a possible disconnect I felt after reading: "written by a 29-year old". Sure some of these things are common phenomena, but I think it's one thing to collect the missives of Louis CK and what not and report on it, another to actually live it. Having lived through my thirties myself -- the reason why I don't make many new friends is because I'm doubling down on all the friends who are around -- and I have no mental bandwidth to keep growing more. The cost of building one deep friendship >> having pleasant company with a ton of acquaintances.
• dragonzooord 10y ago
  One solution to the 'getting friends' problem is to just live with roommates (And change roommates if you don't get along with them). Even if you can afford to live by yourself. This works a bit better if you're single and in major cities like New York or London (where no one will think it is odd that a person in their 30s lives with roommates)
• deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
• wazoox 10y ago
  Nowadays most people (most people reading this at least I suppose) live in a metropolis (SF, LA, NY, London, Paris...). If you're an adult wit a family, chances are that you're living in some suburb because of housing prices. I live one hour or more of traffic jams away from these places where people cultivates their friendships (trendy bars, inner city restaurants, concert venues, etc). Almost all of my friends seem to spend their time around République in Paris. All in all, either you're living in Paris intra muros and it's a few minutes of metro away, or you're simply not getting there at all (I myself go there not more than two or three times a year). Most of the time and understandably, I lack any motivation to spend more than 3 hours to have the chance of having a talk with a friend around a coffee, or even a dinner. It's 25 km away, but as far as I'm concerned it's as out of reach as Marseilles. Unsurprisingly, I go to République about as often as I go to Marseilles. So either it's a large party with many people, or I don't go. No more quick interactions with friends, it's just too much work.
  • 3d-avid 10y ago
    A fellow from Orsay/Palaisseau I suppose?
    • wazoox 10y ago
      No, but about the same distance from the Périph.
• hellofunk 10y ago
  While I would say that I have fewer close social encounters in my 30s that I did in my 20s, I also have the hindsight of realizing how superficial many of my friendships were when I was younger. I prefer having fewer but more meaningful friendships as I've gotten older.
• johndoez 10y ago
  It's a case of energy depletion. Now I'm in my 30s I've decided to exchange deep friendships for acquaintances/drinking buddies. This is because deep friendships involve time, effort and sacrifice. This is fine for when you are a student or retired, but full-time work and family demands all your time, all your effort, and all your sacrifice. I'm sure I will re-establish deep friendships when I retire.
• wjh_ 10y ago
  A lot of the discussion here makes me think that perhaps there should be a coffee meetup HN thread or something similar posted regularly. Comment where you are, a way to contact you, and try to meet new people :)
• MaulingMonkey 10y ago
  As an overachiever, I got this done in my 20s. It's in my 30s that I've begun to reverse course when I didn't even have casual friends left in meatspace. > We should hang out! This isn't actionable. It's a statement about how it's such a shame the universe doesn't conspire to make you accidentally hang out with each other. And I agree it is a shame - however, fortunately, one can make do without such contrivances! > Wanna do X on Y? This is actionable. It's the switch of passive to active in the social relationship. It's strange and weird, way outside of my comfort zone, and I do so awkwardly and nervously - but it works! Sure, they notice I'm awkward and nervous - they just don't care. Or if they do, it's a sign I don't want to hang out with them anyways. Realizing this - not just on an intellectual level, but actually internalizing that logic - makes it surprisingly bearable to be awkward and nervous. Busy lives do mean the answer is often "I can't make it". But sometimes they can, and sometimes it's yes to "Hey, want me to send you a text the next time we're thinking about doing X?" - I'll take the answer to this at face value. Some people might only be available 10% of the time, but it's good to see them when they do. And sometimes they'll suggest a different time - and hey, that might work too. Few I know will go that far to merely feign polite interest - they no longer have time for that. I consider myself rather deeply introverted, and yet I'm playing the role of the social butterfly in causing things to happen in my circles, if only occasionally. It's very strange. I should start dating again at some point. Don't ask me how one works such strange and powerful magic. Baby steps...
• InclinedPlane 10y ago
  I think it's more a matter of people tending to have fairly "loosely bound" friends through their 20s. People they went to school with, people they didn't mind hanging out with when there was nothing better to do. But not necessarily the close friendships that are indispensable. As people get busier and as the novelty of "just hanging out" wears off, people find they weren't as close to a lot of their "friends" as they thought, and those friendships sort of fade into the background. If you don't have a way of making new friends, that's going to set the trend for your friend group overall as you age. People who are younger tend to be thrust into a lot more circumstances where they are in touch with a lot of peers regularly than adults, especially school. Adults have work, but there tends to be a much smaller group of peers there in comparison, and not everyone is good at making friends through work. For my own personal experience though, at 40, I don't think it's particularly hard to make new friends, you just have to actually do things and meet people every once in a while. I'm pretty much a homebody in a lot of ways and yet I continually meet new people and make new friends year after year. A lot of that is meeting friends of friends, and of engaging in things like volunteering and participating in various hobbies and meeting people that way. Strangers aren't going to come walking into your living room and demand that you be friends, you have to meet people, engage with them, and actually be willing to form new friendships.
• NicolasBeuzeboc 10y ago
  I made friends in my thirties by joining a local tabletop role-playing group. We meet a couple times a month, aside from gaming we also have cheerful conversations while having dinner to break the session that last about 8 hours. We take turn hosting, bringing and preparing the food. Some of them have kids but make arrangements. A few people have moved away and new ones joined over the years. Some came back to play with us over skype. They are now among my best friends.
• jsemrau 10y ago
  Over the last 17 years I have moved continents 5 times and lived in 10 different cities. It is really hard to start new everytime you move to a new place and at some point in time you stop caring. However it is not impossible. As a helper I developed this event app drop!in [buff.ly/2fCsdKE ] which always gives me events that I can go to if I feel I need to talk to someone outside of my direct family. The app was awarded Accenture Customer Innovation Award Finalist.
• Entangled 10y ago
  At 20s it is about sharing and cooperation while at 30s it is about competition and protection. They don't disappear, we retreat.
• oelmekki 10y ago
  I'm 34, I totally experience that. Then funny part is that I thought it was a decision of mine, and not a social phenomenon. The more time I passed closed to some people, the more I was disappointed. There was always this time they would do this unclassy or even totally ugly thing. This made me ask a lot of questions: "Is it me?", "Am I attracted to that kind of people?", "Could it be that it's just how humans are?". And then I realized something that was a cornerstone in my relationship with humans: it's not that they are that bad in intimacy, it's just that they do incredible and unsustainable efforts in casual relations. It stroke me that what I felt was a problem was not being plainly "bad guys", but rather not living up to the expectations. How could they? The way they shown themselves in casual relations was nearing perfection. I've come to embrace this. Let's acknowledge the huge efforts people do to be nice and be part of that, and allow them to "rest" outside those social occasions. I'm perfectly fine to have no close friends (except those early friends, but we see each other like twice a year so we can maintain that effort without problem), and I'm glad to be able to tip in the best of humanity.
• chrisan 10y ago
  I think the most important thing in _keeping_ your friends is frequent interaction. I'm over 35, I can't stand Facebook/Twitter, my closest friend (distance wise) is 1 state away, and most of my friends are married with children. That said, I remain in _daily_ contact with my actual close friends, some friends going back to middle school, via games and group chats (then IRC, AIM, now Telegram). I will say it is rare for _everyone_ to be online at the same time with juggling life/kids etc but no one goes missing for more than a couple weeks on vacation Through games I have acquired more close friends
• OliverJones 10y ago
  Gotta do a back-story post on this. Developmental psychology (specifically the work of Robert Kegan) offers a good way to understand the life transition Ms. Shellnutt described so eloquently. (http://www.worldcat.org/title/evolving-self-problem-and-process-in-human-development/oclc/7672087 http://www.worldcat.org/title/evolving-self-problem-and-proc...) Developmental psychology by stages isn't just for middle schoolers. It it continues until we close our eyes for the last time. Lemme do some broad strokes on this, even though it grossly oversimplifies things. When we're kiddos growing up, we go through a bunch of stages of socialization. Most of us emerge in our late teens and young adulthood into a stage Kegan calls "interpersonal." In that stage we define ourselves by our relationships. We learn to tell our own stories by telling the stories of how we relate to the people around us. "BFF" is a shorthand for that. In the world of social media, lots of followers / friends / links is a goal -- in itself -- of this stage. "I know this many people." After a decade or so, may of us make a switch to a new developmental stage. Kegan calls it the "institutional" stage. Again, to oversimplify, in this stage we become our business cards or our families. We tell our stories by the institutions we serve and our relationships to them. Silicon valley rituals like deciding whether to have job titles are part of the dance of this stage. So is the glory that comes from having a short domain name. "I am the VP of design for ZZZ Corp" is a statement made into the matrix of the institutional stage. "Work-life balance" is a dichotomy born of this stage. There's another stage after the institutional stage. Kegan calls it the "interindividual" stage. The transition to this stage is often accelerated by a layoff. When ZZZ Corp takes away my business card saying "VP of design," that can trigger my transition to this new stage. "Wait! There has to be more to life than ZZZ Corp!" That's right. But could I possibly have felt that in my gut ten years ago? Probably no. In this interindividual stage, we resume telling the stories of our lives by how people and institutions interact. This sort of thing often is mistaken for wisdom, and sometimes is wisdom. The transitions between stages can be difficult and perilous times. Some people don't make the transitions cleanly. Ms. Shelnutt's article describes some of the struggles of her transition into the institutional phase of her life. Being laid off "from a job I poured my soul into" is a nasty way to move into the interindividual stage. "My advice to you is to start drinking heavily" was Bluto's advice (John Belushi's character in Animal House), and that's a way to dull the pain of the stage transitions and slow them down. These stages are all good. Not one of them is better than another. Getting stuck in an age-inappropriate stage is probably not so good: a 40-year-old who spends a lot of time looking for Instagram clicks will make us wonder. (If you were wondering, yes I will probably look at this post in a few days to see if I have upvotes or responses. :-) :-) Getting stuck with co-workers who mostly are in different developmental stages from ourselves can be frustrating. http://thedailywtf.com/ http://thedailywtf.com/ is full of stories of software screwups that stem from this frustration. Are there any lessons besides "life sucks in many and various ways and then you die" to draw from this? Yes, of course. It can give us a broader perspective on each other and help us understand our own struggles with transition. When we observe the behaviors of coworker and friends, the ability to tie them to a framework like this one helps give us a little empathy for them. Ms. Shellnutt mentions church communities. A core mission of many congregations is to provide a way for people in the various development stages to interact with each other, and to support people having a tough time with their own stage transitions. But, in the 21st century people understand congregations as oppressive loyalty-demanding institutions. That understanding is often exactly right. Therefore, that source of stage diversity is unavailable to lots of people. There aren't many stage-diverse institutions around. I wonder if places like my fictional ZZZ Corp could figure this out? It looks like Kegan and his colleagues have just popped out a new book on the topic. http://www.worldcat.org/title/everyone-culture-becoming-a-deliberately-developmental-organization/oclc/907194200 http://www.worldcat.org/title/everyone-culture-becoming-a-de...
• dbg31415 10y ago
  If you and your friends have their shit together pick at most two: social life, family life, work life. Work and family tend to take priority for people in their 30s... and even if they don't for you, it takes two to make friendships work.
• ar15saveslives 10y ago
  Friendship is all about common experience. If there's no any - there're no friends, plain and simple.
• Ericson2314 10y ago
  If life was more like school, then we wouldn't have this problem. Maybe school could then be more strictly study, too?
• Fifer82 10y ago
  Friends are overrated.
• zizzles 10y ago
  To sum up everything in this thread: Life becomes less appealing as you get older. You lose friends because "career" and "kids" and "my wife would not agree to this". The novelty and wonderment of being a child is LONG GONE, ie. your brain oxytocin, serotonin and β-endorphin receptors are all but ERADICATED from the grudges of the mundanity of your boring 9 to 5 suburban lifestyle. No time for friends and riding bikes and adventures in the forest and first-kisses under the tree and kickball, those TPS reports need to be finished as soon as possible. You are a walking zombie; living in a biological sense, but not really living. Do not fret because your life is nearing it's end surely but slowly; cell stress, telometre shortening and calcium disposition within collagen has you taking an aged "old-person" appearance as you are scientifically dying from the inside-out as the seconds on the clock tick and tock and by the way is Docker or Vagrant better for deploying a NodeJS + MongoDB app?
  • sgt101 10y ago
    Yeah, but do you have anything negative to say?
  • untog 10y ago
    Beg to differ. Priorities change. "Kids" are an absolute life highlight, and come above pretty much everything else.
    • hyperbovine 10y ago
      For you.
  • eterpstra 10y ago
    Vagrant is for development, not production, silly goose!
  • eranation 10y ago
    Completely on the contrary. As someone with a wife and kids, suburban home, a tech job and similar decisions to make (react or anguar2). Never in my life I had so many opportunities to do fun things but I simply changed my preferences. I still like riding bikes and hiking and hanging out with friends (both couples with kids and just guys night out) however, I much more enjoy alone and quiet time than before. Reading, taking a Coursera course, hooking into my htc vive, finally learning the guitar solo from the wall part 2, learning to read music notes and play the piano. I feel much happier now than in my childhood. I have more friends than I have time for. And much less urge for company. I feel perfectly fine with just my family singing me "Happy birthday".
• huffpopo 10y ago
  I'm an expat who has lived in 15 cities in 4 countries. I'm 32 and have been doing this my whole life so it is roughly 2 years per city. I have had to make a whole new set of friends every time. A few insights that I think my add perspective on what I've noticed as I've gotten older. 1) The odds that a new person I meet will be more interesting than people I already know are in constant decline. This is because I let go of my less interesting friends. As a result meeting random people has gotten a lot less fun over the years. I'm ok with this. 2) It is far more difficult to make friends in some cities than in others. Seattle and SF are by far the worst cities for making new friends that I have ever lived in. Seattle has the Seattle freeze and SF has constant social climbing and virtue signalling. Best to move to a better city like NY, London, Sydney etc. (it's a long list) 3) If you can't move and you still want to make friends I recommend joining a religion or a cult, e.g. crossfit or november project. People in these environments are signalling that they value making new friends over the cost of believing something stupid, doing dangerous exercises, and or getting up and some ungodly hour in the morning. You don't need to stay in the group for long as there are always people looking for others to become 'disillusioned' with. Instant circle friends.
  • kpennell 10y ago
    2nding that Seattle is horrible.
  • mdlcc 10y ago
    Care to elaborate on the Seattle-freeze? I'm about to relocate to the region. Is it really that bad?
    • huffpopo 10y ago
      People are polite to you but no one wants to hang out with you. Ever. Coworkers will tell you about a great party they're going to and will not invite you to come along. It's thoroughly depressing. I highly recommend joining a cult. AFAIK crossfit and november project are up there. If you're young enough Maestro Wenarto has a 'personality cult' that is a lot of fun. Seek him out, tell him you heard that he and his friends are really fun to hang out with, offer to be in one of his youtube videos (1) , bring top shelf alcohol as a gift. It'll help if you're good looking, outgoing, and a fun loving extrovert. Don't mention the 'cult' aspect ;) (1) 'cults' require a negative aspect to define an inner group. You don't get to be in this cult without publicly embarrassing yourself. Still better than crossfit or november project IMO. BTW - treat SAD with blue light therapy or you'll be depressed 9 months of the year. Best of luck.
• mathattack 10y ago
  IMHO the difference is time. When you are single in college or just out of school, you can socialize every night. When you are married, and have kids and a demanding job, you barely have enough time for existing obligations. Just less time for new social bonds, or they come at the expense of old ones. I used to have 2x the personal social network connections (Facebook) than professional (LinkedIn). Now it's flipped.
• peter303 10y ago
  Any set of fri nds not nutured fades after several years. In your 20s you may drift from your high school firends; 30s your college friends and so on.
• JoeAltmaier 10y ago
  Hm. In my 50's, still have my youthful friends. Is this phenomenon generational?
• protomyth 10y ago
  Interesting, must be an urban thing. Personally, I lost a lot of my friends in the my 20's, but that was mortality for you on a reservation. Those that made it to our 30s, I am still in touch with daily. I would think technology would actually help this.
• MarcusVorenus 10y ago
  Perhaps people over 30 just prefer quality over quantity in personal relationships.
• yason 10y ago
  You get best friends for free when you're a kid and they last till about midway through your life. After about 35 you must actively work for the friendships you desire and when enough time has passed, you might have a few best friends again.
• Falkon1313 10y ago
  I'm surprised no one in this thread has mentioned decades of cultural conditioning to fear "Stranger Danger". That makes us both less likely to approach others and more likely to perceive others as creepy or dangerous if they approach us (and vice-versa, of course). Friends mostly come from acquaintance pools. When we were kids, we were forced into a casual recurring social situation surrounded by acquaintances that we saw every day at school. Some of those became our friends for the long evenings and summer vacations of just hanging out. They were the ones that we could relax and be ourselves with. But as adults, the only regular acquaintances that we have are our coworkers. If we ever even have time to hang out then we have to maintain our work personas, which is stressful and feels like work even when talking shop is forbidden. The relaxing, hang out and be yourself friendships are less likely to form. Unlike our childhood, we have no one forcing us into a regular ongoing situation with acquaintances. We have to come up with some kind of pretext (hobby or whatever), approach a bunch of strangers (something that we're culturally conditioned against), and set up that ongoing regular time together ourselves. And unlike school, we can't do it during work hours so there is far less time for it, as others have mentioned. There are some third places left, like churches and bars, that provide a ready context for acquaintances. But if you're not into whatever their focus is, religion, drinking, sports, or whatever, they don't really seem appropriate.
• luckydude 10y ago
  Umm how many of the people talking here have kids? I'm guessing very few. I was in my mid 30's when I had my first kid, lots of friends. Kids make you friends. As a 55 year old dude, I worry about when the kids are gone. Until then, it's fine.
• mcv 10y ago
  I've heard this before, but I'm not so sure friends suddenly disappear. Friends have always disappeared, to be replaced by new friends. When I went to secondary school, I lost touch with most of my primary school friends (except for my former "best friend", but we stopped being best friends). When I went to university, I lost touch with all my secondary school friends. We did agree to meet again 10 years later, and about half showed up, but our lives changed, so our relationship changed. I'm 42 now, but I'm actually still in touch with my university friends. Most stayed in or near the same city, we're all in the same line of work, and most importantly: we kept our monthly RPG sessions. I also made new friends. To me, my 30s were the decade where I met my wife, got married, moved to a new church, and made a ton of friends there (currently playing regular Star Wars games with a couple that originally met on World of Warcraft). Also, having kids gets you tons of acquaintance in the form of parents of your kids' friends, and many of those turn out to be pretty cool too. (I just found out the comic artist dad of a friend my son plays board games with, is himself a board game fanatic who is always interested in meeting new gamers.) Now that I write this, maybe I measure friendship mostly by how often I play games with people. I suppose others may have different standards.
• sunshiney 10y ago
  As I read the responses to this article, I thought of the pontification upon science-based reasons and, what I experience as simply reality. My life experience has taught me that as we age, family gains greater dominance as the source of social connection and support than friends -- and a lack of immediate and/or extended family results in greater and greater lonliness as the years pass. Family can range from one person -- a spouse or significant other -- to a large family including siblings, children, cousins. One's tribe becomes more important. Friends grow busy with their tribe and those outside the tribe become "my dear friends" but not your close, daily bud. I have seen this change occur over the decades and wish I had known when I was younger. I may have made different choices that would have changed my life today. Today I work from a home office, live alone, have no family within 2000 miles and my home is in country. I love business, tech and the outdoors. I am also at that everything is work stage in a start up. I am told that I am confident, smart and independent. What others do not know is that I am so deeply aware of my aloneness that I do crazy tests to determine if I die here how long will it take for someone to wonder about me and find me -- and more important..find and feed the two cats that live with me? Right now, it is day 36. In that time not one person has contacted me as a friend. I am overwhelmed with strangers -- in my spam folder, in my twitter box, in posts on Facebook My husband died recently..in his 50s. That same year, my inlaws, my parents and my sister passed away. My 20'ish son did what sons do...graduate from college and move to a beach area far, far away and start his life. Clubs? Civic groups? A community center? None of those are here. When I am actively calling wives, I can get companionship. But the refrain I hear over and over is about family or work obligations. There are women who are out hunting for a male partner. Note.. they are not looking for a female best friend. I am not looking for a new spouse. So I wonder how long I can live like this as it is so very quiet and deeply sad in an odd way. I never anticipated that my crazy busy and people-filled life would evolve to this stage. I do not recommend it.