I don’t know how old you are, but once you get to around 25-30, it becomes infinitely harder to build close friendships. Around that age there are a few things

I don’t know how old you are, but once you get to around 25-30, it becomes infinitely harder to build close friendships. Around that age there are a few things working against you. 1. Families and priorities erode the time available to cultivate new friendships. 2. You lack history with people you meet and time is not on your side to effect that. Attempts to create history feel forced and unnatural. 3. You develop an intolerability to slights, real or perceived, because your understanding of human nature is more convincing to you than when you were an innocent child. I once read that the best way to make new friends is through spontaneous positive experiences over a long stretch of time. For example, my wife is 41, and she has a new friend she’s known for about 2 years now. They met while picking up our respective kids at school who used to play with each other (spontaneity). Over time, they found out they had a mutual friend and many things in common, same sense of humor, etc. it’s taken a long time, but I’ve seen their friendship grow into what I’d consider close.