Don't Work Too Hard To Make A Friend

[The Penguin]

For people who don't have any or many friends might need to work harder to find them. The thing is, you need to draw a line somewhere. If you are working very hard trying to start a new friendship, but the other person is not trying hard in return, they might not be your ideal friend. It took me a very long time to realize this. It's very important to watch body language and tone of voice to see if this person interested in you. I know some people are not strong in this area. It takes practice to develop this skill. I use to not be good at this myself. Once you master this skill, then you can be better trying to filter out friendships.

When building a friendship online that is text based, this can be a little tricky. My technique I use is to watch the patterns on how the person writes. This might be a hard skill to understand so I will give you an example. There's someone I have spoken with for years. I know the style on how they write to me. However, when things are not well, their writing pattern changes. They may deny and act like things are OK, but I can tell things are not because their writing skill have changed. I use this similar technique to detect if they enjoy talking to me. If I learn they don't, I will stop messaging them. When I do this, majority the time they don't message so my gut feeling is correct. For the few times I might be wrong, I will continue to analyze things.

I had some people say to me to give the person a little more time. However, it's still important to detect these patterns if the person enjoys the company. Sometimes it could be a sign to try the conversations a different way. However, if it seems no matter what you try they don't seem interested, then it's time to give up on this person. If you're lucky to have a good relationship with someone else, you can speak to that person to validate the friendship you have with the other person. I had some people gave me good insight which made me decide to stop talking to a person. At the same time, the person could give bad insight. So you must use your own best judgment based on the suggestions they share with you.

From writing all of this, I'm not working my ass off to build a friendship. If the person doesn't try to show interest, then I will give up on them.

You might also want to consider my post Not Everyone Will Be Your Friend | AspiesCentral.com

It can be hard to figure out a friendship. I have worked out my own system and going to stick with it. For yourself, you have to find a system that works for you. But once you have it worked out, it might be best to stick to it. Oh yes, most importantly, please ensure your system includes to filter out people that might want to advantage of you.

 

[BuskerSteve]

When do you meet your true friends?-and is it true you can coun't them on one hand?

 

[The Penguin]

When do you meet your true friends?-and is it true you can coun't them on one hand?

It something I can't answer. The person seeking for the friend needs to figure that out on their own. I only providing examples. I'm only sharing suggestions and recommend the person to find a system that works for them.

 

[BuskerSteve]

Yes You have written some good advice-
All I am trying to state its hard to find a true friend-a "brother (or/sister) from another mother"-
Sometimes, in my opinion, you're better being on your own
-sometimes you want to be around friends- depends how you feel at the time- some people seem to want people around them night and day-not for me.
I agree with what you say -some people try too hard to find a friend- maybe wait and let them find you.

 

[Judge]

What remains the greatest obstacle to friendship? IMO that's easy- adulthood. When family, jobs and their competition and relocation take precedence, which has always taken its toll on my adult friendships. No matter how much I wanted them, or how much I was willing to sacrifice for them.

The idea of having a lifelong friend you can implicitly trust appears as little more than a myth from my childhood. The older I got, the more mythical the notion became. I don't consider such a dynamic anyone's particular fault. It's just the way life seems to be in general. NT and Aspie alike can all be a victim of today's excessively transient society.

Your inner family will likely follow you through life. But your friends may simply fade away with new jobs, new locales and new relationships. It just happens.

 

[The Penguin]

Yes You have written some good advice-
All I am trying to state its hard to find a true friend-a "brother (or/sister) from another mother"-
Sometimes, in my opinion, you're better being on your own
-sometimes you want to be around friends- depends how you feel at the time- some people seem to want people around them night and day-not for me.
I agree with what you say -some people try too hard to find a friend- maybe wait and let them find you.

You did raised some good points. I did enjoyed my self when I did hiking and camping trips alone. But after losing my job I was not able to do this anymore. I might get a income soon so I can do this again.

I won't lie to you I would like to have kids and a gf/wife. But it seems can't find anyone that likes penguins yet.

 

[BuskerSteve]

You did raised some good points. I did enjoyed my self when I did hiking and camping trips alone. But after losing my job I was not able to do this anymore. I might get a income soon so I can do this again.

I won't lie to you I would like to have kids and a gf/wife. But it seems can't find anyone that likes penguins yet.

They say there is someone out there for everyone (penquins included)- just who exactly are" they who say??"

 

[The Penguin]

Your inner family will likely follow you through life. But your friends may simply fade away with new jobs, new locales and new relationships. It just happens.

Kinda. Bear in mind I don't have strong bond with family. So family does fade away too. I witness many things in my life including things I must face.

 

[Judge]

Kinda. Bear in mind I don't have strong bond with family. So family does fade away too. I witness many things in my life including things I must face.

I meant the family you may some day create....not the one you were born to.

 

[The Penguin]

I meant the family you may some day create....not the one you were born to.

True. Hopefully I get better luck this time.

 

[Judge]

True. Hopefully I get better luck this time.

Yep. Better than me, I hope.

 

[The Penguin]

Yep. Better than me, I hope.

Well I learned don't have it with someone don't want kids. I never predicted she would get an abortion.

 

[Suzanne]

It took going to a concert on my own, for the first time ever, to have a sort of cathasis. First, despite getting through it, I shall never go along again and second, I realised that there is no point in going up to a group of girls and trying to sound funny, to be liked! I mean: there I was, 43 and with a girls much younger, but I might as well, have been their age, for all the blasted confidence I felt!

Of course, I did not see any lone ones there. Knew they were there, but as usual, my eyes only met, groups of happy people, which made me feel even worse!

I did, sadly misread a potential friend's reactions. I finally realised that I was throwing out all the "lets be friends" with her saying: you are a good, true friend, Suzanne, but guess what? When I needed the same thing back, she failed. And since then, not a single text message from her and so, I realised that I had invested quite a bit of useless time, for she is just a loose friend, so to speak. It does hurt, because I found out her favourite things, and designed a cross stitch for her, which she says she loves, but obviously, to her, I am just a casual friend. So I regret that.

I am now blessed to have a genuine friend, who I met on line. It is funny because she is young enough, to be my daughter ie coming up to 20 but we are as close as we can be. We message each other every day and have the most wonderful chats and she recently discovered she is an aspie too, which explains our deep connection. We can tell when we are unhappy and we talk about it and feel better.

I did spend a week with her and it do not go so well and nearly cost our friendship, because I was so disappointed! It was too surreal to be in the same room, talking face to face. However, I was at a disadvantage because I was already severely out of my comfort zone and thus, felt incredibly vunerable.

She is now planning on coming to stay with us for a whole month and I feel that it is going to work well. We are even closer than we were!

So, other than that stupid mistake with this other woman, I do not go out of my way to make friends and I am ok with that. One true friend, is so much better than a 100 false ones!

 

[ayoungaspie]

Interesting thread.

Just one thing Penguin or anyone else who might have anything to say, what happens when you are too shy to initiate a conversation with someone (especially online)? I have done this before and I think it was because I wanted to "feel wanted" by waiting for them to contact me. Does this damage a potential friendship?

 

[The Penguin]

Interesting thread.

Just one thing Penguin or anyone else who might have anything to say, what happens when you are too shy to initiate a conversation with someone (especially online)? I have done this before and I think it was because I wanted to feel wanted by waiting for them to contact me. Does this damage a potential friendship?

You asked a good question. I admit I am a shy person myself. I do try my best to start a conversation. Within time, if I sense they are not interested in me, I would stop starting conversation and see if they try in the future. If they don't, then I will ditch the person. Though you need to find a system works for you. What works for me might not work with someone else.

 

[Ellylldan]

Friendships... The struggle of my life.
There can be a lot of difficult things to deal with and one of them is this one that you mentioned: understanding if the person is even interested in you as a friend.. I must admit, I failed at this many times, especially if conversations happen through the text. I am also prone to thinking and re-thinking the past conversations long after they actually happen and I ask myself a lot if the person is actually interested or just being polite.. It can be really tough. But I learned to let go of not "my" people, at least I hope so.

What you said about the writing pattern, I so agree, Penguin! Though for me it works only with people I know already well enough to notice their usual pattern. Well, I have only two persons I like to call friends (apart of my husband) and both of them live very far from me. I feel very connected to one of them, even if we don't talk very often. I seem to notice any slight change in his writing and usually start worrying. I end up asking him if everything is alright but luckily he seems to accept my quirky self and that's why he's my friend, I guess.

Also friendships with the opposite sex can be a real challenge, as I noticed. I don't know, in a friend I see first of all a person, a human being, but most of people see there something else that isn't there, making the whole friendship thing just impossible.. I lost a few potentially good friends over the years because of how people around were viewing it and it was influencing them. Well, I came to look at it more positively, like probably it's for the best, I didn't need people that give up a possible friendship because of other people's opinion. Umm, or perhaps it's "the fox and the grapes" kind of thing? Hehehe.

 

[Grumpy Cat]

When do you meet your true friends?-and is it true you can coun't them on one hand?

Usually yes. Unless you're on Facebook and into making "fake friends" just to get more notches on your belt and to make yourself look more popular than you are. No one can have hundreds of "real" friendships - they wouldn't have that much time to devote to all of them. Five friends is about what I would strive for to have an active social life and to really be able to get to know them as a friend should be known.

 

[The Penguin]

Unless you're on Facebook and into making "fake friends"

That one of many reasons I can't stand Facebook as many people have so many fake friends. I remember a restaurant was willing to give a free hamburger if a person dumps 5 friends. The restaurant gave out many free burgers.

I do understand there can be some positive of Facebook, but it does not interest me as a whole. Even though I know it important for business, I trying to find someone to help me with that as I not into the whole Facebook, Twitter, and many other social media platforms.

 

[Grumpy Cat]

Interesting thread.

Just one thing Penguin or anyone else who might have anything to say, what happens when you are too shy to initiate a conversation with someone (especially online)? I have done this before and I think it was because I wanted to "feel wanted" by waiting for them to contact me. Does this damage a potential friendship?

Yes. I've told Aspies before that the length of time between "contacts" makes a difference (for me anyway - an NT). The longer the length of time then the relationship gets cold. I know that Aspies have said that time doesn't make any difference to them and they can pick up right where they left off, but at least in the beginning of a friendship there should be quite a bit of contact until each person gets to know the other person and knows there is a friendship going on.

This reminds me that I'm going to have to contact my "new" friend from work because she contacted me last time and it's been a couple weeks now. I haven't said anything because of school and work and this awful weather. As soon as it warms up then I'd like us to go out for dinner probably on a Friday. Thing is the last time she actually called me and I'm only used to that with Mary and I really don't have a couple of hours to talk on the phone. I may call her Monday night. It seems the older people are they want to talk on the phone instead of text.

 

[danielcollins]

Your point about "not everyone wants to be your friend" rings home to me a lot - I used to think that everyone was friendly and had good intentions. Spent a fair few years of my life chasing these people because I didn't understand that they wasn't interested.

I'm still not very good at the things that you mention, I'm somewhat lucky I have a very good bond with and we have a similar thought process most of the time - sometimes finish each others sentences. But, that has taken years to manifest in us knowing eachother.

I think before trying to befriend someone the important question is: What are their intentions?

If only I could work that out, at least then I wouldn't waste time and emotions on someone that's looking to use me.