Children and teenagers make friends very easily and share their deepest secrets with each other. But why is it that once you grow up, it becomes so much harder to make real friends? What is special about friendships of (young) adults? And what is involved in making friendly contacts when you are middle-aged or older?
Obstacles to making new friendships as an adult
If, as an adult, you have met someone with whom you ‘click’ and you would like to see each other more often, it often proves difficult to make new appointments because of both people’s full agendas.
If you, as a couple, are looking for another couple, for example to engage in fun activities together or to eat together occasionally, you have the added complication that four people need a mutual click as the basis for a lasting friendship.
Friendships when you are a (young) adult
People in their twenties and thirties are often busy with their careers or their families with young children. There is less time for friends, because priorities have changed compared to school or study time. Old friends who chose a completely different type of career or who are single often gradually fade into the background. They belong, as it were, to a ‘past life’.
During that period there is often a need to make new friends, and friends who suit your new living situation, especially after a move or after a broken relationship. In practice, making new friendships is not easy.
If you are in your twenties or thirties, you often make new acquaintances through your children’s school or sports or music club. These friendships are often situational and are usually limited to an occasional phone call, an email to make arrangements about playing together with the children or a chat when you have just taken the children to their activity, or are waiting until they come out again to go home with you.
Making new friendships has become more difficult , because you not only have to deal with a new boyfriend or girlfriend, but also because you more or less naturally get his or her permanent partner who may have a different interest.
Singles sometimes find it difficult to make friends with someone who has a partner and vice versa, because couples often tend to choose another couple rather than a single person for friendship.
Friendships in middle age and beyond
In middle age you are more likely to strengthen existing friendships than to make new ones. Sometimes friends slowly disappear from your life, because you have entered a different phase of life, for example because you have become a widow or widower. Then it often happens that the couples you often interacted with before do not know what to do with your new situation and almost all initiatives for a meeting always have to come from your side.
With best friends you can often quickly pick up the thread of friendships made in your youth, if you have both ended up in a more or less similar situation. For example, consider losing your job or the failure of your marriage. Such an old friendship can then blossom again, even though you may not have seen each other for twenty or thirty years or more.
When you’re in middle age or as a senior, it seems even harder to make friends than when you were a young adult. You may have become more careful and picky about the people you interact with. Yet even in this phase of life, people always manage to find new friends.
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- How do you make new friends?
- What is true friendship?
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