Knowing how to make friends is real gift. With good, honest
friends around you, you will never be truly alone, and you will
always have someone to share your successes and celebrations
with, as well as the times when you need sympathy and
commiseration. Making friends is very much a two way street;
remember, as the old saying goes, "It takes two to tango."
If you are an extrovert, you will probably never be short of
friends, and because of your overt nature, making friends will
always come easily to you. But if you are a little more
introverted, don't despair; you too can learn how to make
friends if you simply following the advice I am about to lay out
for you.
Strange though it may at first sound, although extroverts can
make friends easily, it doesn't necessarily follow that the
friends they make will be good friends. In actual fact, more
often than not, an extrovert will tend to have lots of
acquaintances rather than friends, and those acquaintances are
really just there for the fun company and a few laughs. When an
extrovert's mood swings, they very often find themselves alone.
One of the most important things about knowing how to make
friends is knowing how to communicate. But when we talk about
communicating, we are not talking about knowing how to write a
memo, but rather understanding the difference between hearing
and listening.
I expect at some time or another you will have heard someone
droning on about something really boring. What we tend to do in
these sort of circumstances is to switch off, merely feigning
interest, and making the right sort of noises in the right
places. You hear, but you don't actually listen to what is being
said.
If you want to learn how to make friends, and this doesn't come
easily to you, you must first learn how to really listen.
Friends share experiences with each other and in order to do
this properly, listening is essential.
Once you understand what is being said to you, you can
empathize, and this then allows you to pass comment and offer
opinions. The other thing that is really important about
learning how to make friends is having a real interest in what
the other person is talking about.
One of the common failings of people who are trying hard to
strike up a friendship, is that all they really want to do is to
talk about themselves. Now whilst this is an important part of
any friendship, (we're back to that two way street again), you
mustn't overdo it for fear of turning into bore. There's nothing
worse than someone who really loves the sound of their own voice
too much.
Don't just sit there waiting to hear something that you want to
make an opinion about, because all you then do is to keep on
interrupting, and hogging the conversation. People love to be
listened to, but the happy knack is taking equal parts in a
conversation.
But the truly important thing about learning how to make friends
is caring about people and knowing how to show them that you
care. Let me illustrate by telling you a very personal story
about myself.
I split up with my first wife when I was still a young man of
twenty four. It hit me quite hard at the time, and I didn't
realize just how hard. I had a buddy I used to drink with. He
wasn't what I would have called a best friend, just a drinking
buddy whereby we used to share a few jokes over a sociable drink
after work, and watch the world go by.
The next day after my wife had left me I didn't go into work.
The weather was absolutely foul and it suited my grim mood. That
evening there was a ring on my door bell, and when I answered
the door, there stood John; absolutely soaked to the skin and
half frozen to death. He has cycled five miles to my house
through the pouring rain that cold winter evening because he was
concerned about me.
That simple act, showed me just how much John cared about my
predicament, and I will never forget it as long as I live. I did
a similar thing for him when his marriage was going through a
tough time. His wife phoned me, worried because he had gone out
and been missing for some time, and I went in search and found
him strolling aimlessly around the streets. We are still the
very best of friends today, some thirty years later, in happier
circumstances I am pleased to say.
So yes, I know how to make friends. It is through caring for
people, and showing them that you care, through thick and thin,
glad times and sad times. Let me quote one more well known
saying. "A friend in need, is a friend indeed." Being there for
people is what really matters, and it is the stuff that the best
friendships are made out of.
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