How do you determine what people should be your "friend

Post Reply New Topic

I do not know if I have AS, but
I am 21, and I have only really had 2 friends my entire lifetime.
Luckily, both of them are in the same city I am right now.
And I havent made a new friend, in a very long time.
I have always found it difficult to comprehend, how people are somehow able to meld together in groups, and instantly become "friends" and socialize with others they have just met. How do people decide which people they should be friends with? How do "friends" happen?
These questions are always questioning me!
I understand that it largely depends on compatible personality and interests, and other factors such as age, background, culture, for most people.
What I find so difficult in "choosing" someone I would like to be friends with is... If someone is similar to me, I find that to be very interesting.
But if someone is very different than me, I also find that to be very interesting!
I dont really feel like I am influenced by things such as age, race, profession. I can tell by someones personality if I like them or not, but even if I do not seem to like them... judging them on such a superficial basis such as outward personality, is no basis for me to dismiss them entirely as not being a possible "friend". There are potential positive and negative strengths in everybody. I have never met anyone I could say that I have hated. I think every person is worth knowing.

I think it is due to this philosophy... that I have such difficulty in choosing people who are "worthy" of friendship, because I am so unbiased, and therefore, I tend to not seek out anybody in particular.
And so, mostly alone and friendless... which is even more apparent in this University atmosphere, where you are "supposed to be" making new friends.
And so... I just remain... observing people from afar!

Does anyone else have this "problem"?

My problem is not exactly the same. I'm really not sure what my problem is, to be honest. I think, mainly, it's that I do not know how to approach people. I, like you, tend to observe them from afar, but will only interact with them if they come to me. Oftentimes, though, I will ignore everyone around me, so I suppose I do not have the same problem you do, in that I have trouble selecting people I find interesting. I see traits or interests in others which are similar to my own, and this is usually the basis for my interest in them. Relationships based on commonalities seems to be the easiest way, for me.

I have a good group of friends here at school, but I only see two of them on a regular basis, and only have three "close friends" (one of whom is unfortunately away for the year).

I do not seek people out, people just come to me. If someone does not approach me, it is most likely that I will never speak to them. I have been lucky thus far, in that the people who seek me out as their friend have had friends of their own, whom they also introduce me to. I have also been unlucky, in that I also tend to attract manipulative people, and have been in several relationships which I thought were friendship but were actually just deciet. I suppose that in order to have friends, one must be willing to risk that sort of thing.

I've been pondering that, too!

People meet, then a week later they're all friendly, hang out alot and do stuff together. It takes me probably a good 6 months to get to that stage with people.

I find it hard to comprehend how it happens, too. It's like, "hey, you just met that person and you're so friendly and stuff it's like you've known them for years..."

I do get to know the people properley, but it takes ALOT longer than it does for NT's.

I still don't understand why.

I have the same problem.

When I arrived in college, only a few people already knew one another from high school (or before). But after only a few days, they were all very friendly to one another and there were groups of people who always stuck together (and still do). I noticed that for the first time on September 17th with two people I talked to because one of them is interested in astrophysics. I thought they knew each other from high school and they told me they had only known each other for a few days.

Later, two girls (the ones who invited me to go ice-skating) were talking about how people get along with some people more than with others, and since I was sitting in front of them in the class, they asked me. So I thought about it.

In fact, I do not know how to define a friend, an acquaintance, etc. So I do not know whom to call a friend. For instance, I think these girls are nice, and sometimes I like talking with them (except when they are in a group and talking about things such as boyfriends, the math teacher, make-up, hairdressing...), but I do not know if I would call them friends because I do not know them enough.

I think that everyone is basically worth knowing but it takes me a lot of time before befriending someone. And in the meantime, they have the time to notice all my quirks !

anyone who's friendly i guess. i dont have any friends at the mo'

I have two ways that I select people that I like to be around . . .

1) There is something about them that just appeals to me - this is very ethereal and is just a feeling - it is like when I meet them I think 'HERE is a person I would like to get to know better . . .'
That is not to say that I can't get along with people that I don't have this feeling about, it just takes work . . .

2) There is some characteristic about them that I like - for example, they may be neat to look at (I don't know if I've mentioned my concept of attraction here, but I am never attracted to someone in the way that NTs are - when I say that someone is neat to look at it is not a euphamism for anything - it means that they are neat to look at in the exact same way that a beautiful painting would be neat to look at) or they have a trait that I want to learn to have . . .

The biggest problem I have is that I don't know what to do in groups - I have no idea what to say - when I think of something to say people always look at me like I'm crazy and when I don't say anything they get upset, too . . . but the fact of the matter is I like to be in people's PRESENCE sometimes - and not say anything - which sort of creeps most people out . . .

i agree with you. i never know what to do in large groups of more than 4 people other than myself! i'll try to talk but it's a bit hard because i'll end up interrupting people and i have trouble reading signals and stuff.

as for the friends question, a friend for me is a generally nice person who likes to spend time with me and seems to care about me. that's about it.

To me, a friend is someone I can trust. Someone I can just "be" with. At school, mostly people just took me along and became my friends; they later told me they were a bit sorry for me because I seemed so clueless and alone . It's happened just one time that there was an instant mutual sense of kinship with someone, and that I chose to be her friend. Unfortunately all of my old friends live far away and I don't make new ones easily.

To me, friends are to learn from and discuss mutual interests with; however, I do not call everyone I do this with a friend. A sense of mutuality, of togetherness, is needed for that. The few friends I have are enough for me.

The two of me together also have a few friends; the rest of me don't really have any, but for most of them that doesn't matter.

Friendship has to be about something; whether it's a subject, like literature, or an activity, like playing tennis, or some quality, or even a circumstance you have in common, like being in trouble at school... You can't just say, "I'm looking for a friend." You have to be looking for something else first, and then find someone to share it with.

Last edited by echospectra on 30 Nov 2004, 5:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.

erm...

isn't the point about ALL relationships, no matter how casual or intimate, that they are about the connection between you and the other person? rather than a thing? i agree - relationships cannot be approached in the abstract - they have to be about another person, and how the two of you feel/think about each other.

yes, of course, part of that is shared interests. but sometimes, it's just ineffable, and can't be analysed or even put into words...

V

Vetivert,

I didn't mean to define friendship for you; it's just the definition I work with; I forgot about the "I think..." part, sorry. I meant friendship as distinguished from affection (the clearest examples of which are to be found among family members) and romantic love.

With Affection, it's about instinct, warmth; you care about these people even if you have little or nothing in common with them, because you somehow belong together. Many people call this friendship; I would call it a kind of friendship; "heart friendship", perhaps, or "instinctive friendship". If you know The Wind in the Willows - that's what I mean.

With romantic love (Eros), you sit face to face (often literally but also metaphorically), gazing at each other, adoring each other, forgetting about the rest of the world or, more excitingly, seeing it in its full glory for the first time.

With Friendship, you sit next to each other, looking at the same thing, getting to see each other's way of seeing it, and in the process getting to know more about each other than you could ever have found out in any other way. It usually starts with someone saying, "You too? I thought I was the only one!" Unlike Affection, Eros, and the "sub-loves" (don't know what else to call them) Companionship and Alliance, it's totally unnecessary for survival. It's uninstinctive and therefore not jealous. Defined like this, it's not very popular, and rarer than most people think. You could call this "head friendship".

I got these distinctions from C. S. Lewis' The Four Loves and find them very useful. I can say, "The only type of love I'm capable of is friendship as defined by C. S. Lewis"; his may be an eccentric definition, but it's a lot better than following the vaguer, more general ideas of friendship and having to say, "I am incapable of love."

Of course in most friendships, there's a mixture of Friendship and Affection as defined above. This me is much more about affection, sharing feelings, etc.

Last edited by echospectra on 22 Dec 2004, 6:21 pm, edited 2 times in total.

what a great post, echospectra!

quite possibly the best definitions i've heard of those mysterious things called relationships - clear, as simple as these things CAN be made, and meaningful. thank you very much for that.

V

Yes; echo; that was a good helpful post!

I now tend to go, "If you liked this, you'll love the book"...

Meaning Lewis' The Four Loves, of course.

(I just checked, and it turns out this was the first book by C. S. Lewis I ever read; even before the Narnia books. I read it because I thought it might clear up some of the confusion I had about human relationships; so I became a Lewis addict because of my autism...)

I agree, that was a very interesting and quite poetic post, ecospectra.

What is the book about?

About the stuff in the post: different types of love. The chapters are about love/like for things, not persons (like art, nature, etc.); affection; friendship; romantic love; and charity (not the stuffy giving-to-charities kind, but the transforming, unconditional kind). This from a christian perspective.

Yes, when I go out somewhere and I am just around people, I consider that "being social", and I enjoy THAT, but then people look at me and they are like, "are you depressed? Why are you being anti-social?" just because I might not be yaking my face off.

I think that our human society has somewhat "lost" the ability to enjoy the company of others without the use of dialogue, such as it would have been before we bothered to invent language...
But if you observe animals, such as a group of cats... they appear quite happy just being in the presence of one another... or a flock of birds, sitting in a tree... or some bugs on a leaf... okay, I dont really know about the bugs! But... I think it's somewhat sad, that most people believe that they are "required" to keep talking constantly in a so called social situation, when its also enjoyable sometimes to just sit back... and just BE with people.