What’s up, I’m 20 years old and I have no chance when it comes to making friends. I grew up with a lot of childhood trauma that left me with PTSD, a lot of paranoia and extreme trust issues which probably doesn’t help by being so picky when it comes to making friends.
Started a new job and made some acquaintances but nothing concrete and that’s how my social life has always been. I’ve never made it to below surface level with people. I try extremely hard to not overstep boundaries with people. I am an extremely polite and down to earth guy but no matter the times I’ve tried to reach out to some people who I would personally want to hangout with, it just seems like I’m not as important or they’re just straight not interested and it just makes me feel like shit. I am just the background character in peoples lives it feels like.
I don’t think there is one trait I have that makes me a bad person or friend I am simply awesome but people just suck apparently or I guess I do. What the hell am I to people. I even reached out to an old friend of mine but to no avail.
I’m not desperate for friends but I just feel like nobody likes me
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I am a handsome guy, extremely nice and empathetic. I can be funny without being mean and I’ve heard others say it too but my self confidence is starting to take a massive toll. Is it too much to ask for to be relevant in one’s life? Some of these people I know don’t even text back or seem like they wanna hangout
> but people just suck apparently or I guess I do
You are the common denominator. It’s extremely unlikely that everyone you meet is out to discard you, meaning that there is probably something going on with you that puts some of these people off.
What could that be? Well, I’ll start with the fact that I am similar to you. I keep everyone at arm’s length due to trust and trauma issues; I am exceedingly careful about boundaries, politeness, and consent; and I am very picky about the people with whom I choose to associate.
One person finally enlightened me to the problem: me. I was coming across as disinterested, arrogant, an asshole. Of course, I intended to do none of those things, I just wanted to be polite and give people the space they deserve. But those people were assuming I had ill intentions.
So it’s worth looking at your demeanor, countenance, and behavior to see what could be the issue. You’re also young still, so you have time to find the right friend group.
Or don’t and enjoy a life free of friendships. I love my solitude.
People don’t like me either, but they never tell me that to the face, which means I am respect to some extent. That’s everything I need. You just keep doing what you do and centre on accomplishing your goals
It’s really, really hard to tell what the problem might be here just from what you wrote. So many things can go wrong when interacting with people. I think this might be a case where consulting a therapist or coach might be a much better solution – they can ask you more in-depth questions about your behavior, examples of specific situations and can observe what kind of vibes you give. Maybe joining some group therapy focused on interpersonal relationships could help, too.
Otherwise you could try a lot of reading/listening to podcasts/watching advice about social skills, apply a lot of introspection and try to experiment with changing how you treat others and yourself (yes, how you treat yourself also has an impact on your relationships). This could take a bit longer and require a bit more effort, but could be enough. I personally consider these to be quite good sources:
[Crappy Childhood Fairy](https://www.youtube.com/c/CrappyChildhoodFairy) – since you mentioned childhood trauma that left you with PTSD, this could be a good fit for you. I think you can also write her a letter asking for advice, at least there are videos of her replying to viewers’ letters.
[Therapy in a Nutshell](https://www.youtube.com/c/TherapyinaNutshell) – less about social skills, more about self-management, but a solid resource. You’ll see there are some playlists specifically devoted to PTSD and on healthy relationship skills, so you might wanna start there.
[Personal Development School](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHQ4lSaKRap5HyrpitrTOhQ) – focuses on advice specific to each attachment style. There’s an ad for the school in each video, and the information density isn’t always quite high, but I’ve learned a lot from these overall.
[Communication Skills Coach Alex Lyon](https://www.youtube.com/c/CommunicationSkillsCoachAlexLyon) – focuses on communication, which could potentially be helpful to you.
[Charisma on Command](https://www.youtube.com/c/Charismaoncommand) – a bit hit-and-miss, but there are some helpful nuggets there.
Read this subreddit, and you’ll see that a lot of people have similar experiences. Look up “loneliness epidemic” and you’ll see that you’re not alone, that there are books published on this subject, multiple books–one is even by the former surgeon general of the US. More than 20 years ago a sociologist published a book “Bowling Alone” about how society was becoming anti-social–and that was *before* the invention of smartphones.
While you have some extra challenges, making friends is genuinely difficult for most people. Because it isn’t only the people who are lonely and/or very isolated who have trouble–most people would rather have more and better friendships than they have.
I recommend to almost everyone that they join interest-based communities. That gives you time to get to know people, and they get to know you, and the friendships have time to develop. There’s also time to be intentional about arranging hangouts with people and that kind of thing–time to put it off because it feels weird and eventually do it anyway until you get used to it. And in the meantime, you’re engaged in an activity or subject that you enjoy with people you share at least one interest in common with.