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Comment by daniel_ | Hacker News Reader

Oh wow. I never expected this many replies... But anyways, thank you for the advice. I guess I am expecting people to be like me, which I realize is a bit ridiculous, now that you point it out. I think I've been doing a little bit of what you said about trying to find people... I took up an internship at a public radio station because I thought the people there would be interesting, and the people there are great, but the age difference between me and everyone can be a bit awkward at times. I guess I need to repeat that kind of scenario where I put myself out there to meet new people.

You're absolutely right about doing stuff as a good cure for mental blocks. I got a road bike and started going for daily rides, and that helped a bit.

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Here's my longer reply.

First of all Daniel, college won't solve your problem. In fact, don't rely on any external factor to solve your problem (such as transferring to a "more interesting" school). It's all you.

I used to (and still do sometimes) have the same problem as yours, which is thinking that a lot of people are not interesting. This is simply not true, because if I end up spending more time with that person, I would usually change my mind.

What we are experiencing is a typical out-group mentality. It's a human instinct to be on the defensive when we first meet someone not in our tribe, because he can potentially be a spy from another tribe who plans to destroy our tribe.

This simply doesn't apply in the modern days, but we still have that emotion leftover from evolution. Being an emotion means you really have no control over it, you might even make up reasons for your behavior such as "oh this person is just not interesting." It's a known fact, that emotion is felt first and then re-interpreted by your brain. (Check out books on neuroscience and evolutionary psychology, if you want to learn more.)

However your brain can be retrained, just like how you can re-train someone who stutters. Believe me, the latter one is a lot harder to do.

This is what you can do to re-train yourself:

1. Get out of your house (exercise if you don't already)

2. Meet five strangers everyday (any age group is fine)

3. You goal is not to make friends. You goal is to make them laugh five times in twenty minutes

4. Keep a log of the people you meet and write down one thing interesting about each one. (Don't write "not interesting". There's always something interesting.)

5. Keep doing this for at least a month

Making friends is about giving, not taking. I can be the most boring person in the world if I don't want to be friends with you. So give me a reason to be interesting. Make me laugh and I will be interesting. If I'm still not interesting by then, you are having a good time, so what does it matter.

Eventually you'd want to do what SwellJoe has suggested, start a band, start a club, be a leader. Leader gives tons of value to the group, that's why people follow him (and be friends with him).

So, stop thinking, Daniel. Turn off your computer, get out and meet someone right now.

P.S. If you are interested in these kinds of networking/entrepreneurial training, I'm writing a series of blog posts on this topic.

I took up an internship at a public radio station because I thought the people there would be interesting, and the people there are great, but the age difference between me and everyone can be a bit awkward at times.

Excellent! Don't dismiss the old-timers. Some of the most interesting people I've ever known have been a lot older than me. In fact, actually, most of the truly interesting folks I've know have been older than me--they've just had more time to acquire crazy and funny stories. I took a job at an independent television station when I was in college, and that was a great experience (it got acquired by the WB, now CW, while I was there, and the character of the station changed and most of the old-timers left). Several of the folks I worked with had been involved in building the tower and broadcast station back in the sixties. Those old guys (and one gal) had some fantastic stories about the birth and growth (and changing mores, like the fact that smoking pot in master control on the night shift was accepted practice in the 70's) of the station, and had a lot of interesting insight into technology and changes; they'd seen the station go from film to analog video of multiple types to digital video, along with the introduction of satellites and other wonders of modern technology.

Work past the awkward, be friendly and interested in their stories (fake it till you make it), and you'll probably learn something about making friends with folks who aren't exactly like you. Older folks are also more likely to be able and willing to make up for your lack of social graces. Generally, the older you get, the less clique-oriented you become...you might get more set in your ways in a lot of regards, but older folks tend to be happier to talk to new and different people, especially if the new people are truly interested in what they have to say.

Another interesting old-timer story: A friend of mine worked with a lady who was maybe 10-15 years older than her. They became friends, because they were both vegetarian, and had a few other things in common. Turns out the lady was Jimmy Dale Gilmore's (probably best known as Smokey from The Big Lebowski outside of Texas, but he's a famous Grammy-wielding country musician) wife. You want interesting stories? Ask an old music star. Point is, you never know who you're going to find when you actually get to know someone.

Anyway, the old-timers aren't generally going to be your best friends, of course. But, socializing merely for the sake of socializing is good for you.

Old-timers (the cool ones) also don't have stupid social hangups, so they really know how to have fun.

Plus, when it comes time to network for your start-up, old-timers tend to have a lot more connections and resources too.

Hey Daniel. I know exactly what you need. I just moved to an area where I don't know anyone, so I have been experimenting with different ways of meeting new people.

In short, in any situation, if you see someone who might be interesting, just go up and say hi, don't hesitate, you have nothing to loose.

I have to go to work soon, so I will give you the long version later.

How old are you? Where are you?

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