It didn’t used to be. At least for me and i don’t recall constantly seeing posts on social media about how lonely and sad everyone was or how to make friends. Now every other magazine article is about how lonely everyone is, nobody gets together, and gen Z doesn’t socialize, drink, or have sex.
Why is there such an epidemic of loneliness and why are people content to be lonely rather than socialize?
Why is so hard to connect? Because people having nothing in common anymore? I used to connect with people over books, movies, hobbies, etc. But now it feels increasingly hard to do that. Most folks I meet don’t care about any of that, they just mostly complain about their lives to you or go on political rants about how unfair the world is.
My friends and my dates no longer seem to watch films, or do much of anything other than spend time on social media? I dont’ use social media so I’m pretty ignorant of it all.
Join your town’s local discord server. If it has two, one is the shit one. If it doesn’t have one, start it. I started a city discord that grew to over 600 members in two years. Is important to delegate as you grow and encourage all members to try organizing and leading events if they like, at least trying once.
If you can’t host, you’ll need to recruit at least one person that can before the ball gets rolling.
If you like discussing books and films, which are some of my favorite things, movie nights are great easy get togethers and if you don’t have a member with a big living room and TV you can all go to the cinema together (but that’s expensive).
A book club can even be done in a voice channel.
If your town has a boardgame cafe, that’s really good to take prospective friend groups.
If you don’t have that option, look for community organizations with a building, such as a progressive church. Unfortunately that will put some members off events, especially members of many minority groups.
Hiking is free and doesn’t require securing a venue.
You can gain a lot of real (not nebulous internet) community, friends, gratitude, and (to put it bluntly) clout.
During the summer y’all can hang out in parks.
If you’re looking for inclusive spiritual community you can look for Unitarian Universalist congregations. They’re all over Europe and North America. They’re based on progressive values instead of Scripture so you bring your own deity/pantheon/no deity. They’re basically a spiritual community for the left from Pagans to Christians/Jews/Muslims to atheists and agnostics and everyone else.
In my area there are a lot of ageing hippies and a lot of millennials and Gen Z looking for community for their children which is a delightful mix. Lots of LGBTQ+ representation as well.
Could be a useful place to look!