Why it’s so hard to make friends as an adult

Lane Moore thought she would have more friends by now. The comedian, writer, and musician fantasized about having a kindred spirit as she read about in “Anne of Green Gables,” or a tight-knit group of confidantes as she saw on TV shows like “Friends” and “Sex and the City.” But those kinds of friendships eluded her. She wondered, were such relationships even possible?

After working on repairing her relationship with herself — see her first book, “How to Be Alone: If You Want To, and Even If You Don’t” — she decided to devote herself to friendship.

In “You Will Find Your People: How to Make Meaningful Friendships as an Adult” (Abrams Image), she tackles friend breakups, and relationships with coworkers, roommates, and family members, and provides tools to create healthy boundaries with pals.

She spoke to The Post about the challenges and rewards of making friends as an adult. (This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.)

What made you want to write this book?

My first book was called “How to Be Alone,” and that book and this one are really sisters. Much of the work that I did on myself in “How to Be Alone” was about: let me really develop a relationship with myself, be okay with being alone, really develop that self-worth and self-value. Once you do all that, you think, “I want to finally have better friends than I’ve had before” — because when you’re able to actually love yourself or even just like yourself you’re in a better position to choose the people in your life. 

But how do you do that once you’re post-high school or post-college? It’s incredibly daunting. So I really wanted to write a book about how to make friends as an adult, despite all the struggles that can prevent us from doing that.

Why is it so hard making friends as an adult?

There are so many reasons. One is time. So many of us have such intense schedules: We’re working more than we’ve ever worked — maybe 60 or 80 hours a week. And then you have to make time for yourself, your partner, groceries, all of these things. Then, God forbid, you have to do that with a new friend — it’s much harder to get something off the ground. 

Also, it’s so vulnerable to say to someone: “I’d like to be friends, would you like to as well?” Even if you have somebody you think that you would be good friends with, who would like you, most of us don’t want to be the one to say it first. It’s such a similar process to asking somebody if they have a crush on you, or if they have feelings for you. It just feels like there’s this real potential for rejection.

Once someone decides they want to put themselves out there and find new friends, what are some things they can do?

So much of it is allowing yourself these little windows of vulnerability, where you can sit there and say, “This person always comments on my Instagram posts, and I think they seem really cool. And I slide into their DMs and say, ‘Hey, I always thought you were kind of cool. Do you want to do something soon?’” If they say no, they say no. But I think so many of us need to become more comfortable with taking these small leaps, just to see if there’s something there.

Once you make a friend, how do you nurture that relationship? 

I think being able to be more thoughtful in the ways that we probably would be with a romantic partner. Like, when you’re on a date or something, it’s always so sweet when the person you’re seeing brings you your favorite coffee. That’s just as adorable when it comes from a friend. We can show each other love and appreciation in ways that make a deeper, more meaningful friendship.

Why should we try to forge friendships anyway? Why is having friends important?

Friendship is having community. It’s having support. It’s having people to run ideas by and say, “Hey, I’m kind of struggling with this thing. What do you think? Can you help?” I think more than anything, it’s having backup in a world that can be really hard. It’s so essential that we have that in this world.

How do you feel now in terms of the friends in your life?
I think one of the things that I still contend with is how much I’ve internalized from birth, how friendship is supposed to look, how many friends we’re supposed to have. I really think we have to throw [all those expectations] out the window and look around and see what you’re grateful for. I have somebody I know I can call when this happens: That is a successful friendship, because I didn’t always have that. My friendships are in a wildly better place than they’ve ever been — and I think that’s true for many of us, even if they’re not where television told us they should be. So I feel very good about that.