When Your Life Circumstances Interfere With Your Social Life

A common problem people have is, "I want to do better socially, but I live too far from everyone/don't have a car/have no money/live in a small town/am underage. I can't have a normal social life because of this. What can I do?" To put them in bullet list form, here are the life circumstances that seem to interfere with people's social lives the most:

• Living far away from school/downtown/where everyone hangs out
• Living with your parents after high school
• Living in a small, boring town where there's little going on or no one to hang out with
• Being underage (in general or when all their friends are legal age)
• Not having a car
• Being strapped for cash
• Not having a good place to bring friends back to
• Being busy all the time
• Living somewhere with a culture where it's harder to make friends

Here's my advice on all that. First I'll give some general principles, then my take on the specific obstacles:

General ideas

These unhelpful circumstances can undeniably make things harder

Before I go into all the tips and advice, I don't want to understate how much having your circumstances stacked against you can be a real barrier. Issues many people don't even have to think about are a big, inconvenient handicap for you. And some people are stuck in a situation that will never give them all they want, no matter how much they try to make the best of it.

Don't make your circumstances into an excuse

Less-than-perfect life circumstances usually aren't enough to sink someone's social life if they're otherwise motivated and well-adjusted. Lots of people don't have ideal situations, but they still manage to make friends. But if someone is already shy, insecure, or awkward, then some logistical hassles can be the final straw that makes socializing feel too difficult and not worth the effort. If they're on the fence about changing, it gives them a reason to procrastinate. Tougher circumstances can also be used as an ego-saving excuse. People can end up seeing their situation as the sole reason they're not doing well socially, when there are other factors in play.

You can probably do at least somewhat better than you are now

Sort of repeating the last point, there are probably at least some things you can do to squeeze more social success from your current situation. You may have to work harder than everyone else to get their results, but it can be done. Also, if they find you likable enough people usually don't care about where you stand in terms of "on paper" qualities like where you live or how much money you have.

You've got three choices when faced with a bad situation: Adapt, escape, or wait it out

For some circumstances you can change the way you're doing things so you can still have a social life (e.g., living far from your friends). For others, the best long-term solution may be to escape (e.g., living in a tiny, stifling town). And in some cases you may just have to wait (e.g., until you can drive, get into bars, move out of home, or get a job that pays more). Faced with the same situation, different choices may be appropriate for different people.

If you're younger, you may just have to wait for a while

A lot of life circumstance problems hit you when you're in high school or college. Some of this just comes with being young. You're not fully independent and other people get to make decisions for you. You don't get to pick where you live. You don't have a ton of money to throw around. You're too young to legally do some of the things you want to. You have to accept that this is just what life is like at your age, and that you have to put in your time and wait until you're older.

If life isn't perfect now, at least you can work to lay a groundwork for the future

You may be stuck in a situation where your social life will never be where you want it. But maybe in a year or two things have the potential to be better. You can put all your currently wasted time toward making your future social life easier. You could practice various social skills on the people that are around. Maybe you could take up some fun new hobbies that will help you make connections in the future. You might be able to take on some part-time work that will let you move or buy a car more quickly.

Some advice for specific problems

You'll notice a lot of the points below aren't especially profound. You may have thought of them already. For some people the big step isn't coming up with ideas to get around their problems, it's shedding the attitude that their social life is a lost cause because of their circumstances, so there's no point in trying.

Living in a small, boring town

If you truly don't like it, and feel bored and constrained or like there's no one worth knowing where you live, then the only real option is to move. That may not be possible right now, but could be in the future when you start university, or if you save up enough money.

I think some people don't give the members of their community a fair chance though. They see everyone as belonging to a uniform mass of small-minded/conservative/backwards types, when in reality some of them aren't that bad. It can be that cliched "everyone sucks" negativity that may come from being lonely. Someone may not have made an honest effort to explore all the things there are to do in their area either. Sometimes we're too quick to conclude a town is dull, when if we'd just look around a little more deeply, we'd find there's more going on than we realized.

If you don't have access to a car, being able to use one will open up your options. The drive might be a chore, but there could be a ton more going on in the mid-sized city an hour a away.

Living far from everyone

E.g., living far from your school, university campus, downtown, etc. I think some people make this out to be a bigger problem than it really is. Like, "I live so far. No one will want to come over to my house. I'll never make friends." This is probably the circumstance that can be improved the most from changing your mindset. Here are my suggestions:

• If you've decided ahead of time that your far-off location is social kryptonite, at least try having people over. They may not mind. But honestly, it probably is a hassle. It's always easier living near everything.
• Hang out at the places of friends who do live nearby. They may understand you live far away and not care that they can't go to your place. Don't feel you must have people over in order to have a life.
• Hang out with people in spots other than someone's house or apartment. The older you get, the more possibilities open up to do things outside of going over to a buddy's place after school.
• Be around people in organized settings away from home such as sports teams, lessons, or clubs.
• Just accept that you'll spend more time traveling to and from locations than most people. If you take public transit you can at least read, listen to music, or play video games during the down time.
• If you're younger try making some friends with people in your area. Your social circle doesn't have to only include classmates from your school. Check out what's going on in your part of town.
• Once you're legal drinking age, living far from all the bars and clubs can mess up your nights out. People from the suburbs have had many outings cut short because the last bus/train home left at 1:00am. You can figure out ways around this like arranging to stay at a friend's house, or trying to get your buddies to come to a more local bar.
• When you're older the right call may be to move closer to where you want to be.

Living with your parents

This is a similar problem to living far from everyone. There can also be the same tendency to assume it's a bigger obstacle than it is. If your home isn't that bad there's no reason to think you can't have people over. It may not be as convenient as having your own place, but it's not that big a deal. However, if hanging out at home isn't feasible, then just write it off as a possible place to socialize, and spend time with your friends in any number of other spots.

Try not to worry about the stigma it carries. Especially in bigger cities, not moving out right away doesn't mean what it used to. More and more people are living at home in their twenties because it's just too expensive to rent their own apartment. If you tell someone you still live with your parents they may think, "Oh okay. Well I guess we won't be hanging out at their place much", but that's it. If you seem like an okay person most people will assume you're still at home because of finances or your culture, not because something's wrong with you.

Not having a car / not being able to drive

This one isn't so bad if you live downtown in a larger city. It's way more of a problem in suburban or rural areas.

• If you're below the driving age, and a car is essential where you live, then start learning to drive as soon as you can. Then get a car ASAP to get rid of that limitation to your independence and mobility.
• Get rides with friends, take public transit, or take cabs. Agree to meet people at your destination instead of picking them up.
• Don't blatantly use anyone or take them for granted, but if you can, make friends with someone who has a car.
• If someone gives you a lift on a longer trip, or they regularly ferry you around, be sure to pitch in on gas.
• Don't feel you have to have a car to have friends. If you're an otherwise solid person no one's going to judge you because you can't pick them up or drive out somewhere. Especially when people are younger, they don't care as much about that stuff compared to how fun you are or how well you get along with everyone.

Being underage to drink and get into bars

I think this is the most annoying when everyone you know is legal and you can't go along with them. Nothing like being the younger kid in college.

• There are some bars/clubs/concerts that will let underage people in. It may only happen on certain nights, or they'll let everyone in, but the underage kids will get an X drawn on their hand or have to wear an identifying wristband.
• Try to go to more house parties instead of going to bars.
• There are obviously risks to this, and not everyone is up for it, but there are always those well-worn options that underage drinkers have resorted to for decades: Getting a fake ID, getting someone else to buy you booze, or going somewhere where they're lax about carding people or letting minors drink.
• Just wait to turn the legal age. Everyone is too young at some point.

Being poor / broke

This includes a couple of issues. The first would be in terms of not having enough money to go out with your friends. The second would be living in a run down house/apartment/neighborhood that you're embarrassed to bring people back to. The third would be having a "poor" appearance because you can't afford the same types of clothes as everyone else.

• Regarding money, it's not unusual at all for people to be hard up for cash during their university years and their twenties. In fact, I'd say it's the exception to not have to worry about paying the rent at some time. Most of these people manage to have a social life. They aren't going to fancy restaurants four times a week, but they can still have fun. It actually doesn't cost all that much to go out if you budget it properly. If you make socializing a priority, you can almost always come up with some cash to cover the expenses.
  • You can eat at cheap restaurants.
  • You can go to free festivals or only go to the art gallery on the weekday evening when there's no admission.
  • You can go to bars with cheap or no cover. Many venues also won't charge cover if you get there before a certain time.
  • You can pre-drink... with cheap alcohol that still does the job.
  • You can learn which nights have drink specials for all the bars in your city.
  • Instead of going out all the time you can just go over to people's houses and watch TV and hang around and chat.
  • You can do inexpensive activities like seeing a movie, going for a bike ride, or grabbing a coffee.
  • You can do free outdoor activities like wandering around downtown or walking along the river.
• If you think your residence is embarrassing you can apply the advice from the Living Far From Everything section. Just never invite people over and hang out in other places. And if you're a good friend otherwise your mates shouldn't hold your circumstances against you. Move somewhere better if or when it's possible. Another long-term option is to find friends who don't care where you live.
• When it comes to appearance, you can look good on a budget if you know what you're doing. If you're quite young and your parents pick out your clothes for you, get permission to choose them yourself.

Being busy all the time

I think there's always time to socialize if you make it a priority. And who really studies at 11pm on a Friday anyway?

• Be careful about using your busyness as an excuse to justify your lack of a life (to yourself, to other people, or both).
• Try to tweak your social life so that it's less time consuming and fits into your schedule. Like you could meet a friend for coffee after work or class, instead of in the middle of a weekend when you have other stuff to do.
• Spend quality time with friends instead of hanging out aimlessly for hours on end.
• If you don't mind that kind of thing, try to hang out with lots of people at once instead of seeing everyone individually.
• If being too tired to want to go out is the problem, a nap after work or a strategic dose of caffeine may be all you need to get your energy and motivation back.
• If you foresee the busyness as being temporary you may rightly choose to throw your (social) life out of balance in the short term to achieve a greater long range goal. Though whether "all of undergrad plus law school" is "temporary" is up for debate. That kind of thinking can be a justification for avoiding real social problems. It's easier to view yourself as nobly sacrificing trivial social activities for the greater good.

Living in a country or city where it's harder to make friends

Sometimes it's not small-scale practical problem that blocks your path, like not having a car, but your city or country's entire cold, standoffish culture. I go into more detail in this article: