How to make real friends when small talk feels impossible

Most of us want real friends who are there in the good and the bad. But nobody teaches you how to do that.

And it can feel out of reach when small talk is exhausting, awkward, or just plain impossible.

It's like what @appythakre wrote to me: 

"Sometimes making conversations makes me feel more tired than completing my 3km run."

So how do we get there, deep friendship without the dreaded small talk?

Here's the guide I wish someone had given me. It starts somewhere most friendship advice ignores entirely.

Step 1: Find a social experience where you don't have to socialize.

If small talk drains you, skip it.

Find a recurring activity where you show up, participate, and go home. No forced conversation required. Things like run clubs, a martial arts class, group fitness, dance classes.

In larger groups, people bond by doing the same thing at the same time, not through talking. And research shows this works faster than conversation. One month of a singing class creates the same closeness that seven months of an art class does.

You sync up. You get out of your head. You start feeling part of something. EVEN if you never talk.

Not looking for physical activity? There are plenty of low-key rituals too: trivia nights, board game meetups, improv classes, religious services.

Step 2: Become a familiar face.

We like people we see a lot.

It's a safety mechanism, hardwired into us. Our ancestors lived in small tribes. It made sense to fear strangers and feel safe around people you saw every day.

That wiring hasn't changed.

Psychologists call it the mere exposure effect. The more we see someone, the more we like them. This is automatic. No conversation required. Just keep showing up.

So whatever activity you chose in Step 1, go regularly. Say hi if it feels right. Make brief eye contact. Even that alone is enough. Eye contact from a passerby increases feelings of connection.

The focus isn't friendship yet. Just become someone people recognize.

Step 3: Be interested, not interesting.

Once you're feeling comfortable showing up, you might want to start talking.

But skip the small talk.

Instead of trying to say interesting things, just be curious about the other person. What brings them here? How long have they been doing it? What do they like about it?

Here's why this works: small talk is usually talking about nothing important until you accidentally stumble onto something you both care about.

You don't need to do that. You already know what you have in common. You're both here, doing this thing, for some reason. Start there.

You don't need a conversation starter. You already have one.

Step 4: Share something most people don't know about you.

Being curious about someone gets you to acquaintance. Sharing something real about yourself gets you to friend.

A psychologist named Arthur Aron ran a famous study where strangers asked each other a series of increasingly personal questions. Many left feeling genuine closeness, sometimes within an hour. The mechanism is reciprocal self-disclosure: you share something honest, it signals safety, and the other person shares something back.

Try telling the other person about:

• An obsession you've had at some point in your life
• Something you've changed your mind about recently
• Something interesting you recently learned, watched, or listened to
• Something you're working on outside of work

This is the place small talk never gets to. There's no risk with small talk. But the risk leads to connection.

Step 5: Just keep showing up.

Research shows it takes roughly 50 hours with someone to move from stranger to acquaintance. 100 to become a friend. About 200 hours to become a close friend.

That sounds like a lot. But most of it happens in the background, just by showing up to the same place, with the same people, over time.

The same is true for confidence. You can't think your way into it. It builds the same way friendship does, through small moments that add up.

Some people move through these steps in weeks. Others take months. Both are totally normal.

Just stick with the same activity. With the same people. Keep showing up. Stay interested.

Small talk was never the point. Showing up was.

That's the whole thing.