How to Maintain New Friendships

Hey collegiettes! By now you may have established your main friend group: the girls you know you can always rely on when you need a lunch date or a good time. But it’s spring, and a new season can mean new things right? Recently you’ve been to a few events and parties and have exchanged numbers with some gals you thought would be pretty cool to hang out with. But how do you build on the new connections you’ve made? Here’s 3 steps how:

1. Reach out

As easy as this may sound on the surface, this is generally the hardest step for us to do when making new friends (especially when we already have an established friend group). But think about it! She’s never going to know that you want to hang out unless you ask her. So shoot her a text asking when she may be free for y’all to do something together!

1. Make fun plans

I remember one time I invited a new friend to eat lunch with me and it felt so awkward to me! Not really because of the conversation we were having but because I’m more conversationally comfortable studying and eating with friends that I already know pretty well, than with friends that I don’t. And I feel like this happens because when I eat or study with new people we tend to ask each other what I like to call ‘college 101 questions’: ‘What are you thinking about majoring in?’, ‘How are classes going?’, ‘What professors do you have?’, “How’s life been besides school?’. And it’s hard to move beyond these kinds of questions when you don’t know much about the other person already. Doing other activities where you both are actively doing something fun can be a better ice-breaking experience into your friendship! Here are some ideas:

• Binge watch a favorite Netflix show
• Get mani-pedis
• Go to the mall
• Go to a concert
• Hangout in downtown Winston-Salem

1. Make more fun plans!

It may seem weird that this is the last step, but it’s the most crucial step if you want to make a friendship last: keep scheduling time for you guys to do stuff together! If you two had a good time the last time you did something together, then why not plan for you guys to do something else together? You never know! You may have found a new best friend on campus.

• friendship