I find what matters most in my friendships is being on the same page in terms of mindset, because then anything is enjoyable. I'm a social guy, I have lots of "friends", but I really only have three TRUE friends. I called my buddy up (one of the three) that I haven't seen for 2 years, nothing was awkward, talked for a few hours like nothing happened, all because we never changed who we were.

All three of my friends have completely different stances on various topics, topics that usually divide people, in terms of subjects like religion and politics. The thing is, even though we don't agree on much of anything really, we take pleasure in endlessly bantering between one another and "fighting" our opinions. At the end of the day though, nobody is hurt. You always end up learning something new, or exploring some other outlook.

The key is to be friends with mentally strong people. Friends that are open to whatever, whenever.

I hate being friends with people who have defined things that they like, or don't like, for no real reason. My friends and I's take on life is that the only thing that truly matters are relationships, everything else is mainly either a vehicle for fun, or to support yourself, so doing things isn't a struggle because nobody holds any personal or cultural bias against anything.

We like exploring things just by virtue of curiosity and it's nearly always a fun experience.

Just plain old hanging out like as if we were kids.

It really resonates with me too at a personal level but at the same time it's quite surprising if this is indeed so widespread across men.

I'm an extreme introvert with few, if any, close friends and relationships or a strong desire for such, and it has always befuddled me how smooth and effortless many friendships look from the outside. The whole concept of "hanging out" without some common ground or a common activity or goal in mind is almost foreign to me. I can "hang out" with a friend I haven't seen for ages to catch up with what's been going on with each other but I can't see how this is sustainable on a weekly basis or more.

Age is also a big factor. It seems that most friendships go back to childhood, teenage or college years. The older you get, the harder is to make new relationships that go past the plain acquaintance stage. The prospect of building a social network (in the offline sense of the word) from scratch in your mid thirties, say after moving to the other side of the country or the world, sounds intimidating even to normal extroverted people I've talked to, let alone chronic loners.

I've found that there are people that I instantly click with, typically people to whom I can speak my mind without any filter, and who come back at me with theirs. I think filters and worrying about being inoffensive in general really gets in the way for a lot of people.

I think that if you want to get past the polite acquaintance stage, you have to risk offending them, which can be scary, but I think one really good friend is worth more than almost any number of acquaintances, so I think it's worth it.

My bad social habit which I am working on correcting is in imposing a thought on someone's personal life a bit too eagerly, which for me usually begins with the phrases, "so then it's like..." or "you should..." - I got caught out on the former phrase just today, in fact. When they take offense it's always a blow to me since I don't want to be That Guy, but I have to admit that I get the same sense that people I really click with don't even bother taking offense at that stuff. They're okay with having a conversation that has some conjecture and vulnerability, and some difficulty of thought conveyance, built into it.

Conversely, I get a really bad impression when the defense mechanism rolls out, particularly so when it's elaborate, practiced, and snarky. A strong rejection indicates that I've tread into territory they'd really want to not dwell upon. Extreme snark is even worse since it indicates that their intention is to control the power dynamic. The time I encountered that, I found myself boomeranging it by replying "I'm too trusting."