<p>you're gonna have to learn to initiate things. people aren't going to magically become your friends</p>
<p>make the first move: introduce yourself</p>
<p>I ran across a website with a ton of advice for younger socially-awkward guys. It is at How</a> to have more social success and is pretty much a small book loaded with advice. For the OP or others reading the thread who identify with the sentiments expressed by the OP, it is well worth taking a look.</p>
<p>However I still think that talking to a counselor is a good idea, even if you read the site and try to put it into practice. Reading something only gets you so far, and as the material on that site points out there is no overnite fix; its a process that takes time and effort. Some days will be good, some you'll slide back. A counselor is someone you can talk with (unlike a book), who can point out things you miss or aren't clear about, who can give you an unbiased perspective of how you come across.</p>
<p>The concern I have about the OP is that it sounds like he's putting all his eggs into some future basket. Rather than doing something this week to get started, he's going to be willing to suffer thru the present because everything's going to be better someday, once he studies abroad or transfers. That's a way to rationalize doing nothing today. From what I've read it seems very likely that when those days come he'll still not be able to approach people to make conversation, still be unwilling to go to parties or other things without some buddy to shore up his confidence. In other words, still miserable and time will have rolled by.</p>
<p>And for the socially unskilled the college years are the most important!! College is the time to learn those skills, and you have thousands of people to try them on. So if things don't go well with one group there's just so many other new people to meet who offer a fresh start. I'm not talking about having to make lifelong friends, I'm talking about learning skills like being able to approach strangers and carry on conversations, build and maintain friendships, etc. When you finish school you'll spend most of your waking hours during the week at school. Same faces day in and out, many older and/or having families and not interested in socializing at work. Its much harder to meet new groups of people even in your free time, compared to college when you're surrounded by thousands your own age. So just waiting for next semester or next year to bring some change is to waste the most valuable thing you have, the present.</p>
<p>mike thanks, I tried simple things such as just getting to know the people that live around me. </p>
<p>Yesterday I went a hall social that was specifically for that purpose. I went and it was horrible. Everyone who went, went for food and stuck to their friends their entire time. Yeah I did meet and talk to people but nothing stuck. I'm not expecting someone to leap on me and just say hey lets me life long friends, just someone who shows enough interest to the point where I can comfortably say, "Hey do you want to hang out sometime?" "Want to grab some dinner?" etc.</p>
<p>And mike don't worry, im not looking at studying abroad as some golden place that I have to sit around miserably until it arrives. I'm trying and I'll keep trying.</p>