> Most people feel alone because they lack the social skills to make friends outside work, or just lack the initiative, knowledge and internal motivation to work without external pressure and supervision.
I've been remote for ~5 years now, and making friends as an adult, esp. in a new city or location, isn't easy.
But you're right, when you're remote you have to make an effort to build social bridges yourself. That's impossible, or at least greatly strained, during COVID.
Kudos to you, I and most people I know haven't cracked that particular nut in a meaningful way.
It may be an unpopular opinion on this site, but I don't think the human mind is especially well-suited to remote work. We're social creatures by nature and our brains evolved to interact in the meatspace, rather than via a zoom call.
Aye, same. I'm friendly-ish with my coworkers, have played a couple of coworker-only rounds of Among Us, but honestly we're not especially tight and I'll probably never interact with them again once I leave.
At least in an office there is the geographic similarity and discussions that can come out of that, e.g. weather, housing market, sports teams, etc. But half my staff is in Mexico City, India, or the UK. We're swamped with work -- this post is me procrastinating -- and a huge number of them are contractors, vendors, and customers, who we're explicitly told not to get too close to.
And if I'm making friends online, there are far, far better forums for that, e.g. Discord, Reddit, etc.
I've been remote for ~5 years now, and making friends as an adult, esp. in a new city or location, isn't easy.
But you're right, when you're remote you have to make an effort to build social bridges yourself. That's impossible, or at least greatly strained, during COVID.