When news breaks, you need to understand what matters โ and what to do about it. At Vox, our mission to help you make sense of the world has never been more vital. We rely on readers like you to fund our journalism. Will you support our work and become a Vox Member today? How to make and sustain relationships in a new city as a single person. It was my fifth move in as many years.
Being mobile is only one way of living life, and by living this way โ for those of us who have the privilege to choose to move or to stay home โ we inherently miss out on all the other ways to live and build community. Maybe you even know already where the grocery store is. When it comes to the more ineffable stuff, though, it can be a lot harder to plan in advance. The most important thing for me, being in a new city, is to put yourself out there to meet people.
This could be through work, exercise groups, meetups, social media, volunteering, or even dating apps. This does not have to break the budget. As your budget allows, you could also put a small amount of money into a social fund for these activities each month. I spoke with Marisa Franco, a psychologist and friendship researcher, and Gillian Sandstrom, a researcher at the University of Sussex, about transitions.
Finding sustainable communities that you see regularly and can invest in, as Allie Volpe wrote for Vox , is key to thriving in a new place. This could be other people new to a city or country, people who have just graduated from college, or people who have recently gone through a breakup and are looking for friends. Loose connections are also important. Sandstrom worked on a huge study on kindness with people from different countries and found that people often reported kindness in interactions from strangers.
People may also find conversations with strangers emotionally fulfilling โ if they can speak to a particular emotional experience โ or that they learn something from talking to people across generations. Keeping in touch is important. I spoke with Jeff Hall, a researcher at the University of Kansas, about maintaining friendships over time.
