New internet friendships

[themousethatroared]

I find it difficult to meet new friends in social situations. The internet seems to be a good place to develop some kind of friendships with like minded people. How do I regard these new friendships? How real are they?

 

[Thelema]

As real as the two peoples honesty. I met a friend over the internet and I have told her every thing in my life that I could had hidden and she has done the same for me. I feel I know her as well as anyone I have ever met. Because we haven't been afraid to share our lives in an honest way.

 

[slowmotiondaydream]

I do very much like the internet because of meeting new people, yet only the down side is that your not face to face with the person and you can not be 100% sure that you are chatting to the person who they say to be.
I suppose you don't have to concentrate on your social problems as much when online, when i chat with my internett friends i don't feel any social anxiety within me, totally love it.

I had meet some exceptionally amazing people in the cyber world. I would like to meet them all one day.
I've opened up to a couple of people, more then i should on the internet, but they don't judge what so ever.

If you get to know someone on the internet who you can truly relate to and chat for endless hours, i can say that you have met someone awesome.
Be aware, there are odd and disturbing people out there who truly need to get laid though.

 

[Starry]

You need to be very careful with the internet and making friends. But if you do find someone that's honest you can have really good friendships. There's a girl on another site I go on, we've been talking to each other for over a year and a half. (She has social phobia and depression, though the site's not for social phobics.) We know practically everything about each other and don't hold back on what we say. I can honestly say she's the best friend I've ever had. I wish I knew her in real life, but then I know that in real life I'd be awkward, and shy, and would hardly speak so...

I've also spoken to a few amazing people on this site. People that I would like to be able to class as friends, although I've only spoken to them a few times. (Rare for me, I didn't class the other person as a friend until we'd spoken for 4-6 months, I just don't trust people very easily)

 

[crazyfairyx]

Online friendships can be as real as real life friendships, but very often they're much more fickle. I've had a lot of online 'friends' over time but there's only 2 people I would count as my true friends, with another person becoming very close to being the third. I think all friendships, whether online or not are worth waiting for. You can't really tell which friends are going to stick around in the long run until you've been mates for quite a long time.

 

[slowmotiondaydream]

yeh i agree, as you quoted.

'You can't really tell which friends are going to stick around in the long run until you've been mates for quite a long time'

I've meant alot of online 'friends' as well, yet felt and feel very close with 2 particular people (true online friends).
One of them has moved and won't be getting internet access at home, which pretty much stopped our communications. I have to admit, i had a moment of sadness ran through me over his departure for a couple of days. I just wished that the he could have moved closer to me.

But whats done is done, no one can change anything.