From my experience, real friendships only result from situations where you're forced to see the same people over and over.
I've tried going out and making friends via meetup groups and what not. I find it very easy to make conversation with some guys there, exchange numbers, yada yada. But then what? Invite this dude you talked to for like 20 minutes out for a drink some time? No one does that. To be honest, nothing ever comes of it when you exchange numbers with some guy you met once. Compare that to going out and gaming girls: Girls are much less friendly, much harder to talk to, much more critical/judgmental, much more likely to eject from the conversation, etc. But when you do hold an engaging convo with a girl and get her number, you know exactly what to do; text her in the next couple days and just run your standard first date game. Totally straight-forward. So even though other men are far more friendly and open than women, that doesn't mean they're easier to become close with out of the blue.
I've thought about this a lot and realized true friends almost always come from the following categories:
1. Grew up together
2. Went to college together
3. Work(ed) together
4. Were in some close-knit club or organization
5. Hung out repeatedly via mutual friends
Again, notice the theme of places where you'd see the same people over and over.
I assume stages 1 and 2 are behind you, but 3-5 are likely accessible. Focus on those. You can try, as I have, meeting dudes for platonic friendship in the same way that you meet chicks, but I don't know of anyone who does that successfully.
I've tried going out and making friends via meetup groups and what not. I find it very easy to make conversation with some guys there, exchange numbers, yada yada. But then what? Invite this dude you talked to for like 20 minutes out for a drink some time? No one does that. To be honest, nothing ever comes of it when you exchange numbers with some guy you met once. Compare that to going out and gaming girls: Girls are much less friendly, much harder to talk to, much more critical/judgmental, much more likely to eject from the conversation, etc. But when you do hold an engaging convo with a girl and get her number, you know exactly what to do; text her in the next couple days and just run your standard first date game. Totally straight-forward. So even though other men are far more friendly and open than women, that doesn't mean they're easier to become close with out of the blue.
I've thought about this a lot and realized true friends almost always come from the following categories:
1. Grew up together
2. Went to college together
3. Work(ed) together
4. Were in some close-knit club or organization
5. Hung out repeatedly via mutual friends
Again, notice the theme of places where you'd see the same people over and over.
I assume stages 1 and 2 are behind you, but 3-5 are likely accessible. Focus on those. You can try, as I have, meeting dudes for platonic friendship in the same way that you meet chicks, but I don't know of anyone who does that successfully.