Six months sober, the speaker felt paralyzed by social anxiety and what others thought. Their sponsor pointed out they weren't actually trying: no asking for numbers, no follow-ups, no daily texts. Building friendships takes work, not just showing up.
I learned in recovery that I don't really like talking to people. I don't really like interacting with— it makes me very uncomfortable. I'm very concerned with what other people think of me. And there was, I probably had about 6 months sober and I remember talking to my sponsor and being like, I'm so lonely. I don't have any friends. I'm just sitting in my sober living and I wanna talk to people. And he said, well, are you talking to people? Are you asking people for their numbers and following up? Like, are you texting people that you wanna talk to on a daily basis? Like going down this list of things that of course I wasn't doing. And he said, you need, if you want to be this social person, if you want to have friends, if you want to be in community with people around you, it's gonna be work.
