 How do you make new friends when you move? Whether it's moving to a new city or whether it's moving to a new part of town or whether it's trying to get out of the social group that you're in Because you realize that they're holding you back and you want to move on Get a new group of friends. So how do you make new friends? I Get asked this a lot. I've traveled a lot I've moved from Brisbane to London in 1999 and Made new friends and then moved to Los Angeles in 2002 and Did not know one person not a soul But quickly created a thriving social group for myself and Then I lived in South America for a time I went and lived in Buenos Aires, Argentina same thing flew into Buenos Aires airports and almost had a panic attack on the plane on the tarmac because I'm like Damn it. What am I doing here? I don't know anyone and I don't speak a word of Spanish other than Allah and Then I moved to Medellin and then the Bogota in Colombia. I moved to Austin, Texas for about a month in When was that 2010 Yeah, so I've moved around a lot and even when I Quit drinking I moved Social groups Because all of a sudden I went from not all of a sudden rather I went from you know Hanging out with friends where we'd go and have a few drinks during the week or on the weekend and moved into a group of friends who Didn't drink as much or not at all So let's go through a few little actionable things That we can do here the number one that one thing that I do whenever I just I move somewhere is I commit to hosting a Dinner or a party or a get-together of some type Within two weeks of me moving to that new place Hosting not attending someone else's event, but hosting and it doesn't need to be a big event. It can be three people Heck it can be two people sitting in a coffee shop But when you are the host and when you bring people together and when you connect people People will start Inviting you places when you invite someone somewhere the invites will start flowing flowing in for you So my strategy has always been whenever I move to a new a new city I Will just say hey look I'll say it to myself I don't know anyone but in two weeks from now I'm gonna host a party at my place at whatever apartment that I moved into or wherever I'm living or I'm gonna host to get together in a Bar Even if I'm not drinking Or I'm gonna just bring somehow do something to bring people together when I moved to Medellin in 2000 and Something 2009. I think it was I moved to Medellin. I rented a place in Poblato, which is a suburb of Medellin in Colombia and I looked at the the diary and the place that I had rented had a really nice space in the living room is very large living room I mean I just said right two weeks and now I'm gonna host a host a party and bring Cool entrepreneurial type people together even though I was only just getting into the entrepreneurial world and so When I went out and about and met people socially in Medellin which I'll get into in a second. I Would say to new people I would meet. Oh, you should come to my Entrepreneurial party that I'm having next Saturday And they go, oh that that'd be great and there's a let me get your details So then I'd get their number. I'd get the email address and then I would contact them and Invite them Now the invitee loves this because They've just been invited somewhere. Everybody loves to be invited somewhere and when they show up You introduce them to other people that you've invited and now they make new friends and because they make new friends They think that you're a man about town even though you've only been in town two weeks and truthfully you are about about town Because you've just connected people and brought them together So that's an example and you might say well, where do you even meet these people to invite? Well, the answer is is anywhere You get talking to them In the street, you might meet them in a bar. You might meet them in a coffee shop If you join a local sports team, which is another great tip You will meet 20 new friends right away when I moved to Los Angeles in 2002 it was September 30th 2002 I flew into LA and I didn't know whether I was gonna turn left or right out of the airport when I arrived at LAX and I Ended up going down and living in the Hermosa Beach Hostel About it's about 30 minutes south of Los Angeles Airport In a bunk bed with a bunch of other snoring backpackers and what I did was I just Sort out or tried to find a local rugby team because I had played rugby growing up in Australia So I found the Los Angeles Rugby Club and I went okay. I'm in Los Angeles. Let me just alright That's the Los Angeles Rugby Club and then I reached out to someone at the Los Angeles Rugby Club and said hey I'm Australian. I'm just arrived to town. I'd like to you know come and play. How do I do it? and very fortuitously The guy who was the president of the club guy named Jason. I can't remember his last name Jason sent me an email back and this was to my hotmail address. This was back in 2002 It was my hotmail address back then was James. So when I get hotmail.com He sent me an email back saying oh, we're training on the sand tonight at Hermosa Beach Pier And I was like oh my god I had this is just meant to be true because the Hermosa Beach Pier was where I was Staying in this hostel and that's where they were doing their training that they're not on the beach Playing touch touch rugby. So all I had to do was walk down the stairs of this hostel turn left a hundred yards And all of a sudden there were 20 guys all playing touch rugby on the beach And so I just walked up as they were playing and said who is Jason here? Is there a Jason here and they go said yeah go over there. Hi Jason. I'm James. We spoke on email Oh, he goes. Hey man. Nice to meet you. Then he introduced me to a few people and then I joined in on the game and Then when it time to have a break in the game people would say oh, what's your story? Where are you from? Oh nice and this guy called bojo came over to me is a Croatian guy bojo Duranya he came over and was particularly nice and friendly to me and really took me under his wing for The next two years that I lived in LA really I mean he introduced me to all these friends He was kind enough to invite me over to his family's Thanksgiving and Christmas lunches and dinners Because he knew that I was you know million miles from home and I was in America for the first time and Through bojo and through all of those connections at the Los Angeles rugby club. I was able to have 20 new friends right away So joining a sporting team and it doesn't even have to be sporting team by the way It can be the damn like mastermind business mastermind entrepreneurial group But for me joining that rugby club, I had 20 new friends right away right away And then once I'd you know started playing At the end of every game you would will go to a to a bar in this case. It was the Manhattan Beach Sharkies there was a pub there on down near the ocean called sharkies Baja sharkies and everyone would go there after playing a game and You know have post-game beers and food and and whatever and and you'd get to know people even more And then they'd ask you about you and then they'd invite you to places and before you know it You've got like this sort of like booming social life. So joining a club when you get into town is a really great thing a sporting team when I got to Buenos Aires in 2009 Before I went to Medellin before I went up to Columbia. I went and signed up for Spanish classes For beginning beginning Spanish classes and when I walked into the beginning Spanish class very nervous there was like eight nine ten other expats Who were all who all spoke who all had English as their first language who were all just about start learning Spanish And so we got talking there was a guy there called Paul and he in conversation It came out that he was from Colorado and I asked him if he was a Denver Broncos fan like I was and I He said yes, and I said I'm probably the only Australian Denver Broncos fan in Argentina at the moment and and I said to him We should watch a Broncos game Together and he said yeah, that'd be great. And at that point if I recall correctly the season was about to start and so I Identified a pub called the Alamo Which was an expat pub down there and I went to this expat pub the Alamo One night not long after arriving in Buenos Aires, and I just again I didn't know anyone but I just turned up and I heard all these English Speaking voices because it was an expat pub And so I just sat down and started talking to the person that left them the right of me And so we're talking to the bartender and then the bartender told me that During NFL season which I think started like a week after that or a couple weeks after that people all came to this pub to watch NFL games I was like great. What a great opportunity to meet some some more American people So I went to the first week and I saw how they showed games and there was like six TVs and they showed six different games and I Obviously went there to watch the Broncos game and then I all I did was just you know Stand in front of the TV Stand in front of the TV that was showing the Broncos games And of course you look to the left and the right of you and then you see other people who are watching that game And cheering when the Broncos make a play so you go. Oh great. They're Broncos fans, too So then you go oh Broncos fans awesome. Hi. I'm James. Hi. I'm John. Hi. I'm Christie You get talking and then they say How'd you become a Broncos fan being Australian and blah blah blah blah anyway about week three of the season I decided to create the Denver Broncos One second, please I Just lost my chain of thought there actually as I was recording this actually hang on a second Second So I lost my chain of thought there for a second because I was interrupted as I was recording someone came to the door Not knocked on the door and I had to go and answer the door. So I don't even recall what I was talking about This is a curious part of the episode isn't it? What was I talking about? Completely lost my chain of thought Let's see Los Angeles rugby club made a whole new friends And the sipping on a coffee here now, what did I what was I talking about made a whole new friend a whole lot of new friends? Berger introduced me to all their friends. Oh, that's right Buenos Aires Denver Broncos, so I met so many friends. Sorry. I met so many new people at this pub called the Alamo and I met enough Broncos fans to say I'm gonna create the Denver Broncos Buenos Aires Social group in fact, this will be an interesting thing I'm pretty sure if I search on Facebook now if I type in Buenos Aires Denver Broncos, maybe the group that I actually created Even still comes up. Let me have a look Denver Broncos Buenos Aires Denver Broncos. There we go the Buenos Aires Broncos Club So if you want to see the group that I actually created back in 2009 2010 actually it was Or maybe I created it 2009 must have been the 2009 2010 season. So you can actually go to Facebook and type in Buenos Aires Broncos Club and you can see the very group That I created in order to make new friends and so there are people here called Scott and Where are the members here we go members For some reason there's only one member of it. I don't know why that has happened, but I promise you there were There we go. There's an Andrew in there. There was a Marie there was a David There we go. There was a Scott there was a Andy there we go Andy on if you scroll down you can actually see photos there's photos of me From 2009 December 3 2009 in the Alamo pub There you go, and you can see the little meet-ups. I hosted so what I did was I created this Buenos Aires Broncos Club and I spread it out To all the Broncos fans or all the people who who are from Colorado living in Argentina And then I invited them to come and watch the game on a Sunday And so people would come and because I was the one who organized that everyone was like thanks for organizing And then they started inviting me to parties and and I started attending and then I hosted my own parties and all of a sudden I was a man about town and all of a sudden people knew who I was and all of a sudden people Were like, oh the James guy at the Broncos guy and So I made a whole lot of new friends in a new in a new new city. This is so funny I'm looking at a photo here of me from October 5th 2009 James celebrates the Broncos 17-10 win against the Cowboys in October 4 2009 at the Alamo at El Alamo Look at that. There's Sam Smith. There's Tim Nisham. All these guys Seb Sutton. This is a this is hilarious So there you go You can actually see it in action Not just listen to me if you want to actually go and see it and see how I did it then just go to the Buenos Aires Broncos Club and Facebook And you can see the the history of it. So there you go. That's what I did with it with when I was in Argentina But I always liked the I always liked the idea of Being the host being the person that the people That you that you invite excuse me that you invite people because then they in turn will invite you and you can make More people interested in you in 30 days by being interested in them Then you can try to get them interested in you over the course of a year So that means Be interested in them and being in Inviting them somewhere means that you're interested in them people are interested in people who are interested in them The other thing you can do is if you go to a new new city is you can reach out to friends of friends and ask your current friends If they know anyone in the city that you're moving to so if you're moving to Austin You ask all your friends on Facebook. Hey, I'm moving to Austin. Does anyone know anyone in Austin? So, oh, yeah, you should meet Pete. You should meet John. I'll introduce you great They don't introduce you you just say what what's the guy's name? Oh, it's Pete Smith And you go, okay, great So then you reach out to Pete Smith and say hey, we're both friends of whoever your mutual friend is and then that person is now Socially obligated to meet you not obligated and I'm like damn. I gotta meet this person like socially obligated as are cool I get to meet a friend of my friend Lot easier to make new friends when your friends are friends That's a really cool way to do it Um, the other thing is if you don't know who lives in a city you can you can type in the city in Facebook So you might go let's do this. Let's type in. I'm recording this in Los Angeles But let's type in a city that I don't know any I don't think I know anyone in at the moment. Let's go Let's go Minnesota as a place showing Musician here we go region Minnesota And then you go into Friends and so I've just typed in Minnesota in Facebook And it comes up with friends who have visited Minnesota. So it has a whole list of people who've been there now The the part where it says have lived here or from here Or have attended school here. That's very interesting But let's have a look at the have lived here in the 11. So I click on that and now it brings up one 11 of my friends On acquaintances who lived there. So I can see Dustin Peter Eric Libby Jesse Robinson Kevin There you go Kevin Patrick So I've got this is so interesting Kevin Shuewiler who who helps me with my 30 day no alcohol challenge Uh who works for me He lived there. I didn't know he lived in Minnesota. So if I was going to go to Minnesota go Hey, Kevin, I'm going to Minnesota. Who do you know in Minnesota? He go, oh, I know my friend blah blah. I'll connect you great Thanks Kevin Um Patrick here is who's my fiduciary who now lives in Omaha. I had no idea he lived in Minnesota So now that I know that he lived in Minnesota, I can call up Patrick and go Patrick I say you lived in Minnesota. I'm going to Minnesota I'm going there. Um To live or I'm going there for a week. Who do you know there that I could hang out with? Oh You she got to talk to my friend my friend Dave I'll introduce you to now and then introduce me to Dave and then when I get to Minnesota I call up Dave and I go Dave I'm in Minnesota. You want to come and hang out? Okay, sure. Let's do it and then you meet new people So that's a pretty cool little trick um The other thing now there's this thing caught on um in facebook called Uh Near is it called friends near near you or something? I can't remember. I'm gonna pull it up on my phone But basically you can agree to have to download one of the facebook services Where it tells you who's actually in the city that you're in At that time. So when I was in sydney, I was in um bondi beach back in in december and um Here it is. It's called nearby friends discover who's nearby um So it's a it's an add-on feature to facebook called nearby friends and you have to agree to to let people know where you are So when I was in bondi beach in sydney recently, I looked on nearby friends and I saw a friend of mine allison um Was in was in sydney And she lives in la and I didn't know that she was in sydney, but it said friends nearby allison So I was like texted her and I said allison. I see you're in sydney. So i'm i'm at bondi beach You want to meet up and she said how the hell did you know I was in sydney? and I said, I'll tell you when I meet you and um Literally three hours later She and her friend and I met um Up at a place called depot just on north bondi there. Um just up from the um The north end of bondi beach in sydney And it was like, oh my god, I can't believe we just met in austria. That's so so peculiar and then she introduced me to her friend and And um, yeah, and we all had a cool little hangout and it was awesome So that's a cool little little tip What else we got here, um Make an effort with your co-workers and your colleagues If they go to the pub for lunch or they go to a restaurant for lunch Go with them or invite them to go say hey, I'm gonna go for lunch. Do you want to come with me? Just ask people People are being asked if you're the inviter rather than the invitee. They will invite you places We talked about local teams Like I joined a rugby team, but you can join like a running club or a gym or a uh, whatever soccer Um, I talked about spanish classes. So, you know take a continuing education class It doesn't need to be learning a new language. You can be learning how to dance It can be learning how to build a business um Say yes to invites when people invite you Don't like oh, I'll think about it. Just say yes. Just get into the habit of saying yes I mean you're trying to meet new friends, right? You're trying to make You're trying to be connected Why would you even contemplate saying no? Just do it Say yes to everything I mean, I'll I'll tell you I'll give me a great example of this last night as I'm recording this It's a Friday morning here and last night there was an event in Beverly Hills It was an entrepreneurial sort of social group group meet-up and a former guest of my of the show here A recent guest Sophia Pasa lovely woman You probably heard the episode where I was walking with her through the streets of west hollywood If you haven't heard that episode listen to it Forbes magazine rated her one of the top 30 under 30 She made the Forbes 30 on the 30 list various Well connected person in los angeles and she invited me to one of her social get-together events last night And honestly yesterday. I was I was tired like that's had a long day I was I'd done a lot of things with the business And this event started at 8 p.m. And at 6 p.m. I was exhausted And so I went and had a lie down and took a nap and Try to get psyched for it. And I really wasn't psyched to go And even after taking the nap and getting up and having a shower and putting on the clothes and then calling an uber I really still wasn't that Energized to go. I mean, I knew I would have a good time when I was there But I just getting out the door was tough and I did contemplate on a few occasions just not simply not going But I went come on James. Just pull yourself together. Come on. Just do it. And so I did go And it was at the home of A man called Joe green and Joe green was one of mark zuckerberg's friends when mark zuckerberg created facebook Joe green if you've seen the movie social network, you might remember when zuckerberg created I think it was face mash or something like that where they they rated women's beauty and They got in trouble for it and well that His friend at the time in that in those scenes was Joe green and and so he's pretty successful guy and tech and lives in los angeles and It was at his home And there were 50 people there and I walked in And who the hell should be there but Keith farazi who's the author of the book never eat alone who I always The talk about and the book I always reference and the book I always review and You know, I credit that book never eat alone by Keith farazi for You know really turning around the way I look at relationships in general instead of going into relationships thinking how can I You know, how can this person help me? I now start by thinking how can I help this person? and He was there and You know literally within two minutes walking in the door and he came up to me because he saw me and he gave me a big hug And he went James. I went Keith How are you Keith? It's great to see you and we had a little catch-up chat and then he said oh James um Uh, I said well, I actually did the trick that I learned from him on him And I was like, oh, what what are you what are you struggling with right now? What can I help you with and? He said nothing nothing really at the moment, but how's your business going? How how the swanis going? I told him amazing terrific fantastic. Oh, that's great. And I said is it You know, is there anything I can do to help you? He goes well other than just I'd like to spend more time with you I went great and he said um Saturday morning we're going I'm going to barry's boot camp, which is a gym down on las yannaga 10 a.m. You want to you want to come and we'll go and have brunch or breakfast afterwards? I said that'd be great Keith. That'd be amazing And he said great and then he said I got to go and get some ice for my drink I think he was just trying to politely exit the conversation and go and talk to someone else Um, and he exited the conversation and that's it. So So now on tomorrow, I'm going to go and hang out with him and do this gym session with him and go and have brunch with him who with this this idol of mine And uh, it was just because I said yes to the invitation from severe in the first place. I forced Myself to go now. I don't want to I'm not painting a picture that I didn't want to go because of the event It's an amazing it was always going to be an amazing event. It's just I didn't want to go because I was tired But look what happened because I actually pushed myself to go I ran into my one of my great heroes Who invited me to go and hang out and you know, who knows what will come of that conversation other than just continued friendship But maybe, you know, it'll inspire business conversation You know, he'll connect me to more people. I'll help connect him to more people So that's what happens when you say yes, just go to where the people are. I love to Use this phrase actually and you can write this. You should probably write this down or just keep it memorized Go to where the people are Just go to where the people are a lot of times, you know, if I'm feeling a little bit socially isolated it's because I've locked myself in my My home too long and I haven't got out there as soon as I put myself in the groups of people It's amazing how many opportunities Arise the other thing is is that I just It was a sit-down dinner like after that. They did this talk um You went and sort of you know got food from the table and then you went sat down on chairs and I was one of the the first 10 people I guess to be at the dinner table just because where I was positioned when the talk ended and When I sat so I was one of the first to sit down and I and I sat down next to a woman Who I didn't know I introduced myself and said hi my name's James. What's your name? She said oh my name's Samantha You know, hi Samantha. What's your story? Tell me tell me your story. She goes. Oh, I'm in holistic health and I help people with mental illness and Etc. Etc. I said, oh, that's so interesting. I'm into holistic health as well I have a holistic health company where I help people sleep better. She's oh my god. That's so interesting I have clients all the time who Uh struggle with their sleep tell me about what you do and I said well I'm wearing my product of my face right now. These are the swanis blue like blocking glasses and she's oh, that's so interesting And she was fascinated by it and I said I'd be happy to send you a Uh a pair a free pair Thank you so much So I pulled out my phone and I and I got her name and address and I sent it to my assistant and said please send Samantha a pair of glasses and then Samantha calls over What turned out to be who turned out to be a great friend of hers said joe? come over here and she was like Best friends with joe green who was hosting the party so Even though like 50 people were all trying to buy to speak to joe green because he was the host and you know He's a pretty big deal and the tech world and um All of a sudden now i'm sitting next to joe green at dinner Even though everyone else is trying to sit next to joe green at dinner And uh, I spend the next 30 minutes being joe and samantha chatting about life and Right away. I'm trying to figure out, you know, what's joe's struggling with so joe. What's what are you struggling with at the moment? What's your big challenge and um, I don't really want to tell you what it was. It was it was a personal personal matter Wasn't anything bad or awful, you know, but it was personal So I don't really want to share it, but I was actually able to to help him with that with that very issue and then After I helped because I had helped him with that that very issue We connected and we bonded then he asked me A more about me and I didn't I didn't I I didn't talk about my swanic sleep Blue light blocking glasses for like the first 20 minutes of the conversation Until I'd already helped him with something else and then he said and tell me more about what you do in business And I told him and then he turned to me and he goes I sleep horribly I'm like really let's let's solve that let's let's solve that that issue for you right now And so I went through him and found out what his sleeping habits were and and it turns out that you know He's staring into light too much at night time. And so I said, you know what? I'll give you a pair of the swanis blue light blocking glasses And uh, let's see let's test him. He goes that would be great and uh Gave me his details. I mean I was already in the home that I'm going to send the glasses to him He thanked me Profusely he said here take my number. Here's my email address. So now I've got jay green cell phone number and now I've got his email address I'm sending him a pair of swanis. I've helped him on two things Um, I'm going to make an introduction for him This morning probably want to finish this podcast episode actually And now I've got a new friend so Even and and and then by the way, I who else another guy that was there was the editor of of tech crunch Which is a huge tech? Magazine and and and like the bible force for people in the tech world And there was a guy there an editor called joe Sorry john john shiva john shiva is his name and um He was hosting the the the q and a Um I'm that guy. I mean what an interesting guy. He's a journalist and I got talking to him and I said geno. You're a journalist I used to be a journalist And he said all right come outside. I'm going to have a cigarette Let's talk journalism So we went out to the backyard of joe greens place where this guy john pulled out a camel cigarette and and lit up and and uh We got talking and he told me about how he grew up in baton rouge, louisiana And I and I I asked him all these questions I was just you know, genuinely taking an interest in him And he told me the story about how he you know He wanted to be a neuroscientist and but he failed at it and so then he became a journalist a writer and um how he worked for the war street journal and And then you know, ultimately finally became one of the top editors at uh at um tech crunch And in the end he was like saying let's hang out some more. Let's talk some more. I live in la I'm living mid-city and um here. Let's swap numbers and email addresses. I'm like great awesome And so now I've made a new friend Pretty great friend to have. I mean, let's just take away like Any benefit you get right? I didn't talk about business In my in the back of my head. I was thinking well um Two things one this guy's super cool and I enjoyed talking to him genuinely because I was a journalist and he is a journalist And I'm really interested by that so we bonded over that and then the other thing I'm thinking as well This is like one of the top editors at tech crunch Maybe at some at some point this connection might um Might lead to an article about swanese blue light blocking glasses. You never know. I'm not expecting it I'm not asking it, but you never know it might do. So it's also like a powerful friend to have potentially so so And then this is just again I'm just trying to emphasize the point here about why you should say yes to invitations and why you should go to where the people are And why it's important to put yourself in groups of people As I was leaving the event sort of around 10 45 at night A woman came up to me a woman called Sharon winter who has a company called hot app and um and Have I got it wrong? Hang on a second. That's not right What is it? I've I've always kept this wrong Uh, I've got to make sure I get her company right. Is it hot? Who is it? Let me put it in here Bear with me one second here while I uh Well, I get this hot point. Did I say that? Yeah, hot point hot point hot point Hot point. There you go hot point up You know, I get it right and uh, she's like James Um, we have to hang out some more and I was like, yeah, that'd be great. That's awesome. Let's she goes Let's put it in. Let's do something. Let's do something this Wednesday I'll get a group of people together. You get some people together and we'll just do something I'm like that'd be awesome And then she introduced me to a couple of the people who she's going to invite And I met those people and so then I put it in the calendar. So now for next Wednesday Sean and I are gonna do something when I host like a little get together with maybe six people Maybe 10 people and whatever and Cool Awesome. So as I'm leaving the place in fact, let me pull up my note pull out my notes now I'll actually go to my phone And have a look here Um, I took notes throughout the night. Here we go notes Oh, this is the other thing I got talking to a guy there because I was telling him how I wanted to do a clinical study like a proper college Authorized clinical study of the swanese glasses so it could put the glasses on people with sleep issues and monitor their sleep to prove how well they improve people's sleep I met a guy who Is uh conduct studies at uc la not for sleep but for for other things And he told me that I should research contract research organizations Contract research organizations and he said they'll do a sleep study with you. I'm like great. So now I've got this amazing intel I'm about to start googling that and figure that out And So that might help me get closer to my goal of doing the sleep study And then what else have I got here? Oh, yeah met a guy called daniel fine who has a Uh, and also has a glasses company And he is very successful in getting his glasses into retail stores en masse Not as successful as selling his glasses direct to consumer online as I do with the swanese And we got talking about my glasses company Uh, we got talking about his glasses company and he said, um, as we parted ways He said, listen, if you ever want to Get on a call for 30 minutes and I can give you some advice about getting into retail stores I'm happy to do that and I said that'd be amazing. So now I'm going to schedule a call with him to find out how I can get the swanese into like, you know, big retail chains Uh And look on my notes here. It says I have a reminder that says say thank you to sephia This is another big thing always say thank you to the person Who hosted you so I'm going to do it right now sephia pastor. Let's go sephia I'm going to type this in sephia Thank you very much for Thank you very much event last night I met some I met some amazing people I had a great time Thank you smiley face Cool. So there you go. You so now I'll tell you I'll be I'll be one of about probably two percent of people who'll send her a follow-up text the next day saying thank you But that's that's a classy thing to do and people remember that and the host will appreciate that So that's another great way to make new friends is that if anyone invites you anywhere and you say yes And you go always send them a text or a note or something the next day saying Thank you Uh, all right. What else can you do? Uh, volunteer is really good. Like go and join a charity Go and help out on a on a wednesday night here in, uh, los angeles there's a Los angeles food And truck coalition where they feed the homeless in in west hollywood Comes up in my calendar on wednesdays And then I don't do this all the time. I do this sporadically maybe once every four to six weeks If i'm not doing anything on a wednesday, I'll just go there and I go and feed the homeless in line with all these other people who are volunteering And uh, I met some really cool people doing that the guy who organizes this guy called chris really nice guy So i'm friendly with him um, the other thing is you can host a Uh, a potluck dinner if you don't have a lot of money or you're trying to keep these expenses low Then you can host a potluck party which a potluck party is basically where everyone who comes to your home brings a dish I did this i've done this very successfully over the years. Um Or you can cater it and you can just charge people and say hey And we're gonna put together 15 entrepreneurs in my living room. We're gonna sit around and do a mastermind and we're gonna help one another Uh 20 bucks And then you take the 20 bucks and you you know you pay a local restaurant or food place to deliver the food You do a mastermind session and then everyone eats afterwards I did that in uh end of january. I had people like mark dharma who's a friend of mine who's a british la based british Health and mindset expert daniel de piazza from rich 20 something who's about to come out with a successful book great friend of mine Had the new york times best-selling author ben greenfield who was in town at the time Who came along? I had three women from i think they're from oklahoma who were in los angeles for the los angeles fitness show who i just happened uh who were Suggested to me that they should come to my mastermind by a woman that I invited who i didn't even know who i only met for the first time because i'd put the word out to people say hey i'm having a little entrepreneurial mastermind in my apartment Who do you know who might be a good fit and then i was introduced to this woman who said Oh, do you mind if i bring three other women because they're in town For the la fitness show and they're entrepreneurial. I think they'd love to come i said sure So then i had a combination of people in my home of friends and people that i know plus friends of friends and new people that i don't know So being the host again is so important because people remember you people want to Invite you place people want to help you and since then the three women who i didn't know Who came into my place? um two of them have Have have either um bought the swanis I think i gave one of them a pair of swanis that i had a spare one in my in my house And it posted on on their social media saying oh these are blue light-looking glasses Um, which helps my business. I didn't ask them to do it But because i invited them and i was the host They they wanted to help so there you go. There's a few ways. I hope this was uh, this was helpful Uh I spent a little bit of time on the event that i went to last night And i didn't think i was going to but i wanted to once i started talking about i realized that it was actually pertinent because You know if If you're trying to make new friends Just go to where the people are put yourself in those environments because look what happened I didn't want to go last night because i was tired, but i went and now i'm hanging out with Keith Farazzi. I'm got a great idea for a sleep study I've now got an event now i've got an invitation to go and hang out next wednesday night and meet new people with my friend Sharon I'm now You know, joe green is now an acquaintance of mine who i'm about to help By introducing him somewhere Um, so someone rather, um, he's gonna wear the glasses. I've now made friends with the editor of tech crunch Um, and by the way all of these things take away all the business stuff Right the purpose of this is not to like go out there and better yourself everything But it's just to make new friends, but look what happens as a result of just making new friends opportunity Opportunity i didn't go there with any Like i i i kind of went into the party like i don't really want to go here Even though i knew it was going to be amazing But i just because i was tired right but i didn't go in there going oh, i want to meet Keith Farazzi Oh, i've got to meet the editor of a magazine. Oh, i want to meet Whoever's house this is joe green and and and i want a network. I want a network. I didn't go in there with that I just went in there going well Let's just go let's just go to where the people are and make some new friends And then i walked out of there having made new friends and with limitless opportunities For social progress and for business progress Make sense Let me know what you thought of this episode. Send me a tweet at james swanick Leave me a voice message if you go to james swanick.com I want to encourage you actually to leave recorded voice messages for me That i will play on the show if you're not shy and you can handle your voice And your comments being played on this very on this very show then i would encourage you to go to Let me pull it up here Where actually is it on my site? My site's been going under a little bit of construction lately So sometimes it moves around a little bit if you go to james swanick.com And you click on a link That says Where is it? Is it james swanick.com forward slash podcast yeah go to james swanick.com And there's a podcast link there You can click on that if you also want to get my notes on um Never eat alone the book that I just was talking about Key for rz then you can go there to leave the voice message when you go to james swanick.com You just scroll down one little page and it'll say on the right send a voice message to contact james Just click on that And uh, you'll be able to do that Cool good talk I don't mean like i'm not praising myself over the talk. I was just being trying to be funny You know when you have a awkward conversation with a friend and at the end of it you go good talk I don't know why I said that anyway. I'm rambling now Uh, thanks for listening to the show. I hope this was helpful If you're not following me on snapchat You're really missing out because I do some really cool stuff on snapchat You can follow my life behind the scenes in fact I'm going to record one now just so you know to do it and if you're not following me on instagram stories Man, you're really missing out because I do some cool stuff on instagram stories as well Hang on. Let's do a little recording here All right, I'm recording an episode of the james swanick show podcast right now And I've just completed doing an episode on how to make friends in a new city. Check it out So there we go, let me just uh There and then I'm going to pull up my podcast So I can show my uh snapchat and insta stories followers My podcast online. So you kind of like getting a little sneak peek on what I do behind the scenes if you're like So now I'm going to my podcast That you're listening to now, but I'm pulling it up online. I'm going to record a little Here's the podcast the james swanick show you can find it in itunes You want to subscribe and here are all the cool episodes that I've done previously. Check it out Podcast the james swanick show you can find it in itunes. You want to subscribe? Here we go Um Cool and if you want to see where I record this then you can get that on my um snapchat stories as well I'm actually standing up on my treadmill desk. It's a lifespan tread treadmill desk. I'm not walking on it But I'm standing Um, but you can see behind the scenes you can see my microphone and how I'm recording this You can see my stand-up desk and I don't know how I set up my life So if that if that interests you and you'd like to see a little bit more about how I Record these episodes where I do it and get the visual component. Not just the audio My instagram is james swanick. You can follow me on insta stories or my snapchat is james swanick You can follow me on snapchat. Thank you very much for listening And uh, I'll see you on the next episode. See ya