Partying hard can be partly hard

We’ve all been there. Someone asks you to join a group of friends to go out late, but you don’t feel like going. If you say no, you will be taken over by guilt. If you say yes, you might regret it later in the form of tiredness, procrastination, and missed deadlines.

Yeah. It sounds familiar.

Alcohol = social life?

The lives of young people orbit around social life. Especially as you turn eighteen, there are suddenly so many parties around that you might have trouble choosing which ones to go to. If you’re a party animal, you’ll feel right at home. But if you are an introvert or you don’t enjoy drinking, you might be in quite a pickle. The pressure to drink and conform to the rest of the group is high. After all, nobody wants to be a killjoy. But what if people drag you down when you don’t want to drink as much as they do or don’t want to drink at all?

We live in a cultural atmosphere where it is more acceptable to drink than not to drink. So does alcohol correlate with having a social life? Is partying the key to having friends and fun?

The answer should be no. While there isn’t a miraculous cure for this issue, we can all start small: if you have been the person who comments on someone’s choice not to drink, you can just stay quiet the next time. Non-drinkers might have various reasons behind their choice: religion, values, health concerns — or they’re just not feeling like drinking that day. Whatever the reason, it really isn’t the point. It’s about having fun, right?

On sale: friendship for the taking

For some, drinking is not the issue — it’s the lack of friends to go out with in the first place. And what if it’s hard to get them without partying? No worries. You’re not the only one.

The internet is full of forums that gathers similar-minded people together. And if you don’t have any specific interest or a hobby, you can still find nice people to hang out with. For example, recently in Finland, a young woman wrote a post to the wall of a recycling group, originally meant for people living in certain region of the capital city Helsinki. Instead of offering an item to recycle or sell, she offered her friendship for free. She wrote that not having that many friends is often stigmatized, despite the various reasons and life situations that might be causes behind it. She wanted new friends, so she set out to get them. Soon enough, her post had thousands of likes and there were loads of people excited about the idea. The next weekend, they had a meeting in a local pub and the stunt gathered a lot of media attention. It also revealed that the issue is a lot more common that it might seem. Fortunately, making friends can be easier than you think — as long as you are willing to get them. Good things come — not for those who wait, but for those who put effort into them!

Text: Pia-Leena Heikkilä, 24 years, Helsinki, Finland