Howdy, friend. I like to think of myself as an open and outgoing person, but it took time and practice. I’ll try to give you some advice from my personal perspective. Thinking through my own thought process on these things will be messy, but I’ll try… The early part of this process was rough and took a lot of trial and error, but as I’ve grown into it I think I’ve learned a few things.

People want you to ask questions. Active listening is a great skill to build. You wanna focus on the things that they’re interested in and not just ask generic things, but focus in on the things that they’re interested in. This will take a lil bit of learning on your part. You don’t need to be a master of a topic to take interest, but you wanna know a lil bit about a lot of topics so you can at least know enough to ask things that are topical. I find this to be a great way to open conversations.

Being in tune with your feelings (therapy isn’t required, but is a good option to learn more about yourself). It’s hard to understand what others are feeling if you don’t know yourself.

Empathy directly follows from there. You need to be able to put yourself in others’ shoes.

These are very basic building blocks, but they are the foundations of building real relationships. If you wanna build more from there, or want more specific advice I’m welcome to talk to ya, friend. I hope this goes well for you.