Sometimes growth is as simple as going to the event alone.

Waiting for company is a reasonable habit that quietly shrinks your life. Most of what you want to do requires either a reliable friend with the same schedule or a tolerance for arriving by yourself. The second one is available immediately. Nobody at the event is tracking who you came with, though it feels that way in the doorway.

Pick something small this week and go without checking whether anyone else is free. Give yourself permission to leave after twenty minutes if you want. Notice that the hardest part was the parking lot, not the room.