GTA Online is time consuming!

You're doing nothing wrong, actually. This also happens to me, but it's something that's pretty normal in GTA games. The loading times are usually long and there will be connection issues. GTA 4's loading times were also very long and I'm thinking that they should add some sort of shortcut to go to an invite only session from an online FR lobby. It takes too much time to load into SP and then Multiplayer again. 

This is how I always start my sessions.
Start up game and let it load into single player > start Online and go directly into an Invite only session. At this point is one or two things. I look for a txt message from Simeon to see if there are any vehicle to grab, if there are I head out and find a Baller along the way to sell then grab one of those Simeon vehicles and turn it in. OR. I will bring up friends list and see who is on and either join their session or ask what is going on.
With all the random killing that is always going on in open FR sessions, I never just load straight into FR from starting the game.

Usually, my routine is just:

Check who's online > Load up GTA > Single Player > Invite Only Session > Do missions with randoms or race with crew members. 

Then. Just change all the >'s with loading times HAHA

With the latest patch when I am online and chose the find new session, it puts me right back into an invite only, not sure why. I would also like to know why you can not choose an invite only while being online Mo-seph. It baffles me.

It definitely isn't something you can hop on for an hour of play and actually accomplish anything.

One thing I could suggest is that instead of invite only, as no one can search for crew and join that, you should start using the crew only sessions and setting it to 2 crews. This allows other crew members to drop in on you by "join crew session" and also allows you to have a non crew friend drop in by joining your session specifically.

That makes sense Mo-seph. I did goto an Invite Only session but am now choosing the Crew Session with 4 selected.

I think closed crew may be invite only crew...there is another crew option that isn't closed.

This is exactly what I do these days as well. The recent addition of the RRR chat box has been good too, as I've been joining when I get online. I then get a picture of what's occurring on that side from the updates that appear as I'm car hunting.
With the 2 friends I most regularly play with, I know ahead of time if they're gonna be on or not and we coordinate via mobile. Most of the time, if there's only a couple of us then I prefer an open free roam to closed, there's more going on and you can do a bit of bounty hunting for fun, but I always go into invite 1st if they're not on already.
Starting a multiple crew session instead is a great idea, will definitely look into that. If it's invite free then that's great.

It is a real pain if you're getting kicked from session to session, slowest loading game I've had for years. Time consumption is a whole different level tho, I can spend my 1st and last hour on doing bugger all.
Yesterday I stood around looking at my cars before going offline, as I often do, decided on a quick cruise in the Sabre. That lead to me robbing a store I'd not been in before and getting into a brief shootout with another customer. Lost the cops, hit a unique jump, tested all the in car quick actions, smoked all my cigs, ate all my snacks and drank all my beers- just to make as much litter as I could, got drunk on the apartment whiskey, tried to combine that effect with a bunch of bong hits, looked out the window... then realised I was just avoiding signing off for the evening and quit. 45 minutes after I'd intended to.