Some people feel so awful if they are single that they mate carelessly out of a desperate wish to avoid being alone. Carl Whitaker warns, “If you really want to experience loneliness, get married.” The most painful form of loneliness is feeling alone while in the company of an emotionally inaccessible partner.
Some people have been so badly disappointed by past romances that they vow never to love again. In self-protective isolation, they even avoid making close friends and settle for having acquaintances with whom they share shallow alliances set up to have company in activities of mutual interest.
Keeping busy becomes a substitute for risking the dangers of loving once again. It passes the time, but the time will pass in any case. While it passes, why not invest yourself in closer, more enriching relationships? You may well get hurt again, but as W.H. Auden wrote, “We must love one another, or die.”
Without love, what kind of life do we have?