I came across this article on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love-shyness
Some men are "love shy". They may have an intense obsession with finding and falling in love with certain women, but they are incapable of ever developing an intimate relationship with anyone. Close to 100% of these men will never date and never have a sexual experience for their entire lives, and a large proportion of them live as friendless social isolates.
I have personally met dozens of people who fit the definition of love shyness. I actually come across a lot of these types of people in my line of work all the time; computer programming seems to attract a disproportionate number of extremely introverted, or just plain neurotic individuals. At least 30% of all the programmers I've worked with fit the definition of love shy.
Interestingly, most of the love-shy people I've met have wide range of personalities:
- Programmer types: very introverted, socially isolated individuals, with slight neurotic tendencies.
- One of my friends is an overly macho, sadistic asshole (more or less a Cartman clone). He's somewhat extroverted and impulsive, but he has and will never have an intimate relationship with anyone.
- A guy I knew in high school was a pity whore, who whined to people on messageboards about how ugly he was and how girls didn't like him, and then he would verbally attack everyone who tried to give him advice.
- Another guy I knew believed he was the reincarnated soul of a dragon and acted as such.
I think this phenomena is hard for most people to understand, because dating and sex is a normal part of their lives.
I don't really have a lot to say on this topic, but just thought I'd pitch it out in the open for discussion.