Not exactly a new realization, but one that’s been making its impact felt strongly of late.

I can’t work alone.

This is crippling for someone who wants to be an entrepreneur and operate a small business with an absentee business partner. And it’s pretty crippling for its extended implications upon the rest of my life.

Really, I can’t do anything alone . I’m inept, a basketcase. I can’t work, I can’t play, I can’t create, I can’t “have fun” — none of these things even make sense without other people. Zen koan cliches be damned, I can’t clap with one hand. For me, other people are part of the definition of an enjoyable, productive life. In isolation, life is simply existence, and a painful one at that. An agony that perpetually distracts me from everything I try to do. The pain of being alone and the distraction it causes are getting worse as I get older.

You can’t tell me to “learn to enjoy being alone”, in the same way that you can’t tell a person to learn to enjoy having their hand pulverized in a wood chipper. I can’t focus on a single train of thought when I’m alone — my productivity leaps a thousand-fold when collaborating with others. With no opportunity to create that context for myself, my current livelihood is in jeopardy.

And the problem is self-perpetuating. Loneliness makes me miserable and desperate. My misery and desperation make me unapproachable. So it has been for my entire adult life.

There is no solution.