Groucho Marx's line from 1933 will not leave my head: I would not join a club that would have me as a member.
What has that charming sentence to do with the troubles of the divorced and the single?
Since you ask, I will answer.
That sentence is the distilled essence of a low self-image. In fact, of a self-image that is too low.
Because this is what men and women with a very low self-image do: they think less of anybody who is enthusiastic about them.
Not always, of course, and not everybody who declines your attentions is a lonely soul with a fragile self-image.
And yet.
The experience of somebody displaying willingness and enthusiasm and warm feelings towards us can shake some of us in a way that is entirely unjustified.
And the covert, poisonous internal dialogue of a person with a shaky self-image runs like this:
I am damaged, and I know I am damaged.
You have fallen in love with me — therefore you are damaged.
And I do not go for damaged people.
Really? How low can you go?
The logic is airtight and completely mad, and it has one property that makes it so durable: it is self-confirming in both directions. Anybody who wants you proves their judgement is poor. Anybody who does not want you proves your assessment of yourself was right. There is no possible piece of evidence that could disturb it, which is why no amount of being loved has ever once cured it.
So never, ever be rude or superior towards somebody who is enthusiastic about you.
And in case anybody was in doubt — disappearing on people is for nobodies.
A reminder: we are all human beings, and the wheel tends to turn.