"You're just afraid of failure"

"If... if I asked you out, will you go out with me?"

This... question has been floating about in my head. It's really nasty to be thinking this question when I'm seriously still at odds with myself. There seems to be a complicated mix of emotions/rationalisations that are in existence deep within my psyche. It's really back to the same old arguments, me being the_laptop and me being human-ish. It's so old that I don't even want to rehash them here again.

Jimmy made a completely accurate (and blunt) assessment of my situation.

"You're just afraid of failure."

In more ways than one, that is so true. I've clawed my way to so far (given my highly mediocre skill sets) that I can't afford to lose. Despite efforts to turn into a really well-rounded individual, I realised that I'm far from it. Being a "Jack-of-all-trades" means that there's no single skill that I can rely on to provide for myself in the future, hence the dedication to the study of computer science. Failure is simply not an option that I'm willing to explore, because time is already running short, and there's so much that needs to be done, catching up notwithstanding.

But of course, Jimmy's statement wasn't really directed at my career/specialisation choice. He asked me, in very blunt terms (and in Mandarin, so that the 90% of the people around didn't understand what he said) whether I wanted a girlfriend. That did two things to me. First, it threw me off as I felt that he was really getting a little to close to something deeply personal. Second, I felt instantly irritated with that question, and delivered an icy reply to the effect of "I don't give a flying fuck dude, and stay out of my personal affairs". Which prompted the statement above.

Let's face it. I might act as though I'm fine and dandy, and that life goes on, but deep inside me, all is still not well. There's this inexplicable feeling of sadness whenever I approach the topic of relationships with myself, it seems as though that there is a kind of auto-repulsion to the idea of having a relationship. My human side, on really bad and lonely days, will throw up an idea of possibly hooking up with one girl for a long term relationship. Then, whatever-the-other-side is called will just have and instant revulsion to the idea and start lobbing out all the arguments that I've been laying out for so long. And then my human side gets beaten up senseless and is forced into retreat once again.

Put in other terms, I've lost the ability to approach romantic love. I've no more courage to take the first step (with the likelihood of failure), no more courage to say what I truly mean, no more strength to speak up for what I feel for. In short, I'm turning into a wussy, a cowardly person who, less than a year ago, was willing to fight someone all the way just to prove a point. Now I just sit there and get beaten all over verbally over my ideas.

What the hell is wrong with me?