First, a little backstory. I'm 21 and in college, and have only had one girlfriend so far. She and I started dating right after high school and dated LDR for about a year and a half; it's been a little over a year since we broke up.

For a while now, I've missed having a girlfriend (for both physical and emotional reasons), and have considered putting some more effort into getting out and meeting people.

The problem is this: my relationship with my last girlfriend was stellar. It was bumpy at times (LDR's usually are), but I was so heads-over-heels in love that I didn't care. I didn't have the highest self-esteem in high school, and she single-handedly has done more for my confidence and self-esteem than anyone else before or since. I trusted and loved her more than I can ever put into words, and I have no idea where it came from. All I knew was that, less than two weeks after finishing high school, I finally had a girlfriend and she was more than I had ever hoped for.

I'm to the point where I'm mostly over her, aided in part by the fact that she recently started dating one of her friends. However, I'm having trouble convincing myself to get out and meet people, for two reasons: 1) I'm still very bad at talking to random people, and 2) any attempts to ask somebody out for the sake of having a date simply feel like they'd be shallow compared to her.

So basically, I'm torn between two desires. On one hand, I just want to be able to meet and date some cool people. On the other, I want the type of relationship I had with my last girlfriend, which I doubt I'll be able to get in the casual dating scene. On top of all this, I have little to no experience with putting in effort to meet people; while we were dating, I didn't feel the need to meet anyone else, and so left those skills largely undeveloped.

Any advice?