TLDR at the bottom

This past year I've found happiness in other aspects of my life like fitness and my friends. During this time I also got a lot of my shit together in terms of responsibilities, especially as of late. In the past I put women above anything else and it ultimately made me feel empty. I still approach on rare occasions but even when they don't go anywhere I'm outcome independent. I'm starting to get an overwhelming sense of loneliness and I don't know why it is just coming out now when I have found value in more than just girls in my life.

This all started two weeks ago when I met this girl at my work who checked off a lot of my boxes. The bad thing was that she was fresh off a breakup and really emotional. Despite knowing that this girl was bad news, I couldn't help but flirt with her really hard. We hit it off and she seemed to love trading touches and teasing. It felt like I was relapsing on a drug, knowing the risk but it felt too good to resist and I wanted more.

Ultimately nothing came of it as we only worked two shifts together and I ended up being transferred. I'm not super obsessed with her thankfully. After this experience I feel like it's been something I've been missing out on in my life despite being happy without women. I want to feel like I did before and keep working on other aspects if my life. Now this craving for female interaction is dominating my hierarchy of needs.

I'm scared if I put all my effort into girls again I'll just end up back where I was. I never had major success with women and I realized it was because I put them above all else and my lack of results for the effort I put in ate at me. Now that I learned of my past mistakes of using them as a metric for my self worth, I think I may be able to try to find success again. I'm stuck between trying to preserve what I have versus taking the risk and making things better.

If anything is unclear, or you have a question, I'll respond the best I can. I appreciate any help you guys can give.

TLDR; I used to rely on women for happiness and it was really unhealthy. Now they are out of my life and I have made a lot of positive change in my life. I have recently been feeling overwhelming thoughts of lonelyness and sexual desires that haven't been in my head for such a long time. I think I may have learned from my past mistakes but I don't want to risk falling back into the dark hole of my past