The incel doesn’t quite know what to do with the feeling of helplessness he experiences when forced to be physically close to women, like packed public transit or small class/work rooms. The pattern of noticing that a girl is cute, avoiding eye contact, and trying to keep himself in check before conjuring any hopeless or baseless images in his head is nothing new to him, yet he has only now gotten around to describing this ingrained reflex. He imagines being so clingy and socially starved that he could very easily fall in love with anyone that is polite enough to give him the time of day or even bat an eye in his direction. At the very least, this is the script he was told by the internet as to how introverted shut-ins like him deal with the opposite sex - with his failure with his grade school crush serving as evidence. This script portrays him and his cohort as burdens to the people we choose to subject to our fantasies, and who is he to selfishly impose on the people around him who just want to study or work in peace?
Using the word selfish implies that the pursuit is one sided, and at the moment, that’s what the incel believes - that every advance in his direction or sign he interpret is an illusion and a side effect of fantasizing too much.
If the incel believed that his tastes and priorities were at least somewhat in line with the people around him, he would follow his gut instinct, pursue the people he liked more actively, and be satisfied with himself for getting out of the starting gate and working towards a goal he has deemed impossible for his entire life. He can already taste some of that glory! But because he has conditioned himself to dismiss every and all romantic feelings and thoughts as unwarranted and unrequited, he runs into metal friction and anxiety when feelings do arise, and wages a war in his head to rationalize inaction and complacency.
The incel gets a certain relief from knowing that he is not doomed by something superficial like his appearance or his net worth, but all the while, there’s something poignant about having full control over his mental state and guaranteeing himself doom by staying the way he is right now.