Dependence?

Paradhinam prana sankatam
Loose translation: Dependence on others is distressing to the soul
This is one thing that put paid to my budding career as a Wodehousian character - you know, the sort of guy who leads a carefree life cadging funds from his friends and family. There I was, merrily planning for a life in which I neither toiled nor spun but gently flitted from friend to friend, lightly nicking a thousand here and a five hundred there to accommodate my modest needs. Then, some busybody friend (prescient and taking preemptive action against my cadging from him? Maybe...people are SO devious) shows me this saying. Huh! Distressing? THAT is not quite what I want for a life.
I was not willing to take it as true, right away. One does not just abandon one's pet projects like that. When he explained, I could sort of get his point, though. I mean, if I had only one friend and the chap went away on a long holiday, whether or not it would distress my soul, it would distress my stomach - if I ran out of money before he came back. Besides, even with many friends, if they wanted nothing from me (if they wanted something, it would be inter-dependence, not dependence, right?) they could just refuse to give me my money. (These modern people are SO ungenerous). One would then have to go find new friends, tap friends after carefully checking whether they are feeling generous (or weak-minded) at the moment and all that. Too much hard work and THAT would certainly distress my soul.
You know what, I have found that people can get dependent even when it is not a matter of survival. Some depend on one person for affection, love or friendship and are forever hungry to get it. Have you seen someone hug a child too tightly? Does the child smile, hug back and dribble all over his shirt or does it squirm and try to get away? (If you think it will be the former, you have never hugged a child in your life or are only trying to pick a quarrel with me) Precisely the same thing seems to happen when one person so hungrily depends on the other for emotional sustenance. The situation gets so claustrophobic, that the other person tries to escape in any way possible. AND, if it would not be distressing to see that chap run away at the sight of you, you would not be smothering him with your presence in the first place.
The funniest thing, though, is the way people depend on others, whom they never see or even put a face to. I mean, pleasing someone you know is difficult enough, but pleasing a nameless, faceless multitude is impossible. On top of it, if you decide that your happiness rests in pleasing this nameless, faceless multitude, then you ARE doomed to distress. Yet, you decide on a career, even your spouse at times, a style of living, what you eat, how you eat, where you go, how you travel in order to get what you call 'social respect'. Exactly who constitutes this 'Society' I am yet to discover, other than, perhaps, a multitude of other people who are also trying to please 'Society', which apparently includes you. And, yet, none of you actually seem to decide what it is that should please you. There you go, hanging your happiness on 'others', and whether you are happy or distressed by having to pay all those EMIs for the house, car and appliances that you bought to get this 'social respect', only you can say. I, in your place, would certainly be distressed, if I let my personal goals for happiness be dictated by unknown people, who would seldom bother to praise me when I succeed in achieving the goals, criticize me when I fail, and even reset those goals at whim.
But, then, I would not be in your place, would I? After all, if I were the sort to bother about achieving 'social respect', I would not have set out planning to live a life cadging off friends. Alas! Fate sent me that idiot, who spoiled it all for me by telling me this quote!
P.S: A response to a 3-quote challenge, tagged by Rachna