So good. I definitely noticed with this last person I was dating: my aversion to her in “my space” was a product of a self who was afraid of failing, being smothered, oppressed, etc. Without fearing those things, there is no problem.

Is There A Self?

Yes, and the crux is that there is, seemingly, a self that takes itself to be real in order that there can be the positing of an other who is, e.g., encroaching on said self. But there is, actually, no self.

That is: in your “practice,” place the emphasis not on fear per se but on what fear implies. As The Upanishads says (paraphrasing): “Fear is the consequence of duality.” 

The Pith

1. No self, no other.

2. No self and no other, no problem such as fear.

Coda

When there’s just scanning this reply, there’s no self and no other. If the I-thought arises, “I don’t think that Andrew knows what he’s talking about” or if the I-thought arises, “I think Andrew really knows what he’s talking about,” then it seems as if there is a self-other relationship. In both cases included here, “I am the knower” has–seemingly–entered the building.

“Seeming” means actually nonexistent. There’s the seeming existence of an ego-I that’s not actually existent.