I grew  up with two cousins, fear and anger, we were close, they came everywhere I went, slept near me every night, sat next to me in school and visit me often still, especially in the night.

There is a third cousin, he hides behind the other  two: selfishness.

I didn’t realize until fairly recently just how many cousins my cousins have, when you grow up being crazy you assume that everyone else is sane, when you discover that everyone else is quite often crazier than you are, you are usually too far along in life to change radically.

What I’ve learned about anger and fear is to be aware of them. They lie and mislead.  Each can break over me slowly like a summer breeze or strike suddenly like  a clap of thunder.

I’ve also learned that fear and anger are often a matter of geography, quite often not real, a space to cross, to get across, to walk through.  Masterful illusions, the work of devils and dybbuks.

So many things trigger my cousins – it might be something minor or slight, or someone might say the wrong thing or send the wrong message, or say nothing at all. They are always close by, in my head, and out of it.

If you follow John Bowlby’s attachment theories, which I do, you learn that the seeds of fear and anger are planted early, and quite often out of preservation and necessity. We all do what we need to do to survive, and then pay for it later.

Fear and anger and selfishness have often been friends to me, one protecting me from danger, the other helping me to find my voice and stand up for myself, the third getting me what I want.

As a child in a troubled home, the cousins either break you or teach  you defiance and strength.

My cousins are both agents of chaos, they connect us to nothing but our own broken parts. Yet we are all endowed with these emotions, we must need them.

I believe we do need them, they are the gifts we never wanted, they remind us to be better, they keep us humble, they force us to consider spirituality and peace of mind.

I think fear and anger are both angels, I have come to believe that every time I am angry or afraid, I create another angel to help me and  guide me and others through the darkness.

This was a fantasy I created when I was very young to get through the night, I gave birth to many angels, they would stream out of me and through the window and out into the night.

I always loved a good story. This one helped.

I know there are angels, because I always come out on the other side. I have out lasted the cousins, at least so far.

Int the world of the left and the right, in the realm of social media, polarization, too much technology,   Facebook and Twitter, e-mail, texting, anonymity, the instant “send,” I am often drawn back into that world of anger and wariness, and yes, sometimes even fear.

So many people watching, telling me what to do, liking or disliking what I say, agreeing or disagreeing, sneering and cheering, questioning and support. There is no quicker way to anger for me than when strangers tell me what to say or think or write.

Some people like me, some don’t. These messages of all kinds are  helping me to know who I am, and to like who I am. It isn’t that I’m perfect, or always right – quite the opposite.

I need to be reminded that I am not perfect or always right, otherwise why bother to grow and learn and think and change?

I have learned that there are many people who say they want to think, but who  hate me if I make them think. And there are some people who want to think and are grateful for the chance. There is no one thing in this world, but many things, they fight one another for space.

I cherish ideas and feel they are my children sometimes, I know how strong and determined they will have to be to survive even for a single minute in this world, or live long enough to learn to breathe and protect themselves. So many die, each one is a new angel.

I know too many people now who will no longer speak freely or openly in public or online, free speech is considered dangerous: so many on guard, wary fearful, taught to be cautious and look out for the armies of invisible enemies waiting to strike, for identity thieves and hackers and worse.

And then there are the visible ones too, the people who drink hate for fuel.

I have promised myself never to succumb to that. There are always damaged people in the universe eager to pounce on any idea,  I will speak up for myself, use my voice,  and understand I must accept and acknowledge the worst parts of myself.

That is the learning part.

I won’t accept fear and anger as the final word, I reject the idea that either will ever again control my life or poison my friendships or relationships. Fear closes us off from the rest of the world, blinds us to truth.

Anger keeps the blood from getting to our hearts. Selfishness robs the pure joy of giving.

The reward of authenticity is truth. We learn to speak up for ourselves or we never do. We learn to break through the fear and tell our story, or we never do. We learn to stand up for ourselves in strength rather than anger, or anger eats our souls alive.

We don’t have to be right. We don’t need to be saints. We don’t even have to be nice. We just must be  us.

Out of this storm brew comes love and compassion, and a genuine sense of empathy. Don’t ask me  how this works, I don’t know yet, I am working on it.

I am persuaded from my life and reading that love is the point. True love is bigger than true fear or anger, it casts a much deeper shadow. True love, like the hero journey itself, asks us to step outside of ourselves, to give rather than get, to learn to place the needs of others ahead of our own.

Selfishness an addiction all of its own a killer of love.

Selfishness is my natural inclination. I watch out for it all the time.

Because of that I struggle against it almost every day of my life.

That is the spark of the spiritual experience, I think, where I go to get on the path.