Not too long ago I was talking to one of my students about managing anger and suggested he experiment with what it would be like to be grateful for his anger and other so-called negative emotions. I told him that considering this concept when he’s calm might help him learn how to control these emotions when they occur.

Sometimes accepting your full self has to do with respecting your rougher sides. Being human affords us a wide range of emotions. Learning how to celebrate all of them in an appropriate manner helps us appreciate our feelings. And as Dr. Rachel Naomi Remen noted in her brilliant book “Kitchen Table Wisdom,” “The part in us that feels suffering is the same as the part that feels joy.”

In other words, it helps to remember that coins have two sides.