Book Nook: The Littlest Acorn

Books can be great tools in helping kids learn lessons. I recently had the chance to review The Littlest Acorn, a book that encourages kids to use their talents and enjoy their own unique abilities instead of trying to be something they aren't.

It's a simple lesson, taught in the setting of a tree, who grows up strong but is jealous of other trees. When a bird makes a nest in the tree, however, the tree realizes that it has been perfectly grown just for this purpose.

I had a chance to interview the author, Lisa Manzi Lentino, PhD, to learn more.

Why did you decide to write this book?

To be honest with you, I never intentionally set out to write a children’s book. I specialize in working with adults and adolescents in my practice. However, the idea for the book just kept coming to me. So one day, I went to the ocean and sitting on the beach I wrote the story in one sitting. I then worked with a wonderful writing coach Rebecca McCarthy who helped me adjust the wording so that it resonated more with children. I was then blessed to find Connie Lovett who I believed captured the story beautifully with all hand done illustrations.

How can books help kids gain confidence to achieve their potential?

From my perspective, the most important message we can give children to help them reach their potential is that they all have unconditional self-worth. Their self-worth is inherent in the fact that they’re unique human beings that come into the world with a set of potentials and a purpose that only they can fulfill. Rather than falling into the all too common trap of thinking their self-worth is dependent on something external to themselves, like their grades or athletic/musical performance or how they compare to others, my hope is that every child realizes that they don’t have to do anything to “earn” their self-worth. Instead, they can just spend their lives discovering what’s in their “acorn,” what they need to do to develop their gifts and talents, and then how they might share them with the world.

How are we sometimes programmed to think in ways that can inhibit what we’re able to do?

From our earliest moments as children, we start accumulating information based on our interactions with our families, friends, schools, society and media. Based on the information we gather, our subconscious mind forms core beliefs about who we are, relationships and the world in general. The unfortunate thing is that as we grow, we start believing these core beliefs as if they were absolute truths, forgetting they reflect the relative health or dysfunction of our social and physical environments. Also much of this programming may not be aligned with who we truly are or our innate talents and passions. For example, all too frequently, people end up doing what they “should do” for a living based on other people’s ideas or suggestions rather than being guided by their innate inclinations that would ultimately lead to more enduring contentment.

Can you briefly touch on your three-part method?

My philosophy is that there are three phases to living your ideal life:

I.               Freeing yourself from your mind’s database: This phase involves becoming more consciously aware of the programming you may have inherited from growing up. By becoming more aware of your subconscious programming you’re in a better position to actually take conscious control over your life. Otherwise, you’re at the mercy of the quality of your subconscious programming in terms of how your life ends up turning out.

II.             Discovering Your Acorn: Phase two involves discovering your “acorn” or, in other words, the innate talents, passions, strengths, and personality with which you entered the world. Discovering these is the best way to discover what your purpose in the world may be and your path to a truly meaningful life.

III.           Learning to Program Your Mind Constructively: Once you’re more grounded in your true self (the acorn), the final phase of the process is to learn how to consciously program your mind constructively so that it actually helps you manifest your true potential rather than limiting you. Unfortunately, most people have never been taught how to think constructively on such key topics as sense of self, relationships, emotions, stress, money or conflict nor how critical our thinking is to manifesting our ideal lives.