Review of Miranda Kerr's Treasure Yourself

I have always admired Miranda Kerr – she is not just the glossy face on advertisements and billboards, but also a mother to her two-year old son Flynn, wife to Orlando Bloom, creator of the organic skincare line Kora Organics, and author of the self-help book for teens, Treasure Yourself.  Naturally, when I saw the pink and white book decorated with flowers and butterflies on Amazon, I just had to buy it.

Big mistake.

The book is intended to be a collection of memories and lessons geared toward the younger generation of teenage girls to inspire them by teaching lessons about self-confidence, acceptance, and inner beauty.  However, the book is really just 245 pages cluttered with clichés, awkward anecdotes that are impossible to relate to, and hand-drawn butterflies.    

This book can be summarized with the clichés: Follow your dreams!  Be positive!  Smile!  Love your life!  Love your family!  Cherish what you’re given!  Never stop growing!  Seize the possibilities!  Be grounded!  Love yourself!  The entire book was a big sugar-coated lollipop surrounded by vanilla beans, sparkles, and unicorns.  Although I could let the first couple slide, I found myself irritated by the end.  She had nothing profound to say, and while I genuinely believe Miranda Kerr is good-hearted and kind, the book felt like a celebrity publicity piece.

Reading the book was like reading a twelve year old girl’s diary.  The writing was marred with so many repetitive phrases and awkward clauses I wonder how it even passed the editing stage of publication.   In one instance, Kerr writes “If you planted your heart, would it grow?”  Maybe Kerr and I just aren’t on the same brain wave, maybe I don’t understand Australian slang, or maybe I don’t possess the imagination needed to emotionally and mentally grow from reading this book, but in that moment I had to stop reading, collect my thoughts, and push myself to finish the book.  After all, I just had to finish it.

But after a mere 130 pages, I found the last pages to be fluffy quotes and hand drawn butterflies from people that inspire her like Deepak Chopra, Steven Covey, Louise Hay, and none other than Miranda Kerr herself.  The best part of the book was the fifteen pages of personal family pictures that showed the stages of her life growing up – of course the part that didn’t involve reading. 

The book isn’t quite a self-help book.  This book isn’t quite a biography.  It is simply a marketing piece to sell her Kora Organics products that she talks about at the end of the book.  After reading it I am ready to bury it in my backyard, spritz some lemon and noni juice on top, chant some clichés over the bright sunlight and blue skies, and wait for an orb of happiness to grow into my life and bless me with her adorable dimples. 

Well that is, if “dreams really do come true.”