The actress and MindUP founder talks to PEOPLE about the message behind her second children’s book, ‘The After-School Kindness Crew: Slam Dunk Day’

NEED TO KNOW

• Goldie Hawn talks to PEOPLE about the message behind her children’s book series The After-School Kindness Crew
• Her second book in the series, The After-School Kindness Crew: Slam Dunk Day, is available on Tuesday, Nov. 10
• Hawn also shares her own approach to kindness, including smiling at people on the street

Goldie Hawn has a pillow with a proverb stitched on it in needlepoint: “It says, ‘The smile you give is the one you get back,’” the Oscar-winning actress tells PEOPLE.

In other words, the Private Benjamin and Overboard star, 80, gets a lot of grins coming her way.

“I smile at everybody,” continues Hawn, whose bubbly personality and infectious laugh have endeared her to fans for decades. “I’m on the street and I have a smile on my face. And you do receive back because people actually return that.”

“You’re in an elevator, ‘How are you today?’ ‘Oh, I’m feeling pretty good.’ ‘Oh, that’s good. I’m happy to hear that.’ I do that when I’m in New York in my elevator in the apartment. And people are so sweet. And then when they get in the elevator again, ‘Oh, I got to see you again!’” 

“It isn’t even just an act of kindness — it’s a state of mind,” says Hawn.

The idea of spreading kindness is at the core of Hawn’s children’s books co-written by Lin Oliver. The After-School Kindness Crew series, which chronicles the adventures of three elementary school students, Tony, River and Mia, is an extension of MindUP, Hawn’s preventative mental health program. Since its inception in 2003, it has been implemented in schools around the world to teach kids about the human brain and how to regulate their emotions.

With her books, Hawn hopes to get her message out in yet another way.

In the first Kindness Crew book, Pooch on the Loose, the trio help find a home for an energetic shelter dog in a funny and entertaining story that highlights inclusivity, compassion and empathy.

In the second book, Tony, River and Mia encounter neighborhood hermit Hugo, who’s rumored to be a grump and a “really unpleasant fellow.” When they’re playing basketball nearby and the ball goes into Hugo’s yard, they eventually get to know him and learn he’s a multifaceted person whom they had prejudged.

Hawn says the story is loosely based on her own experiences growing up with her friends. “We lived in Tacoma Park, Md., which has all these old houses that were really cool. And we had one house there that looked like a haunted house, and I used to have dreams about it when I was little,” she says.

“We had just a bunch of kids; we were all a gang. And then we would look at that house and say, ‘I know that person in there is a crazy person.’ We made all these things up,” she continues. 

“And we realized that this man was actually an old man who was something very special and different than we ever thought,” recalls Hawn. 

“So I thought, ‘Why don’t we tell this story, and yet [the characters] actually find out, by knocking on the door, who he is.”

Hawn says there’s an important lesson to take away. “If more people could actually accept the fact that they can be wrong, and that it’s not a bad thing to be wrong, it’s how we learn,” she says. “And that is the whole meaning of the book and the experience.”

Hawn, who has four children in the blended family she shares with longtime partner Kurt Russell, dedicated the latest book to her eight grandchildren, whom she calls her “angels.” Adds Hawn, “ I want to help excite them around things that they’re learning and make it fun to read.”

The first book in the series (there are four planned altogether) became a New York Times bestseller when it was released earlier this year.

Hawn, who has two prior bestsellers — the memoir A Lotus Grows in the Mud and the guided journal 10 Mindful Minutes — says she’s “always surprised” by the success of her books. But, she adds, “I’m very happy about it.”

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The After-School Kindness Crew: Slam Dunk Day comes out on Nov. 10 and is now available for preorder, wherever books are sold.

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