Blake Lively didn't stand up for herself as a young actress because she feared she would be labelled as a "diva".
Blake Lively
The 'Gossip Girl' star has confessed she was worried about "fighting for herself" when she was younger and didn't want to "demand fair treatment" as she felt it might affect what people thought she was like to work with.
She said: "I think that sometimes you're not encouraged to stand up for yourself. It doesn't even mean in really dramatic ways. That just means that if you're working too many hours, or you aren't being paid what someone else at your work level is being paid, or if you're being treated differently than someone else on the crew, or whoever.
"I didn't feel like I could fight for myself in the same way, because I was afraid of coming across as a diva or difficult or demanding. As a woman, you're afraid of a label you may acquire by demanding fair treatment for yourself that you know that you've earned."
And the 30-year-old actress - who has daughters James, two, and Ines, 12 months, with her husband Ryan Reynolds - wishes her younger self would have loved herself more.
Asked what advice she'd give her younger self, she added to People magazine: "I'd encourage myself to love myself and fight for myself, as hard as I fought for other people."
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