Shallows star Blake Lively appeared at the L’Oreal Women of Worth gala last week and spoke about the best piece of advice she ever received — it was from her mother, of course!

“Whatever it was, whether I was doing a school project, I was doing something creative, she would always say, ‘You can’t mess it up’,” she said to CTV’s eTalk. “I mean, I could mess it up really severely, but just the fact that she told me I couldn’t almost made me feel like I couldn’t.”

It was this idea that gave her the courage and strength to become an actress. “I took risks and I would do things I otherwise would have limited myself with. I do think we all believe in the same thing, which is everybody wants happiness, everybody wants peace, everybody wants to feel safe and secure.

“I feel like with social media we’re very lucky to have an opportunity to talk to a lot of people… so for me it’s important to stand for the things that I believe in,” She concluded. And as for any makeup tips (it is L’Oreal after all!): “Rather than trying to put makeup on to cover yourself up or look like something else, find what you find beautiful in yourself. Then bring that out, accentuate that.”