Brooklyn Decker shares the worst advice she never took

The actress and model is glad she ignored the advice to "stay in her lane."

August 20, 2018, 4:13 AM

When it comes to the worst advice she never took, actress and model Brooklyn Decker recalls something that she says wasn’t meant to be harmful.

"The worst advice would be when someone told me to stay in my lane. I, at the time, was modeling and was going to make the very cliché transition into acting, it’s one that a lot of people take, and I think that they had the best intentions in mind." Decker told ABC News’ chief business, technology and economics correspondent Rebecca Jarvis.

Decker was a successful model before she launched her acting career. Discovered at a shopping mall in North Carolina as a teenager, she began gracing the pages of Vogue, Elle, GQ, Glamour and eventually the coveted cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue.

"They were trying to encourage me to go after job security and they’re like, 'You have a good thing going, why would you ruffle feathers, why make a detour career wise?'"

She didn’t listen to the "advice" and shortly after went on to launch her career as an actress. In her most recent role she stars alongside Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin in the Emmy nominated Netflix series "Grace and Frankie," renewed for its fifth season earlier this year.

And she didn’t stop at acting. Now a mom of two, married to former tennis pro Andy Roddick, Decker recently found herself in another lane becoming the co-founder of Finery, an automated digital wardrobe platform that she created with her friend and journalist Whitney Casey. The pair wanted to create an easy way to virtually keep track of the clothes in your closet and together have built the company from the ground up.

"Brooke [Decker] is the only person I know who Slacks [messaging app] from a big time set. Which I think is kind of a cool thing like she's sitting next to Jane Fonda in her chair Slacking to developers." Casey said of her co-founder.

Juggling motherhood, entrepreneurship and her acting career has become second nature to Decker and she wouldn’t have it any other way. She says she never considered saying in her lane, but rather, always knew she would push herself and the boundaries around her.

"I think you look at most people and they've lived several different lives or done several different things and to me it was never a possibility to listen to that [and stay in my lane]."

Hear more from Brooklyn Decker on episode 88 of the "No Limits with Rebecca Jarvis" podcast.