'To live is to choose. But to choose well, you must know who you are and what you stand for, where you want to go and why you want to get there.'

'You don't get to choose how you're going to die or when. You can only decide how you're going to live. Now.'

- Musician and activist Joan Baez (1941-present)

A quote by award-winning actor Tom Hanks

"We are still in the position of waking up and having a choice. Do I make the world better today somehow, or do I not bother?"

'All your life, you will be faced with a choice. You can choose love or hate … I choose love.'

-Johnny Cash (1932-2003)

'One man can make a difference and every man should try.'

- Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (1929-1994)

'We become not a melting pot but a beautiful mosaic. Different people, different beliefs, different yearnings, different hopes, different dreams.'

- President Jimmy Carter (1924-2024)

'When you come to a fork in the road, take it.'

- Baseball great Yogi Berra (1925-2015)

'The best way to make a dream come true is to wake up.'

- Fashion icon Anna Wintour (1949 – present)

'I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.'

- Author Douglas Adams (1952-2001)

'Too often we participate in the globalization of indifference. May we strive instead to live global solidarity.'

- Pope Francis (1936 - 2025)

A quote by Ralph Bunche

"The well-being and the hopes of the peoples of the world can never be served until peace - as well as freedom, honor and self-respect - is secure."

'The minute you start talking about what you're going to do if you lose, you have lost.'

- Diplomat George Shultz (1920–2021)

'Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth.'

- Muhammad Ali (1942-2016)

Ranking life's biggest decisions

Psychological research presents some unsurprising wisdom about how to make big decisions without regret: focus on people, don’t miss opportunities, and stay true to yourself.

'Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.'

- Author James Baldwin (1924–1987)

'Knowledge will forever govern ignorance.'

- US President James Madison (1751-1836)

'Our greatest responsibility is to be good ancestors.'

- Polio vaccine developer Jonas Salk (1914–1995)

'Be silent, if you choose; but when it is necessary, speak—and speak in such a way that people will remember it.'

- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791)

'Without goals, training has no direction.'

- Twelve-time Olympic swimming medalist Natalie Coughlin (1982-present)

'You will never feel proud of your work if you find no joy within it; your best work is always joyful work.'

- Stevie Wonder (1950-present)

Jean-Paul Sartre believed 'existence precedes essence'

The existentialist figurehead argued that humans are not born with an identity or purpose; instead, they develop them throughout their lives. For Sartre, this meant making meaning for oneself rather than relying on authorities (like religion or government) to provide it.

David Foster Wallace's iconic commencement speech

David Foster Wallace’s remarkable 2005 commencement speech, This is Water, is a timeless trove of wisdom for living a meaningful life. Here is a full transcript along with audio.

The Nobel Peace Prize is sometimes awarded to inspire ideals, not honor achievements

Critics argue this approach has led to regrettable choices, such as honoring Yasser Arafat despite his militant past or Barack Obama before he established a peace legacy. Committee member Kåre Kristiansen resigned in protest after Arafat was named a laureate in 1994.

Fifteen answers to 'what is the meaning of life?'

Writer James Bailey repeated philosopher Will Durant's 1932 project soliciting opinions on the meaning of life from a variety of luminaries. In this article, read the fascinating responses people gave to the all-important question, from renowned author Hilary Mantel to a seasoned palliative care supporter who had witnessed dozens of deaths.

Davos has been home to many pivotal moments in international diplomacy

Davos provides a forum for unlikely meetings: FW de Klerk met with Nelson Mandela and Mangosuthu Buthelezi during South Africa’s transition from apartheid, North and South Korea held their first-ever ministerial talks, and East and West German leaders discussed reunification.

David Attenborough received the 2021 Champions of the Earth Lifetime Achievement Award

The UN's highest environmental honor celebrated Attenborough as "one of the leading voices of the global environmental movement." For at least four decades, he collaborated with the UN Environment Programme by advocating for "efforts to counter the climate crisis, biodiversity loss and pollution" and addressing "world leaders at the UN Climate Change Conference" in 2021.

SpongeBob exemplifies Aristotle's philosophy for living well because he understands that happiness doesn't come from external factors like money, recognition, or power.

A Yale student wrote a profound essay about the consulting industry's influence on elite college students that was published in a book of her writing after she died in a post-graduation car accident.

See the most iconic photos from four decades of LIFE magazine

Existentialist writer Jean-Paul Sartre coined the famous phrase 'Hell is—other people' in his play 'No Exit'

In 2018, 26-year-old missionary John Allen Chau was killed by tribesmen after attempting to reach and evangelize on India's isolated North Sentinel Island

The identity of the Tank Man in the iconic photo from the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests remains unknown and was possibly killed.

After NASA's Voyager 1 captured Earth as a single pixel as it left the solar system in 1990, astronomer Carl Sagan used the image to reflect on humanity's fragility and the responsibility to protect 'the only world we've ever known.'

A researcher recently discovered an interview from 1967 between groundbreaking journalist Joan Didion and the Grateful Dead, years before the band became an institution.

In 2026, Finland was named the world's happiest country for the ninth consecutive year based on its wealth, social safety network, and high life expectancy, among other factors.

Watch contemporary footage covering the US-backed Shah of Iran fleeing the country in the face of the 1979 Iranian Revolution

Frank Lloyd Wright's houses are historically hard to sell because they're old, subject to local landmark commissions, and often unfashionable

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

In 1939, baseball star Lou Gehrig delivered his inspirational 'Luckiest Man' speech after retiring due to the health condition that now bears his name.

Apeirophobia is an overwhelming fear of living forever, perhaps stemming from the brain's inability to conceptualize an infinite life.

Brandi Chastain, the star of the 1999 US victory over China in the 1999 Women's World Cup, was a last-second choice to take the penalty kick that sealed the victory.

Famed poet TS Eliot rejected the manuscript for George Orwell's political fable 'Animal Farm,' writing that its criticism of authoritarianism was not 'the right point of view.'

The original copy of the Declaration of Independence is not a pristine document, and even features a smudged anonymous handprint in the bottom left corner.

US intelligence allegedly pursued more than 600 schemes to assassinate Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro.

Salvador Dalí believed he was his own dead brother, who had died nine months before he was born

Studies suggest when you sleep is as important as how much you get, and syncing with your circadian rhythms may lead to less fatigue and improved long-term health outcomes

Chaos theory—informally known as the butterfly effect—is the reason why weather forecasts are presented with probabilities rather than certainties.

Sunflowers have long been a symbol of nuclear disarmament because they can extract large amounts of radioactive cesium from soil.

Volcanoes 'die' when their supply of magma runs out, if they are shifted away from their underlying magma reservoir, or if they get clogged by collapsing or their magma cooling back into rock.

Watch the cumbersome, but necessary, precautions healthcare workers must take to care for and protect themselves while caring for Ebola patients.