'You will never be happier than you expect. To change your happiness, change your expectation.'

'Sometimes opportunities float right past your nose. Work hard, apply yourself, and be ready. When an opportunity comes you can grab it.'

- Actress Julie Andrews (1935 - present)

'Don’t try to be young. Just open your mind. Stay interested in stuff. There are so many things I won’t live long enough to find out about, but I’m still curious about them.'

- Actress Betty White (1922-2021)

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

- Fashion icon Anna Wintour (1949 – present)

'It takes a lot of courage to be happy, but I've got courage, so I think I will be happy again.'

- Actress Florence Henderson (1934–2016)

'I have learned from experience that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends upon our dispositions, and not upon our circumstances.'

- Martha Washington (1731-1802)

'The fact is always obvious much too late, but the most singular difference between happiness and joy is that happiness is a solid and joy a liquid.'

-Writer J.D. Salinger (1919-2010)

Some of the 'Jeopardy!' host Alex Trebek's best quotes

"The secret to happiness, of course, is not getting what you want; it's wanting what you get."

'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)

'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)

'You shouldn't dream your film, you should make it!'

- Filmmaker Steven Spielberg (1946-present)

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

- Author James Baldwin (1924–1987)

'I love quotations because it is a joy to find thoughts one might have, beautifully expressed with much authority by someone recognized wiser than oneself.'

- Actress and singer Marlene Dietrich (1901-1992)

1975: Betty Ford, remarks at the International Women's Year Conference

"Change, by its very nature, is threatening but it is also often productive."

'Until you're ready to look foolish, you'll never have the possibility of being great.'

- Cherilyn "Cher" Sarkisian (1946-present)

'Getting old is like climbing a mountain; you get a little out of breath, but the view is much better!'

- Actress Ingrid Bergman (1915-1982)

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?"

A psychiatrist warns that chasing happiness can lead to misery

Rafa Euba, a retired consultant psychiatrist, argues that happiness is a vague and abstract concept that is hard to quantify. He suggests accepting that suffering and pain are a normal part of life. An attainable goal for one's life is to attempt to minimize pain, and pursue balance and contentment rather than a false ideal of permanent bliss.

'Why am I trying to become what I don't want to be … when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say I know who I am.'

-Author Arthur Miller (1915-2005) in "Death of a Salesman"

'Remember, no man is a failure who has friends.'

- 1946 film "It's a Wonderful Life"

A quote by Lauren Bacall

"Imagination is the highest kite one can fly."

'Practice, which some regard as a chore, should be approached as just about the most pleasant recreation ever devised.'

- Legendary athlete Mildred "Babe" Didrikson Zaharias (1911-1956)

'It's the repetition of affirmations that leads to belief. And once that belief becomes a deep conviction, things begin to happen.'

- Legendary boxer Muhammad Ali (1942–2016)

'I can’t go back to yesterday–because I was a different person then.'

- "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" author Lewis Carroll (1832 - 1898)

Visualizing where happiness comes from

Researchers asked 10,000 participants to list 10 things that recently made them happy. One author broke down the responses into subject-verb-object categories, isolating the people and events that made responders satisfied. The result highlights how simple things like having dinner or watching a movie made someone happy. Dive in and look for some ideas or tips on feeling happy today with this fascinating visualization.

‘The consumer isn't a moron, she's your wife’ is among David Ogilvy’s most memorable pieces of advertising advice

Some of David Ogilvy’s maxims include, “talent, I believe, is most likely to be found among nonconformists, dissenters, and rebels” and “never write an advertisement which you wouldn’t want your own family to read.”

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

See the most iconic photos from four decades of LIFE magazine

Dorothy's famous entrance into Oz in 'The Wizard of Oz' relied on analog tricks, including a body double and sepia-toned paint, as much as it did on technology

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

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

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

Netflix profits when you're not watching, and its movies are designed that way—read a detail-rich critical essay exposing lesser-known Netflix takes

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.

Comedy legend Catherine O'Hara, star of 'Schitt's Creek' and 'Home Alone,' quit 'Saturday Night Live' after just one week to return to her old job.

When a Paris department store hesitated to sell Estée Lauder's perfume, she 'accidentally' broke a bottle, causing the smell to spread throughout the store and shoppers to start asking to buy the scent.

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.

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

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

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.

American dance legend Martha Graham, sometimes called 'the Picasso of dance,' refused to perform at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin and conceived the piece 'Chronicle' in response to the experience.

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.

The story of Dollree Mapp, whose legal challenge over her 1957 conviction for possessing "obscene material" led to a major strengthening of the Fourth Amendment

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

Clever Hans was a 1900s horse that was believed to be able to solve math equations, tell time, and read and comprehend German, until a psychology student discovered how he got his answers.

The name 'Silicon Valley' arose from the founding of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Fairchild Semiconductor in 1956-57, founded near Stanford University in Palo Alto

In recent years a child anxiety expert has created and tested a novel phobia and anxiety treatment approach for children, focused on changing how parents respond to the fears.

See a ranking of the best (and worst) Federal Reserve Chairs since 1914 out of the 16 men and women who have held the office since.

The word 'jazz' evolved from 'jasm,' 19th-century American slang for 'energy'

Hotels in Cannes, the glamorous city on the French Riviera, hire hawks to ward off seagulls during the city's famous film festival.

NBA superstar Victor Wembanyama spent the 2025 summer training with monks in central China to enhance his body and mind.