There's never a bad time to start a good habit. Let these talks set the framework for a healthier, happier life.

In an exclusive preview of his book The Stuff of Thought, Steven Pinker looks at language and how it expresses what goes on in our minds -- and how the words we choose communicate much more than we realize.

What is happiness, and how can we all get some? Biochemist turned Buddhist monk Matthieu Ricard says we can train our minds in habits of well-being, to generate a true sense of serenity and fulfillment.

How do creative people come up with great ideas? Organizational psychologist Adam Grant studies "originals": thinkers who dream up new ideas and take action to put them into the world. In this talk, learn three unexpected habits of originals -- including embracing failure. "The greatest originals are the ones who fail the most, because they're t...

Can we break bad habits by being more curious about them? Psychiatrist Judson Brewer studies the relationship between mindfulness and addiction -- from smoking to overeating to all those other things we do even though we know they're bad for us. Learn more about the mechanism of habit development and discover a simple but profound tactic that mi...

Forget the latest disease in the news: Cardiovascular disease kills more people than everything else combined -- and it’s mostly preventable. Dr. Dean Ornish explains how changing our eating habits can save lives.

How can architects build a new world of sustainable beauty? By learning from nature. Michael Pawlyn describes three habits of nature that could transform architecture and society: radical resource efficiency, closed loops, and drawing energy from the sun.

Dean Ornish shares new research that shows how adopting healthy lifestyle habits can affect a person at a genetic level. For instance, he says, when you live healthier, eat better, exercise, and love more, your brain cells actually increase.

Tuna are ocean athletes -- fast, far-ranging predators whose habits we're just beginning to understand. Marine biologist Barbara Block fits tuna with tracking tags (complete with transponders) that record unprecedented amounts of data about these gorgeous, threatened fish and the ocean habitats they move through.

What makes us create and innovate? Here, wildly creative thinkers share ideas and insights into what kindles genius.

Language isn’t set in stone. It changes all the time -- and in turn, our language changes us. These talks explore how new words come to be.

We often find ourselves stuck in narrow social circles with similar people. What habits confine us, and how can we break them? Organizational psychologist Tanya Menon considers how we can be more intentional about expanding our social universes -- and how it can lead to new ideas and opportunities.

Out of fresh ideas? These inspiring talks offer the kick-in-the-pants you need to unleash your creative spirit.

Robin Chase founded Zipcar, the world’s biggest car-sharing business. That was one of her smaller ideas. Here she travels much farther, contemplating road-pricing schemes that will shake up our driving habits and a mesh network vast as the Interstate.

To find the path to long life and health, Dan Buettner and team study the world's "Blue Zones," communities whose elders live with vim and vigor to record-setting age. In his talk, he shares the 9 common diet and lifestyle habits that keep them spry past age 100.

Games like World of Warcraft give players the means to save worlds, and incentive to learn the habits of heroes. What if we could harness this gamer power to solve real-world problems? Jane McGonigal says we can, and explains how.

The world is moving fast. These talks will inspire you to take time to process it all. Bonus reading: Pico Iyer’s The Art of Stillness, a beautiful meditation on this subject.

Tanya Menon speaks, writes and consults on collaboration. Her research focuses on how people think about their relationships and the habits that allow them to build positive connections with other people.

How do we improve in the face of complexity? Atul Gawande has studied this question with a surgeon's precision. He shares what he's found to be the key: having a good coach to provide a more accurate picture of our reality, to instill positive habits of thinking, and to break our actions down and then help us build them back up again. "It's not ...

On the heels of a long and bruising camel ride, Keith Bellows became fascinated with the "SUV of the sand," and with the many thorny aspects of their personalities (and mating habits) most of us would rather not dwell upon.

These talks can help you fine tune your composure in the face of frustration.

Easy, straightforward techniques to jumpstart innovative thinking and surface new, brilliant ideas.

Once your smart devices can talk to you, who else are they talking to? Kashmir Hill and Surya Mattu wanted to find out -- so they outfitted Hill's apartment with 18 different internet-connected devices and built a special router to track how often they contacted their servers and see what they were reporting back. The results were surprising -- ...

How does the metaphorical lightbulb go off? Is it a flash of genius? The power of crowds? These heady talks explore the nature of ideas themselves: Where they come from, how they evolve, and how each of us can nurture them.

Ever dreamed of starting your own business? These talks can help get your idea off the ground.

What is one goal you wish you could accomplish? Chances are, you have no problem naming it, so what holds you back from achieving it? Life has a nasty habit of interrupting the best-laid plans, but more often than not, it’s our own minds that get in the way of our goals. We make a litany of excuses for why those goals don’t get checked off our ...

Feel like you're running low on fresh ideas? Get creative with these thought-provoking TED Talks to inspire new and experimental thinking. (Curated in partnership with Nuveen.)

Everyone wants to be happy. But how, exactly, does one go about it? Here, psychologists, journalists, Buddhist monks and more gives answers that may surprise.

As Wittgenstein wrote, "The limits of my language mean the limits of my world." Watch talks by linguists, data analysts and word nerds.

Which TED Talks did you watch and share most in 2016? These talks about being a better listener, parent, person ... and, um, spam email recipient.