How do you blend purpose and joy into your work, and love the life you live? The answer, in short, is to stay curious.

Day 2 of TEDNext was filled with so many questions. My mental inquiry ran the gamut from “How am I going to keep my chill when I meet one of my favorite speakers?” to “Where do the big TED letters go when they’re not on stage?”

But there are more important questions, too: What lights you up? How can you improve a rough situation? Where is your next step going to take you?

I talked to so many incredibly inspiring and insightful people today, and while it’s literally my job as an interviewer to ask questions, I learned that the exploration should never really stop. Whatever answers you’re looking for, you’ll find them through staying curious — about yourself, others and the world around you.

Here are 3 principles of curiosity I learned today:

1. Curiosity is connective

When Patrice Brown, MBA came to TEDNext in 2024, she was separating from 25 years of corporate life. “I wasn't sure what was going to be next,” she said. “I had to find my center, and that required a lot of sitting still and listening to what was happening on the inside.” She arrived with an open mind and left inspired.

This week, she returned to the conference as the co-founder of Patllom Impact, a business consultancy with the goal of helping 1 million small businesses thrive — and she credits her experience last year as the push she needed to get started.

“It made me realize I could do it,” she said. “This is a full circle moment.”

Her advice to any other budding entrepreneur? Build connections and go deeper — both with yourself and others. If you’re introverted, it might be difficult to strike up genuine relationships with strangers, but Patrice offers three simple steps:

1. Smile. “When you smile, you're showing that you're approachable.”
2. Be curious and ask questions. “I try to be interested, as opposed to interesting.”
3. Say “Tell me more about that” to open the floor to deeper conversation.

Another connective curiosity hack is to ask “What lights you up?” instead of “What do you do?” when you meet someone new. Patrice learned this from a talk from last year, and it really, truly works. When I asked Patrice what lights her up, she said “people” with a glowing smile.

2. Curiosity can be lifesaving

When David Fajgenbaum, MD, MBA, MSc was in medical school, he nearly died from a rare sickness called Castleman’s Disease. After several rounds of chemotherapy, the doctors told him there were no more options … but if they’d just used seven different chemotherapies to try to save him, why couldn’t there be an eighth?

“That curiosity to find a treatment ended up resulting in a drug that saved my life. And ever since then, all I've been able to think about is how many more drugs are out there that could be repurposed to treat more patients,” said David, today the cofounder and president of Every Cure (a grantee of The Audacious Project and a TED speaker!).

His company is driven by insatiable curiosity, using AI to find new uses for existing drugs in order to help patients suffering from little-known diseases. This work can often be difficult, but the possibility of saving more lives drives them forward.

Whatever your pursuit, David says you need three things to push past the fear of failure:

1. A vision for the future you hope to achieve
2. An amazing team to help get you there
3. Persistent patience: “Take one step at a time and you can achieve things that you never could've dreamed would be possible.”

Even when your ambitions are grueling, pushing past the fear can help not only yourself, but others, too. “Something that my mom taught me 20 years ago, before she passed away, is that we shouldn't just look to find silver linings. We should actually look to create silver linings,” David shared.

Ask yourself, “What can I do? What can I create?” Every tough situation contains an opportunity to better yourself or the world around you if you ask the right questions.

3. Curiosity isn’t a moment — it's a mindset

Mary Fajimi, M.S., CPC first came to TED as an employee at the conference bookstore many years ago and has been coming back to fill her cup so she can pour into others. Her professional journey has taken her far and wide, and this week she returned as a Donor in support of TED’s mission.

“I want to make sure that I'm contributing to TED in a way that reflects the impact that it's had on me,” said Mary, adding that she wants to foster that same experience for others. One of the reasons she comes to the conference is to find like-minded people who challenge and inspire her.

TED has shown me how serendipitous connections emerge when curious people gather.  I spoke with attendees who found themselves reconnecting with college friends after twenty years, while others found new long-distance friends to stay in touch with year over year. Mary shared her own story of unexpected fortune — a reminder that when openness meets curiosity, connection follows.

“At TED Women, I met someone who had just finished a PhD program that I was thinking about pursuing. At TEDNext last year, I ran into someone that worked at the school where I was just about to submit my application,” said Mary. “I have always found the special moments to be the people that I run into that seem like you meet them at the exact right time.”

Also, it never hurts to be prepared: Mary and I talked about the value of showing up with intention — clearing your schedule, exploring the TEDConnect app to see who’s attending, and making space to meet people who share your interests. (We learned we’re both avid note-takers — with color-coded systems, of course). But a big catalyst for those impactful, serendipitous moments is just staying open-minded.

“Part of it is just not being afraid to say hello to whomever is randomly standing next to you,” said Mary. “It is by staying curious, by opening yourself to the idea of wonder, that you become more wise, because you ask questions. So instead of assuming, you learn.

“It's not necessarily a moment, it's a mindset.”

It feels like TEDNext is a mindset, too. While the conference passes in just a few days, the inspiration you gather and the relationships you build are lasting. I’m learning this in every interaction, with every TED Talk delivered.

Curious for more?

If you want to catch all of the unedited talks, tune in on TED Live! You can bring the TEDNext experience to your home on demand — or anywhere you want to watch — and get all the in-between moments of wonder on stage.