“I think I just met the happiest person in the world.”

I said it out loud to myself as I stood on the sidewalk, staring at the empty bench where she had been sitting just minutes ago.

It had been a normal morning. Or at least, what my mornings usually felt like—rushed, stressful, and heavy. My bag was too full, my phone was buzzing with emails I hadn’t checked, and my head was pounding from lack of sleep. I had barely eaten breakfast, and I was already exhausted, even though the day had barely started.

I was walking fast, my eyes on the ground, too lost in my own thoughts to notice much of anything. But then, for some reason, I did notice her.

She was just sitting there on a bench by the street, an older woman, maybe in her seventies. Her silver hair was a little messy, but it suited her. She wore a colorful dress, one of those patchwork kinds that seemed to have a story behind it. Her hands were wrinkled but gentle as she tossed small pieces of bread to the pigeons at her feet.

She was laughing.

Not just smiling. Not just a small chuckle. She was laughing. A deep, warm laugh that filled the air around her. The kind of laugh that made you stop and wonder what was so funny, what was so good in life that it could make someone that happy.

And before I could think about it, I stopped walking.

I don’t know why. Maybe because something about her felt different. Maybe because I hadn’t heard real, genuine laughter like that in a long time—not in the office, not from the people I passed by every day, not even from myself.

“You seem really happy,” I said without thinking.

She turned to me, smiling like she had been waiting for me to ask. “Oh, I am, sweetheart. The happiest person in the world.”

I let out a short laugh, shaking my head. “How?”

She patted the empty space beside her, and even though I was in a hurry, even though I had somewhere to be, I sat down.

She tore another piece of bread and tossed it to the pigeons. “You know,” she said, “most people think happiness is something they have to chase. They think, ‘I’ll be happy when I have more money. I’ll be happy when I find love. I’ll be happy when I get that job, that house, that perfect life.’” She sighed, shaking her head. “But by the time they get those things, they’re already looking for something else. Always reaching for more, never stopping to see what’s right in front of them.”

I swallowed hard. Because… wasn’t that exactly what I was doing?

She smiled, as if she could hear my thoughts. “Happiness isn’t something you find. It’s something you make.”

I looked down at my hands, fidgeting with the strap of my bag. “That sounds nice, but… what if life isn’t going well? What if things are just… hard?”

She nodded, like she had heard that question before. “Life will always be hard in some way, my dear. There will always be problems, worries, things that don’t go the way you want. But you get to choose what you focus on. You can spend your whole life collecting problems, stacking them up until all you see is what’s wrong. Or…” She paused, tilting her face up toward the sun, letting it warm her skin. “You can collect little moments of joy. The way the sun feels on your face. The sound of a bird singing. The first sip of tea in the morning. The way a stranger smiles at you on the street. Small things.” She looked back at me. “They add up, you know.”

I let her words sink in.

I had been so focused on everything that was wrong in my life—on what I didn’t have, on what I still needed to do—that I had forgotten to notice the small, good things. Had I even allowed myself to feel happy? Or had I been pushing it away, thinking it had to wait until my life was perfect?

She reached into her pocket and pulled out a tiny, folded piece of paper. “Here,” she said, pressing it into my hand.

I hesitated before opening it. Inside, in shaky handwriting, were the words:

“Happiness isn’t something you find. It’s something you create.”

I stared at it, my chest feeling tight in a way I couldn’t explain.

When I looked up to thank her, she was gone.

I turned my head in both directions, searching for her, but the street was busy, and she had disappeared into the crowd like she had never been there at all.

But her words stayed with me.

As I sat there on the bench, feeling the sun on my skin and listening to the soft flutter of pigeons’ wings, something inside me shifted.

For the first time in a long time, I wasn’t thinking about my unread emails. I wasn’t stressing over my to-do list.

For the first time in a long time, I just… sat.

And for the first time in a long time, I felt something close to happiness.

Maybe, just maybe, I had taken my first step toward creating it.