Agatha had everything one could ever dream of—wealth, luxury, and a life of comfort. She lived in a grand mansion, drove the most luxurious cars, wore designer clothes, and dined at the finest restaurants. To the world, she was a woman who had it all, the wife of an extremely successful businessman, admired and envied by many. But deep within her, something felt incomplete.
She had spent years convincing herself that happiness was defined by the material abundance she had surrounded herself with. Yet an unspoken emptiness gnawed at her soul. It was like a missing puzzle piece she never quite acknowledged until one fateful day.
Sitting in the backseat of her high-end car, Agatha was waiting at a red light when her gaze fell upon a woman sitting on the street corner. Unlike the hurried passersby, this woman sat peacefully on a small piece of cloth, her hands resting around a bowl. Beside her, a child played with the dirt, giggling uncontrollably every time a coin clinked into the bowl. The woman, despite her circumstances, smiled with genuine warmth, her eyes lighting up at the sound of her child’s laughter.
Agatha watched, mesmerized! There was something so pure, so untainted about that moment. The woman’s happiness wasn’t about the coins she received—it was about the joy her child found in the simplest of things. That unfiltered, unrestrained laughter! The kind Agatha had not experienced in years.
A strange warmth spread through her chest. It was as if something inside her had suddenly woken up from a deep slumber. A part of her that had been neglected for so long that she had forgotten it even existed. For the first time in years, she felt an unfamiliar kind of happiness—one that wasn’t tied to wealth, status, or possessions.
That evening, as she stepped into her grand home, something had changed within her. She turned on an old song from her childhood, one that she hadn’t heard in decades. The melody transported her back to her carefree school days, to the time when she would dance barefoot in the rain, make drawings that held no meaning, and sip homemade lemonade on a hot summer day.
She found herself moving to the rhythm, hesitantly at first, and then with more abandon. She danced, not for an audience, not for approval, but for herself. For the sheer joy of it. Laughter bubbled in her throat as she twirled, her body moving in ways she had long forgotten.
Memories flooded her mind—of playing cards with her grandfather, swinging so high on the playground that she felt like she could touch the sky, crying loudly when she scraped her knee, and then laughing even louder the very next moment. She had once been a child so full of life, of curiosity, of wonder. When had she stopped? When had she let the world tell her that growing up meant letting go of all these beautiful, unfiltered emotions?
That night, Agatha sat by the window, watching the raindrops trickle down the glass. She thought about the layers she had wrapped around herself over the years—expectations, responsibilities, the need to be ‘proper’ and ‘mature.’ She had become someone that the world approved of, but in doing so, she had lost herself.
She realized that true happiness wasn’t in the perfection she had been chasing. It wasn’t in the luxury or the status. It was in the simplest, purest moments of life—the kind she had witnessed in that mother and child on the street.
The next morning, Agatha woke up with a new purpose. She promised herself that she would reconnect with the child she once was, the one who found joy in the little things. She went outside and let the morning sun kiss her skin; she picked up a paintbrush and painted for the sake of painting; she played a board game without worrying about winning or losing. She allowed herself to feel, to express, to be raw and real.
The world hadn’t changed overnight. She was still the wealthy woman with a grand house, still admired for her status. But inside, she was different. She had found something priceless—the ability to live freely, to embrace life without the weight of expectations.
We all have a bit of Agatha in us. We grow up, we conform, we chase achievements, and we convince ourselves that this is what life is meant to be. We tuck away the child within us, believing that maturity means silencing that pure, untamed joy. But the truth is, the happiest version of ourselves is still in there, waiting to be rediscovered.
Let Agatha’s story be a reminder—it’s never too late to peel back the layers and find the simplest, purest version of yourself. Let the child in you be the inspiration you’ve been searching for all along!
Love,
Shweta