JULY 6 — There is something strangely familiar about standing in front of a nasi campur counter.

The stainless-steel trays are neatly arranged in a long row, each one trying its best to persuade you. 

Ayam goreng. Sambal sotong. Gulai daging. Ikan bakar. Sayur lemak. Ulam. Sambal belacan. If you arrive close to lunchtime, the food is still warm, the choices still plentiful, and for a brief moment it feels as though you could have everything.

But of course, you cannot. You begin with the rice. Then, plate in hand, you move slowly from one tray to another, adding this, leaving that, changing your mind halfway, before eventually deciding that your plate is full enough. 

Only then do you reach the cashier, where the total quietly reminds you that every extra scoop has its price.

I have been eating at nasi campur stalls for years, and yet I still pause in front of the dishes as though I am making a life-changing decision. 

The amusing part is that, after all that careful consideration, I almost always end up with exactly the same combination. Ayam goreng bahagian dada. Sayur lemak. Ulam. Sambal belacan.

Perhaps I was never choosing lunch. Perhaps lunch has been trying to teach me something about life.

When we are young, adulthood looks remarkably like that nasi campur counter. Every possibility appears to be waiting patiently for us. 

There are universities to attend, careers to pursue, cities to live in and people to fall in love with. The future feels wonderfully generous, as though life has laid out every dish and invited us to take as much as we like.

Somewhere along the way, however, we discover that the plate is not as large as we imagined. Time has limits. Energy has limits. Even our hearts have limits.

The older I become, the less I believe adulthood is about getting everything we want. 

Instead, it seems to be about choosing what matters most, while quietly accepting that every meaningful choice leaves something else behind. And that is true in almost every part of our lives, if you think about it.

Accepting one job often means saying no to another that was equally exciting. Choosing to live close to ageing parents may mean letting go of opportunities elsewhere. 

Starting a family changes how we spend our weekends, our holidays and, occasionally, our sleep. 

None of these are necessarily sacrifices in the dramatic sense of the word. They are simply the natural consequence of choosing one path over another.

For a long time, I thought maturity meant making the right decisions. Now, I am no longer sure that such certainty exists.

Looking back, many of the decisions that shaped my life were not choices between something good and something bad. More often, they were choices between two good things that simply could not exist at the same time. 

Whichever path I took, another equally meaningful possibility quietly became an unlived life.

I have come to realise that adulthood is filled with these quiet goodbyes. We rarely notice them at the time because we are busy building the life in front of us. 

It is only years later, usually over coffee with an old friend or while looking through photographs from another time, that we catch a glimpse of the person we might also have become.

I suspect many of us will recognise this feeling too. Perhaps you once imagined yourself living in another country. 

Perhaps there was a career you almost pursued before life gently nudged you elsewhere. Perhaps there was someone you met who made you wonder what another version of your life might have looked like if your paths had crossed at a different time, under different circumstances.

And such thoughts are not signs of regret. They are reminders that our lives have been rich enough to contain more than one possibility. 

The mistake, I think, is believing that acknowledging those possibilities somehow diminishes the life we eventually chose.

It does not. In fact, I would argue the opposite. A meaningful career is rarely built because we found the one perfect job. 

It is built because we kept showing up, especially on the ordinary days when nobody applauded our efforts.

A lasting marriage is not proof that we never encountered other remarkable people. 

It is the quiet decision to continue building a life with the person we chose, long after the excitement of beginnings has given way to the comfort of familiarity.

Even friendships (or “situationships” nowadays) become deep not because they are effortless, but because someone keeps making the first WhatsApp message, arranging the next cup of coffee, or remembering a birthday without being reminded. Celebrating the little, ordinary things. 

Perhaps that is what adulthood really is. Not collecting every beautiful possibility that life places before us. But learning which possibilities deserve our faithful attention.

There is a curious peace that comes with this realisation. We stop comparing our lives with all the versions that never happened. 

We become less interested in asking, “What if?” and more grateful for asking, “What now?” The roads we did not take remain part of our story, but they no longer compete with the one we are living.

Tomorrow, I will probably find myself standing in front of the same nasi campur counter once again. I will look at every tray as though today might finally be the day I choose something different. Well, perhaps I will.

But more likely than not I will scoop the same rice, reach for the same ayam goreng bahagian dada, the same sayur lemak, the same ulam and the same sambal belacan before making my way to the cashier.

Not because the other dishes were never worth choosing. Simply because, after all these years, I have learnt that a good life, much like a good plate of nasi campur, is not about fitting everything onto it.

It is about being able to sit down, enjoy what we chose, and leave the table without feeling the need to look over at someone else’s plate.

* Nahrizul Adib Kadri is a professor of biomedical engineering at the Faculty of Engineering, the Director of UM Press, and the Principal of Tuanku Bahiyah Residential College, Universiti Malaya. He may be reached at nahrizuladib@um.edu.my 

** This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of Malay Mail.