The icy cold arrival of middle age has a way of making you reflect more than any other period in your life. It’s a time that comes with a palpable realization of your own mortality and a shift in how you perceive yourself. The physical changes, time passing faster, and reflecting on the choices you’ve made.

I turned 50 last year. And as a middle-aged man, it’s a strange thing to look back at your life and feel two things at once. Gratitude and a quiet tinge of regret. Not because life hasn’t been good … it has. I’m surrounded by more love than I could have ever hoped for and I feel like one of the luckiest people I know. But there are decisions I made, and ones I didn’t, that I’ll never get a chance to revisit, and versions of myself that I’ll never get to meet.

There’s nothing I can do to change that and my life didn’t stop because of them. It’s still going. But every day I still have an opportunity to make decisions that will change the course of my life.

I think that’s something my best friend understood better than anyone I’ve ever known. Igor was a very deep and reflective artist and he had a saying that has stayed with me to this day … “If you love something, you’ll learn it.”

It seems so simple when you say it out loud. So completely obvious. I used to think yeah, of course. But as I think about it now, I realize on a much deeper level what he was trying to express. And it hits so much different.

He wasn’t stating the obvious. He wasn’t implying “if you love something, maybe you’ll learn it” or “hopefully you’ll learn it.” The phrase is imploring you to act. To take action in service of the things you love.

The things we love are what make our lives worth living. Life has a way of breaking us down and it doesn’t get easier as you age. It’s relentless. But what makes it bearable is finding something you love, learning it, and doing it.

Loving something isn’t always easy. It takes effort. And if you stop loving it, it dies. When things are easy, there’s less at stake … and you take it for granted because there’s no pressure to follow through. You can sit idle in your own comfort and not have to confront the uncomfortable reality that another dream has slipped away.

When I think back to those moments and my inability to act in service of my dreams, it’s hard to hold back the remorse. I’ve done therapy, microdosing, self-help books … they’ve helped. But nothing, and I mean nothing, has helped me more in my life than that simple saying my best friend shared all those years ago.

I carry it with me the same way I carry his memory every day. “If you love something, you’ll learn it” is not just about making art or music. It’s foundational in every aspect of my life. If you love something, take the time to understand it. Learn what’s wrong. Learn what’s right. Act in service of it.

It took a while but I’m in a place now where I’ve learned how to act in service of the things I love. Not just in service of making things, but with friends and loved ones. And most importantly, myself. I’ve learned more about myself in the last several years than I have my entire life. A lot of that was due to the upheaval of losing my best friend. It changed so much about how I think now, not just about the things that matter but about how I use the time I have. And I love myself more now because of it … and because of him.

Igor was a futurist and I wish he was here to see the world as it’s unfolding right now. For all the chaos, there’s an equal amount to look forward to. The progression of AI, advancements in creative development, the Artemis missions … all of it would have delighted him. And I would have loved nothing more than to sit and listen to him talk about it at great length… because there is still so much to love and so much to learn.

Miss you, Ig.