This post is in memory of my friend Ilmo van der Löwe, who suddenly and unexpectedly passed away during last year.

Sometimes, I’m still in a state of stunned, painful disbelief that Ilmo is gone. Why him? Why this soon? But I wanted to write this so that anyone who might stumble upon this post one day will get a glimpse of how special a person Ilmo really was for those who knew him and loved him.

Ilmo was my best friend and the closest thing in the world I had to a brother. I loved him like family. He inspired me, helped me find wonder in the world and the people in it, and was there for good times and bad times. I can’t even count on two hands the number of life milestones that Ilmo, Hayzell, and I shared together over the years.

I still can’t believe I’m writing about him in the past tense. Ilmo was a loving husband, and a proud, devoted father. He was a mentor, teacher, and friend for a lot of people during his fascinating work at Cambridge, Facebook, Google, Waymo, and elsewhere. But as impressive as all of that is, it’s not really what comes to mind first when I think about him.

When I first learned the news about Ilmo, it felt like a part of me had died too. That is still true a year later, and I’ve learned a feeling like that doesn’t just go away but you learn – somehow – to live around that hole that is left by someone you love and you miss very much. I went back through old emails and messages — hundreds and hundreds from over the years. I still can’t fully put into words what the loss feels like, but I’m holding onto the good memories because that’s what Ilmo would have wanted. And there were a lot of good.

I first met Ilmo when we were both undergraduate students and Haas Scholars at the University of California, Berkeley. I thought what he was working on was so cool, studying psychology and emotions such as compassion — and that was the beginning of a brilliant academic career where he worked with great minds such as Dacher Keltner and many others over the years. We overlapped in the Bay Area when I was working at Google. Then I happened to follow him overseas to Christ Church College, at the University of Oxford, and we just missed overlapping again at the University of Cambridge by about a year as Ilmo pursued his adventures in the tech world.

The very first time I spoke with him, I remember thinking: “Wow. I wish I could be just like him.” And in many ways, I’m still trying to be like him. Ilmo was the kind of person that made you want to be better, kinder, more curious after spending time with him.

Ilmo was, without any exaggeration whatsoever, one of the kindest, funniest, most creative, and most inspiring people I’ve ever met anywhere in the world. He was the kind of friend who made you feel better after seeing him, even if it was just a quick chat or a message. He had a story or a joke for every situation imaginable. There was a warmth about him, a kind of gravitational field, that drew people in. I still marvel that a heart that big could fit into one person.

My old messages with Ilmo are filled with conversations about books, science, research, tech, philosophy, food recommendations, Simpsons memes, love, life, and everything in between. But it was always about more than that. Ilmo could have done almost anything he wanted with his talents, and he chose, again and again, to use them to make the world a kinder place and to lift other people up.

Ilmo was a Renaissance man. He did academic research on how to make the world a more understanding, compassionate place, and he left behind a legacy of work that will keep influencing people for a long time to come. He was brilliant, but never in a showy way; he used his wonderful mind to tackle cutting-edge questions and then explain them in a way that made you feel smart just for being in the conversation. He was a gifted teacher. He could perform magic in a seminar room, or over lunch, or on a walk — taking an idea that sounded abstract and making it relevant and alive. He had an artistic soul who wrote songs and stories, who also MacGyvered with the fabric of everyday life in unexpected and delightful ways.

Do you know that Maya Angelou quote, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel”? If I had to describe that Ilmo feeling that he instilled in me, it was a kind of understated defiance of convention – why this way, and not something a little more awesome? It was the way he rearranged the world to make it a bit more playful, a bit more humane, and a lot more interesting.

If you read the memories that people have shared on Ilmo’s website, you see the same themes appearing over and over again. People remember how he made them feel welcome, how he took them seriously, how he encouraged them to think differently and to believe in themselves. They remember him spending an hour on the phone helping them prepare for a job interview, mentoring students late into the evening, making scrambled eggs that somehow turned into a lesson about curiosity and joy. They remember that when Ilmo said, “We should do this,” he meant, “We’re actually going to do this.” He followed through. He made things happen. Reading those memories is like looking at a map of all the places and people he quietly stitched together over the years.

He was generous with everyone he met, always thinking about how to help others accomplish what they cared about and become better versions of themselves. All he ever asked in return was: pay it forward. Be kind. Help when you can.

There’s another quote I keep thinking about: “Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born.”

For me, Ilmo created worlds. He opened up new ways of thinking, new possibilities, and new versions of myself that I wouldn’t have found without him. From Berkeley to Oxford to Cambridge and beyond, so much of my life’s map is traced through the adventures we shared.

I’m eternally grateful that I had the good luck to share decades of friendship with him.

I’ve always hated having my picture taken. Now I wish we had had more pictures together, more memories, more time. Remember to tell the important people and loved ones in your life how much you appreciate them.

I will really, really miss you, Ilmo. I will never forget you, and everything wonderful about you.

There are some really wonderful memories that friends and loved ones have shared on Ilmo’s website.

Forever my best man.