The goodbye

I don't know what "friendship" means as a word and value - and I don't care about that now. Only thing I care about now is basically wondering why that separation felt bad and what to do about it.

That opened my eyes to an idea. And wanted to write about that.

Milan and the people who left

It's been a long time in Milan. Met with a lot of people. Believed that they will be my best friend but they left me halfway. Started seeing old people from bachelors who I actually had disagreements with back in the day again, because being in the same class - the circles are merging now.

But one of them really had an impact on me. Saw that he is really like me. We share the same values. We almost spend our daily time exactly like each other. We both have long-term goals, trying to self-actualize, trying to build our own empire, trying not to lose ourselves in the messiness and chaos and always keeping an open and close eye on things happening around.

How we met

September 2025. One of the first classes of the second year of my master's. Taking an elective course. First class. Mic running around in the hands of the students and everybody tells a thing they enjoy or something like that. My turn. Picked up the mic and said "martial arts." Yeah, I do love fighting as a sport and training regarding that. Then at the end of the class, this guy Bingen approached me. Asking questions about my hobby, martial arts. We started having a conversation. Walked together to the train station that day.

But even in the beginning of the class, I remember watching this guy from the corner of the classroom and something was catching my eye about his vibe. Maybe how grounded and calm he looks or something else. But even before the actual conversation, there was a spark, I'd say.

Why he's different

I say we seemed different. When I talk about him to my friends, one of the first things was always telling how weird he is. But the better the weirder. I know for a fact. When you get really badly obsessed with something in your life, you get weirder. When you stop accepting whats given and start questioning. When you don't align with the normal, you look different. That's what we were doing. Trying to go deeper in every conversation, always having thoughts about how to improve, how to increase the standards of our life.

In my opinion, the same small hometown background is pretty important. We believe everything depends on the mindset. Everything is achievable. We share every note hanging on our walls. "God didn't give them the vision he gave you." The same books, same perspective, same drive to create, discipline, taking life seriously, personal development. Even in other areas, the similarity was there. What kind of person he is. Why he's rare to find.

Even one of the last talks we had was on the topic of how the music we listened to affects our mood, lifestyle and other important things. Again we had the same idea, same opinion, same stance. That was really shocking to me about that person. Whenever he started a conversation around a book, asking if I read it or even know the book or the author, I was saying "YES" with all the excitement.

That was such an amazing friendship, similarity and closeness I felt to this guy.

The mistakes I made

At first, we weren't that close. Then the closeness grew. Mostly through coworking. Sometimes twelve hours of working together. We were the first ones to enter the faculty building and last ones to leave. Creating together is what grew the friendship.

But I made some mistakes.

I had another class that semester where I had friends from the same program. So I picked them to always hang out during the breaks or even sit side by side in the class. Usually ignored Bingen and didn't even introduce him to my friend group. Hear me out: the main reason was Bingen was the total opposite of what my friend group was at that moment. That friend group most probably still the same, but they turned their back on me after the recent breakup, because with the ex they were all a common friend group. Yeah, that bothers me, but let's go back to the topic. That was a huge mistake by me. Something between the two parts of my life wasn't aligned and I couldn't make the pick to decide which is the real Efe. But every day I didn't introduce Bingen to them and avoided him was a decision made. Unfortunately.

Also one more case. For the same class we met in, we had to form a group for the final work. I texted him to work together. But my goal was to do the bare minimum to pass. He told me he's aiming for the highest score. He always has been. "Never settle" is written on his wall and then it influenced me too. We didn't agree on that and I wished him luck and took the course asynchronous, completing the final by myself. At the end, I got the full score but he was suffering because of the teammates and told me he was the one who did all the work. I believe him.

Two missed opportunities. If I could go back in time, I'd change them.

How it grew

Those experiences happened, but our conversation, can't remember why, didn't stop. All of a sudden, we turned into coworking friends. Started coworking couple days back to back. Twelve, ten hours of work a day. Back to back, in total fifty hours.

This guy Bingen was obsessed about self-improvement. Even reading the same books. He was building a meditation application. It's actually on the App Store, go check it out. Eclipta, the name is. Doing exactly the same; building my own app was also my biggest goal, the way I wanted to turn my life around. Having my own business, basically. This guy influenced me a lot and I also started all of a sudden. At that time, the breakup also happened, which gave me a lot of free time where I can do the things I couldn't. But that was obvious: he had huge impact on me starting to build my own business. Still, I know there are a lot to learn from this guy.

After that time, meetings turned into coworking. Talks turned into very grounded, very chill conversations where you don't feel any weirdness in the silences. We didn't have many talks. Our meeting type was not going out to the bar and drinking and having conversation for straight two hours. It was only in the breaks of coworking. But even though the average length of conversation I had with Bingen is thirty minutes, it was more valuable than three hours of meetup with other friends of mine.

This guy is grounded as fuck. He taught and reminded me to be comfortable in the silences, not always requiring a response for everything, being slow. He had something I maybe lost in the years of making myself or that I'm now yearning for. That was the reason for the connection, in my opinion. I was able to see the greater version of myself coming alive as I spent time with him.

We usually talked about humanity and society. How lives are shaped now and how it doesn't reflect our values and how we are having a hard time finding depth in our relationships with other people. There was something between us which we couldn't find in any other person, which made the friendship very smooth and nourishing.

The last days

Towards the end of my time in Milan, our friendship became really strong. We started spending whole days coworking, him crashing at my place, going to the gym, coworking several days in a week, every day ten-plus working hours. Recording videos. Sharing info from our depths. Criticizing the society and trying to find the light for ourselves. It wasn't just about work and creating anymore; we started noticing the similarity in deeper areas too. Relationships, sexuality, life.

As I spent time with him, I realized how smooth things were and how easy it was to get along with him. Sometimes looking at my connection to other people and how I suffer from those connections, this one with Bingen was really nourishing. Not getting anything from me but only giving and giving. The biggest part was me being able to show the real me and run towards my goals and his existence not slowing me down, not bothering me, but increasing my velocity.

Colifting

A day before our separation, we met again. Goal was coworking but he had a class in the morning and then had to prep his luggage for the Easter trip to his hometown. So we met late in the day. And directly packed for the gym and finally did our first gym session together. Our lifting programs are totally different. He kind of does push-pull-legs and me doing full body and explosive stuff, for the combat sports. But that day he had a leg day and I had conditioning. So it was a blessing that we had filler so that we can change. We altered our program and did chest and back and some isolated.

But forget the lifting. Even though it was amazing. I felt like Ronnie Coleman lifting with the buddies, yelling at each other, doing drop sets and between sets having deep talk about sexual relationships, bipolarity or the need of a woman in our lives. Talking about Fight Club.

But yeah, forget that part. The good fucking thing was my mood was above the average by ten times. I saw how I missed lifting with a buddy and basically building together. It's again the same as coworking. We build our own stuff but side by side, supporting each other, making sure we are progressing and putting more than we can, pushing ourselves to our limits, not leaving anything in the tank. Coworking and lifting together. Coworking and colifting.

If I'd live with that guy, I'd boost my productivity, my push, my motivation by a hundred times every day and the outcome of my life would speed up crazy. In this part of my life, I'm realizing a close bro, where you share the same goals and values, is pretty important. Unfortunately, long distance doesn't work because you should literally be side by side. Doing every shit together.

What could have been

Maybe we could have spent more time together. Could have even been flatmates. You start to realize that living with someone like this pulls you upward. But there's no regret here. Because what happened was already real and valuable.

The pieces we carry

Friendship doesn't die when distance comes. We take pieces from each other. We carry them inside us. They carry something from us too. Separation is not a total disappearance.

An important thought crystallized: even when we part from people, we carry a piece of them inside us. We become a little bit of them. It's not about missing someone. What matters is holding onto the spark you took from that person, having respect for it. People change over time and so do the ones around them. But if you can keep that spark alive, the friendship is still living. This is a stance against separation. It applies to friendships and romantic relationships alike and it's becoming especially clear now, coming out of a breakup.

Yeah, I felt a little sad this happened because, as I told you, if I would live with that person, my life would get super fast, even improving myself. The things I would achieve in ten years I would achieve in a year; that is a big difference.

So I'm learning this: a brotherhood is actually pretty important. Finding one and then driving through together. It's almost a similar goal and then pushing each other to give yourselves your best. Let's say, like now I'm writing this, I'm having a day and I'm trying to increase my productivity, doing things. If he was here, I would be ten times more productive. Okay, this is not happening now; he's not here. So how do we do that? How do we still keep that push that we provided for each other?

The idea is this friendship, this mindset. It should still be living there because it's about the pieces that we've collected from each other and then given to each other and it affected who we are and how we live our life. If you could keep that alive, that would be amazing. There is a crystal we share with each other. The goal should be keeping it alive, having respect for it.

How to honor it

The world is huge. There are completely different people everywhere. And two people from different countries, very similar to each other, meet somewhere in their lives during a master's program. This is an incredible thing. I feel very lucky, very grateful for it and this is something that deserves to be honored.

The best way to keep this friendship alive: living the good things we took from each other more strongly in our own lives. Getting closer to our own best version.

If I can keep alive the things I took from him, if I can become the person he wanted me to be, the person he expected me to be; he was always putting on more weight, always saying "keep going," always saying "you can do it." If I can do what he believed I could do, then this friendship will be honored.

So no matter how far friendships go, the pieces still live there. We should try to honor them. Out of respect for what was lived, we should be able to keep that honor alive and keep improving ourselves; with the very pieces this friendship gave us.