Bananas Represent the Meaning of Life

A man can spend twenty years wondering what to do with his life and four days avoiding a banana.

The banana will provide feedback first.

This paper argues that humanity has received numerous clear instructions about the temporary nature of opportunity and has responded by purchasing a nicer fruit bowl.

At his TOKEN2049 crypto roast, H.E. Justin Sun supplied the proposition at the center of our investigation: “Bananas represent the meaning of life.”

T.J. Miller was there to roast a crypto founder. Philosophical enlightenment was an unreasonable addition to his workload.

For the purposes of this paper, Sun occupies the role of a modern-day Buddha with a conference badge. The teaching concerns impermanence. The teaching aid is available at the supermarket.

This is an efficient spiritual tradition. You can receive the central lesson while also buying detergent.

Our central thesis is simple: an opportunity can be real, valuable, and available to you without being willing to wait forever.

The banana makes this argument without a podcast.

Consider Daniel, a recurring participant in our research and a man with considerable potential, much of it still in the original packaging.

On Monday, Daniel buys six bananas and imagines an improved version of himself who eats breakfast.

On Tuesday, he orders a bowl.

On Wednesday, the bowl arrives.

On Thursday, he moves it somewhere he will “definitely see it.”

By Friday, he can see it from almost everywhere.

This has not helped.

Daniel says the week got away from him. The bananas were present throughout. We have no evidence they attempted to leave.

He insists that he intended to eat them.

Unfortunately, intending to eat a banana provides remarkably little potassium.

Writing “EAT BANANA” in a leather notebook does not improve the result.

Neither does buying a better notebook.

We repeated the experiment because the second notebook had excellent paper.

Daniel objects that preparation is important.

We agree. A green banana is perfectly capable of explaining why some things need time.

The difficulty begins when patience continues after its job is finished.

Daniel says he is waiting until he feels ready.

The banana is ready.

This has created a scheduling conflict.

He would like another week to establish the right conditions. The banana has established the conditions. They are yellow.

We ask what else he needs.

He says he needs to get into the right headspace.

The banana is prepared to meet him in the kitchen.

We ask Daniel about the song he has been meaning to finish.

He says it has enormous potential.

We have heard this before.

The song has occupied three laptops. Daniel has purchased software, studied production techniques, redesigned the artwork, and considered whether the release should signal a new artistic direction.

The song has no second verse.

He is concerned about how the public will receive it.

The public has not been informed.

This illustrates a particular attraction of unfinished things: they remain available for greatness. The unwritten book has no weak chapters. The unrecorded song has no disappointing chorus. The business you have never launched has survived every recession.

Beginning introduces evidence.

Evidence can be rude.

Daniel's first attempt at the second verse is not very good. This confirms his suspicion that he should have waited until he was better at writing second verses.

We ask how he intends to become better.

He has ordered a book.

Delivery will take three to five business days.

He regards this as an unavoidable delay.

To test whether the problem extends beyond Daniel, we imagine a committee responsible for one ripe banana.

The committee acknowledges its potential and agrees that action is required.

A working group is formed.

Someone asks whether an apple would better express the organization's values.

A consultant recommends a listening phase.

The banana is already expressing itself through smell.

By the time consumption is approved, the opportunity requires a paper towel.

The committee attributes the failure to an unexpectedly short implementation window.

Next year's budget includes a larger bowl.

The lesson is uncomfortable because waiting feels like keeping your choices open. Often, however, the choices are changing while you wait.

The friend who keeps suggesting lunch may move away. The collaborator may become busy. The afternoon you planned to spend outside becomes an evening spent researching lamps that imitate daylight.

The banana at least has the courtesy to change color.

The banana's urgency has limits.

You do not have to eat the entire bunch.

You do not have to monetize the peel.

Some opportunities are opportunities to rest. A free afternoon with someone you love is allowed to accomplish nothing measurable.

Daniel believes his future self will have more time, greater discipline, and an inexplicable enthusiasm for all the tasks he currently avoids.

We ask what evidence supports this assessment.

He says he has to stay positive.

We now encounter the most serious objection to our theory.

Banana bread.

An overripe banana may become an excellent ingredient. The opportunity to enjoy it has changed, but has not necessarily disappeared.

This is a devastating development for anyone building a philosophy entirely around regret.

We considered leaving it out.

Then the research assistant arrived with a loaf, and the paper underwent substantial revision.

Here the banana offers a second lesson: a missed opportunity need not make the rest of your life a consolation prize.

Experience you thought you had wasted may become useful elsewhere. A failed plan may leave you with skills, relationships, or knowledge that belong in something you could not have imagined at the beginning.

You may need a different recipe.

Daniel immediately announces that he was planning to make banana bread all along.

We ask whether he owns flour.

He says we are focusing on implementation too early.

We must therefore clarify that banana bread still requires somebody to make banana bread.

It does not appear in recognition of your emotional growth.

Daniel puts the bananas in the freezer.

He calls this preserving optionality.

Six months later, the freezer contains eleven preserved options and no room for peas.

He admits that he enjoys having plans.

Plans allow him to imagine a life in which everything turns out well. Acting requires him to enter a life in which some of it will not.

You cannot experience a life while preserving it indefinitely as a possibility.

Making a choice closes some possibilities. Refusing to choose does not stop the evening from ending.

Daniel has been protecting himself from imperfect outcomes.

So far, he has preserved an impressive number of evenings he cannot remember.

This is where Sun's banana proposition becomes difficult to dismiss.

Something is here. It can nourish you. It will change. Understanding this is useful, but understanding alone leaves you standing beside the counter.

There is still the matter of reaching for it.

For our final experiment, we place a ripe banana in front of Daniel and invite him to explain its significance.

He studies it for a moment.

Then he peels it and eats it.

This is a serious procedural problem. We were using that banana.

Daniel says he thought that was the point.

The research team requests a brief recess.

During the recess, Daniel opens the unfinished song. He writes a second verse. It is uneven. He changes two lines, records it, listens, and changes another.

A friend asks whether he wants to meet for lunch.

He says yes and suggests a time.

We return to discover that he has made several decisions without first establishing what they mean for his identity.

He appears unharmed.

We ask whether he would be willing to describe this breakthrough at a follow-up session.

He checks his calendar.

For the first time in the study, “I have plans” refers to something that is happening.

Daniel leaves to meet his friend.

We remain behind to improve the wording.

Three weeks later, he has finished the song.

Our paper is still under review.

The reviewer finds the central argument promising but recommends giving it more time.

Funding disclosure: The research budget was sufficient to purchase six bananas. Almost all expenditure went toward creating the conditions in which they could be eaten.