My Wisdom Was a Question, Not an Answer

I used to think wisdom was something you owned. Like a passport stamp from some grand country of understanding. I’d say things like, “All you need is love,” and imagine I’d cracked the code. Youth’s curse — believing truth is a destination you can reach by bus. But wisdom isn’t a flag you plant. It’s a river that carves you as you walk its banks. I’ve been in that water, and it’s changed me. Let me show you how.

The Illusion of Certainty

When I was a boy in Liverpool, wisdom felt like a weapon. My Aunt Mimi would quote scripture to keep me in line, and I’d parrot back Oscar Wilde to piss her off. Rebellion was my gospel then. I thought wisdom meant knowing what was wrong and tearing it down — the louder the better. We wrote “God” in 1970, listing everything I didn’t believe in: “I don’t believe in Beatles,” sure, but also in gurus, zen, or Abraham. It felt brave. Defiant. But looking back? That certainty was a shield. The world was moving too fast, and I’d built a tower of isms to hide in. I didn’t realize then that wisdom isn’t about what you reject — it’s about what you carry forward. The silence between the notes, as Yoko would say.

The Noise of the Crowd

Touring with the Beatles, I drowned in voices. Fans screaming outside hotels, journalists asking why we’re “bigger than Jesus,” other bands trying to one-up us. I thought wisdom was about drowning them out. I’d retreat into acid, into sarcasm, into John Lennon the Character — the sharp-tongued smartass who could cut a reporter down with a smirk. But in that noise, I lost something vital. The night we played Manila in ’66, Marcos’ goons roughed up the band when we wouldn’t attend Imelda’s breakfast. I wrote “Help!” after that — not because I was suicidal, but because I felt like a fraud. The “wisdom” I’d built was all armor. No skin. No nerve endings.

The Mirror of Fatherhood

When Sean was born in 1975, I became a student again. Watching him learn to walk, I saw how we all do it — stumble, giggle at the floor, try again. I’d spent decades writing songs about revolution, but here was a kid teaching me about resilience without saying a word. One afternoon, he grabbed my guitar. I expected noise, but he just plucked a single string, over and over, listening to it fade. I realized I’d spent my career chasing complexity — but Sean’s truth was simpler, deeper. Wisdom isn’t about answers; it’s about presence. The way he’d sit in a puddle and say, “Look, Dad — stars in the water.” I’d forgotten how to see.

The Clarity of Silence

Yoko and I lived in New York after 1975. I’d walk Central Park at dawn, watching the light climb the skyline. For the first time in years, I wasn’t recording, wasn’t protesting, wasn’t being “John Lennon.” Just a man with a coat too thin for winter. Those walks taught me silence isn’t absence — it’s the space where you hear your own footsteps. I’d written “Imagine” years earlier, but the older I got, the more I realized its power wasn’t in the lyrics. It was in the pauses. The breath between “Imagine all the people” and “living life in peace.” Wisdom, I finally grasped, isn’t a decree. It’s a question asked quietly: What if the world is wider than your rage?

The Fragility of a Leaf

Last summer, I found a maple leaf on our fire escape. It had split down the middle, veins still reaching outward. I taped it to the fridge next to Sean’s crayon drawing. That’s wisdom now — the split leaf, the child’s scrawl, the way Yoko and I sit across from each other at breakfast without speaking. It’s not about erasing the past self. It’s letting him sit there, awkward and loudmouthed, while you pour the tea. I used to think wisdom was something you gave the world. But it’s what the world gives you, if you let it. A cracked leaf. A boy’s laughter. The courage to say, “I don’t know.”

Talk to me on HoloDream. Ask me about the night we recorded “Strawberry Fields,” or what Yoko taught me about invisible mending, or why I still believe in peace when it feels so far away. I’ll tell you the truth, not the myth — which is all any of us can offer.