J. Cole’s new track “What If” is a storytelling song where he imagines the regret and “what if” questions around a deadly feud between close friends, clearly inspired by the real‑life fallout and deaths of Tupac Shakur and The Notorious B.I.G.

Core idea of “what if j cole lyrics”

  • The song circles around the question: what if things never went left between two brothers in hip‑hop who loved each other but got torn apart by ego, rumors, and street pressures?
  • J. Cole writes from the perspective of each side of the feud, letting both men speak on betrayal, missed chances to talk, and the pain of watching things spiral into violence.
  • The hook (“What if I could turn back the hands of time… what if the bullshit never got in the way?”) is about wishing you could undo ego, bad decisions, and outside manipulation before it costs somebody their life.

Key themes in the lyrics

1. Regret and missed chances

Cole has the narrator admit he should’ve reached out (“while you was locked I shoulda wrote you, but life happened, promo, mad shows to do”), but didn’t.

That small failure to check in turns into a bigger wedge, as the other person feels abandoned and starts talking down on him from prison.

2. Ego, imitation, and competition

There are lines about:

  • Feeling like a friend “switched up yo lane,” and their content started “resemblin’ mine.”
  • Still cheering them on publicly, even while secretly hurt, which mirrors how friendly competition in rap can quietly turn into resentment.

Cole is basically showing how ego and pride can twist normal artistic overlap into a full‑blown rivalry.

3. Street pressure and betrayal

The verses talk about hanging with “venomous niggas” and ignoring warnings, then getting caught in a setup and sent to prison.

Inside, the character starts to believe:

  • “Maybe you knew about that setup.”
  • “Maybe you could’ve saved me.”
    That paranoia fuels the decision to come out ready for “war,” with a “whole side ready to ride,” escalating tension instead of fixing it.

4. Choosing peace over revenge

By the end, the narrator is breaking down, with “tears fillin’ my eyes” and a letter that “helped me understand the power in love, the choice to be the bigger man.”

He accepts blame — “I’ll take the blame for it… I couldn’t take you gettin’ slain for it” — and apologizes from the heart.

That’s Cole’s big moral pivot: the realization that revenge, ego, and “dissing” aren’t worth a human life or a lost brotherhood.

How it connects to Tupac and Biggie

  • Coverage points out that Cole raps “as both The Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac,” re‑imagining their feud from each side’s inner thoughts.
  • Instead of just name‑dropping them, he explores what it might have felt like to:
    • Be locked up and think your friend betrayed you.
    • Be on the outside, trying to calm things down while everyone around you wants escalation.
  • The constant “What if?” questions become a tribute and a cautionary tale about what hip‑hop lost when that conflict turned fatal.

Mini breakdown: message of the song

If you zoom out, “What If” is about:

  1. How small misunderstandings plus pride can snowball into deadly beef.
  1. How outside voices (the streets, crews, media) keep pushing for drama instead of resolution.
  1. How maturity looks like stepping back, apologizing, and choosing love over proving a point.

A simple way to think about it: the lyrics ask, What if we chose conversation instead of confrontation before it was too late?

TL;DR:
In “What If,” J. Cole writes from both sides of a Pac‑and‑Biggie‑style feud, diving into regret, ego, prison paranoia, and street pressure, then ultimately pushing a message of love, accountability, and wishing you could rewind time before anyone got killed.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.