A clear and accurate map helps get us from one place to another. Reliance upon our favorite smartphone or in-car map has become so apparent that we often use it to navigate around town to familiar places. We do so for real-time traffic updates, alternative routes, or simply because we fear missing a turn and arriving late. Without a good map and accurate positioning, we’re left feeling lost and disoriented.

Life rarely has reliable roadmaps. Regardless of our chosen destination—a school, career, partner, family, success, influence, health, or happiness—the pathways to our intended goals and aspirations are not as established as we’re often led to believe. Certainly, others have taken the journey before you and others before them. There is, indeed, a tested roadway or path, but it’s rarely built with long-lasting materials.

Many of us know what it’s like to live in a region where the roads are constantly under construction for repair or improvement. The sight of orange signs and barriers in your daily routine is enough to create frustration and a mild headache. Now imagine life in a city where most roads are regularly closed, detoured, and rebuilt every few years. Not only would that be a frustrating and confusing existence, but it would require our maps to reflect the unceasing changes. Without accurate maps, we’re left following numerous dead ends and unexpected detours. So when the map is no longer helpful, we require a compass.

A compass doesn’t tell you where you are; it reveals the direction you’re traveling. A compass isn’t used for positioning but for orientation. Life doesn’t operate on a well-charted path or use accurate maps. This is increasingly apparent in a fast-moving and always-changing world. Therefore, a reliable and trusted compass becomes necessary for everyday living.

An inner compass—a set of hopeful and future-oriented values—is necessary for navigating the uncertain times we face. Values that are adaptable, unconditional, liberating, and exist to benefit the common good become a reliable compass for leading yourself and others with courage and confidence. Values are always personal and self-determined but shaped in the context of community and experience. Choose your community of influence—choose your values and your future. 

Vibrant and sustainable communities of tomorrow are future-oriented while grounded in present-day realities. Their compass is attuned to a now-shifted true north. They are not as concerned with why the road is no longer in front of them but with how to arrive at a hopeful destination they know is still possible. Values like holistic perspectives, openness, a commitment to progress, and seeking equitable outcomes are the intricate parts of a resilient compass that can guide us where yesterday’s maps are no longer reliable. These values are built on fundamental human virtues like love, beauty, curiosity, creativity, compassion, and justice.

The values that will guide us into the future are not as familiar as the storied roads of the past, the neighborhoods we grew up in, or the communities we once belonged to. New stories, new experiences, and new hopeful communities can help shape our beliefs and our future for a better tomorrow.

We don’t need accurate maps, but an upgraded compass.