When considering navigation, the questions become: “Doesn’t one need to know exactly where one wants to go? And what does one do if the compass ever proves to be false? Does one trust the compass again?”

When using a compass for navigation one doesn’t necessarily need to know absolutely where one wants to go. One only needs to think of true exploration, where one only has a general idea of where one wants to go, as in “Go West, Young Man.”

In that case, one orients oneself with the compass — one figures out which way is west. Then one sights in on something in the distance that can be used as a landmark in that general direction, understanding that some variations will present themselves: a river, a deep ravine, or anything else that will block one’s direct path.

These kinds of blockages happen to all of us in our personal journey.

But, one keeps one’s eye on the distant landmark; which we’ll say is the tall tree in the distance. Ideally, once one gets a little ways along, one can sight back to something as a landmark where one began, which gives one a way to begin to establish the line one is traveling. This allows one to correct one’s course.

In the purely personal journey, the landmark of where one began can be served by a journal or other reminder of where one has been, but it helps if it’s more than the memory of the events which led one to the place of departure. The journal serves well because the honest journal will capture the feelings one had as described in brutal honesty of the moments one felt them.

When one reaches the distant point, the “tree,” then one re-sights on another, further landmark.

The same thing basic idea can be applied to our own journey, where the only absolute one may have is where one is, and some distant tree.

The reality is that we are often stuck in a trackless desert with no landmarks to sight on. In this case one must simply trust the compass. In these times it helps to have a bearing on the sun, or the North Star, finding these things figuratively in one’s life.

All of us have these internal reference points.

We tend to overlook these internal reference points, because in order to find them we must look within, which is the hardest work any of us have to do. We prefer to find our landmarks in other people or in some escape of some sort, not realizing that the distant landmarks we find in others are often at least quite transitory, and at worst a trick and a lie.

It seems that one must trust something, or wander lost. If one is observant, one can always find something that is true, even if it’s not leading directly to one’s destination. Once some truth is established, then it becomes a matter of faith and wisdom to find one’s way.