Sometimes life feels like it is confusing, chaotic and uncertain, especially today when we might feel that the kind of civilisationand values which have sustained us for generations are collapsing. And so many around us, including in the media, are responding with conflict and extreme views, or helplessness and despair. We are living in a post-truth era, and itmay not look so nice. So we all need our own compass to show us a way to live when things seem to be going to pieces. We need to carve our own path up the mountain. If things seem to be going to pieces we don't need to be going to pieces with it. We can direct ourselves to awareness and a life that makes sense, including a life of kindness and caring. Our compass is the development of qualities and capacities that we and those around us need at these times. The Paramis, in particular, are a Buddhist teaching of inner capacities derived from a bigger, freer view of reality, with which we go out in the street, we act and we relate to others and the world around.