I'm going to talk about the "C" word today. It's a word I used to be pretty nervous about it. But ever since Rachel and I have had that W.N. Murray reading hanging on our wall, the word commitment has been one of my favorites.

"There is one elementary truth: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would otherwise never have occurred."

How do you know you're "definitely committed?" I think it has to do with speaking your commitments out loud. That's different than saying them to yourself for a couple of reasons. First, you hear yourself say it, and once it's out of your head and into the open air, it's got a reality that's hard to ignore. Second, and even more important, other people hear you say it and they want to believe in you. Many of them will support you. And that's when the surprises start.

Good stuff has happened to me because I've made commitments. And the best stuff is what I never expected.

I was pretty paranoid about the whole idea of commitment for a long time. Just ask Rachel. Finally, she got around to asking me to marry her. Which was a good thing, because as soon as I agreed, things began to happen that I hadn't even thought of, not least because my time horizon for making plans now began to stretch beyond next week. It became natural to not only plan a wedding but to also decide to buy a house together-to think big. Take a trip to Australia for the America's Cup? Sure! Have a baby? Good idea!

A couple years before that, I'd inherited my job at Sailing World magazine, when the chief editor left. Ever since then, I'd been trying to decide what my next job should be. Now, with this new concept of commitment, it occurred to me I didn't need to move on. In fact, I liked my job and maybe there was some value to be had if I committed to doing the best possible job I could-telling stories that were both entertaining and accurate. Maybe if I didn't treat this job as if it were just something to do before I graduated to the next thing, maybe some good stuff could happen. Who could argue with getting paid while learning more about writing, editing, sailing, publishing technology, business, and more. I could travel now and then to some really cool places. I could even help out some non-profit sailing groups I'd begun to participate in.

I'm sure you've all made similar life-changing decisions. The first thing that seems to happen when you have a commitment, once the initial excitement wears off, is that you suffer a crisis or two. All the things that make it impossible to fulfill on your commitment arise. Often, however, the crisis you'll have is entirely inside your brain. That's where the inner conversation comes in.

In my case, I made the commitment to stick with my job-and said so out loud to family and friends. There were plenty of problems that cropped up, but I'll just tell you about one. A big part of an editor's job is writing and editing. A small part is being a spokesperson for the magazine. Guess which one I found harder?

In college, I was slow to form my thoughts in class and always seemed to be ready to raise my hand right after the discussion moved on to the next subject. In my fraternity, my halting speaking style at house meetings quickly earned me the nickname "Capt. No Doze." All my brothers felt they needed that over the counter caffeine drug to stay awake while I finished my sentences.

You might say I was not only a poor public speaker, but an insecure one, too.

But as chief editor, I had to make awards presentations and other speeches. One time I went on a cable TV show and made the mistake of looking down at the monitor where I saw myself, looking at myself. I was tongue-tied and although I recovered, I never wanted to go through that again.

My best defense was to have written notes, and if possible write out my speech completely. I learned that if I was well prepared, I could deal with my stage fright. If I got nervous, all I had to do was read my script. Later, I discovered that I could sometimes edit my text on the fly, perhaps ad libbing about something that happened earlier. I could begin to relax and actually have some fun. Maybe in another 10 years I'll even start telling jokes.

If I hadn't made that unexpected leap, would I, 10 years later, have said, "I'll take on being the worship committee chair." And I would've had heart failure a few months later when I found 16 people in our living room talking about how our minister was leaving and that our committee would soon be responsible for leading every service for at least a year.

In fact, the toughest part of that process was dealing with my inner conversation. On the subject of worship, I knew I was pretty clueless. For example: What is worship? What is Unitarian Universalist worship? Should we do things the way they'd always been done or would it better to make changes? How consistent should the services be from Sunday to Sunday? And the really tough one-during each service, when should the announcements be made?

None of us were experts and our services, while genuine, were far from smooth. We even used to joke that something had to go wrong at least once in every service. Occasionally we were intimidated by the idea that we amateurs were leading a spiritual, religious exercise for others-at least I was-but at the same time, in an overall sense, we shared an extremely powerful experience. Later we came up with a name for it which has stuck around-ministry together, or shared ministry.

If I'd been lurking in the shadows, afraid to speak up and to lead, others committed to Channing would have worked us through that period. But I would've missed out on the opportunity to contribute and to grow. I didn't, because of a commitment I made a decade earlier.

*So commitments we make every day can and will play a role years down the line. That may be the best reason to make commitments. But here are two others:

First, we learn a lot and we often learn fast. That's because we over the counter caffeine drug have to ask a lot of questions. When we start out, we don't have the experience or tools to achieve our goals. Take, for example, the decision to have a family. For most of us, as young adults, we might as well be putting a man on the moon. But as time goes on, we learn how to live with and care for a pregnant wife. How to change diapers. Even how to share a house with a teenage daughter. We adjust. We change. We stay engaged.

A second good reason to make commitments is to find out what's important to us. Last year I said I was committed to writing a book. I quickly discovered this wasn't going to be easy. Two significant obstacles appeared-one relating to my commitments at Channing, the other to the fact our magazine was put up for sale. There was probably no way I was going to write that book last year, but if it had been a "must do" for me, I'd still be working toward its completion. Instead, I realized it wasn't absolutely important to me. I let it go and have moved on.

Is it depressing or frustrating when circumstances conspire against you? Sure. And sometimes you have to change your plans. But the value of a commitment is that it gives you the vision and the will to dance with the circumstances and with a bit of persistence, you can usually make progress toward where you want to go. Sometimes things get really bad and you wish you'd never made the commitment in the first place. But even if you had no commitments, bad things would happen anyway; that's the nature of life. Only now you'd have no lens to look at what's happened, put it in perspective, and move ahead again.

As an editor, I've made mistakes both in fact and in judgment. Sometimes, I've just had the bad luck to run the wrong article at the wrong time. I've been sued by one boatbuilder for libel and had another launch a personal vendetta to get me fired. Worse, I've had to slash budgets and, in a couple cases, eliminate someone's job. Illness, stress, sleepless nights, and high-blood pressure have sometimes resulted. I've needed help and support from my family, friends, this community. And the lifeline that's always led me back into my work has been my commitment to accurate, fair, entertaining stories. I can't change whatever's happened, whatever we've printed; but if when I hear from people who are upset, I can speak from my commitment, I can usually find actions that are constructive and supportive.

I think most of the errors that I've made at Channing fall in the category: errors of omission rather than commission. There are dozens of things I've said I would do that I haven't done, or that I've taken months to do when I might have done them in a week. Sure, I could blame my oversubscribed "to do" list-and sometimes I do. Sometimes I let the conversation in my head take over. That's when I find myself sitting on the couch feeling powerless and overwhelmed, thinking "You blew that one, John." Or. "Why didn't you call Amy when you said you would?" I can think up excuses with the best of them, but eventually I sit up and say, "OK, you have 20 things to do. Pick one and do it right now." Usually it means making a phone call to simply acknowledge that I didn't do what I said I would. That clears my head, engages me with someone else who, typically, is also committed to what I want, and it therefore brings me back to what I wanted to do in the first place.

Some kinds of commitments don't involve man-on-the-moon types of challenges. Our singing group was originally Lisa and Rachel deciding to sing together every Monday night at 7:30. Since they started meeting at our house, I got invited.

Showing up every Monday night was a simple commitment but it's really enriched my life-people, music, and especially having my children be around that much more music and be encouraged overtly or otherwise to make their own music. I've developed a more intuitive understanding of music. I'm better at listening to others while I sing and harmonizing. I've made some real friends with people I might never have hung out with otherwise. They've encouraged and taught me how to play the guitar. I've written half a dozen songs, one of which I sang earlier about a stressful period at work last fall. The guitar has, in fact, helped me handle stress better. And today, although Robert couldn't be here except through the instruction he's given me on the guitar, Lisa, Rachel, Jim, and Tom have helped me lead a service at Channing.

None of us in this world is exactly like Jimmy Stewart in "It's a Wonderful Life," but in fact, we're all like him. Things happen for other people because we said we'd do something and then we did it and it had an effect on their lives. The same can be said for some people in Newport more than a century ago, without whom we wouldn't be here.

I've been chairing a group here for the last year called the Strategic Planning Task Force, a group that exists mainly because we found damage to our steeple two years ago, decided we should do something about it, and then thought, well, we'd better look at the big picture first before we decide what to do about the steeple.

Our task force has met with many of you, conducted research, and finally drafted a report with goals for the church and recommended actions. We'll be meeting with board members and committee chairs for a workshop next week, and expect to offer the same to the congregation in early April. I'd like to say three things about this group.

First-and here's the inner conversation coming to the surface-the slow pace of our work has been eating at me; mainly because I know that at times I've dragged my feet, been indecisive, and truly lacked the vision to move it along more quickly.

Secondly, and more importantly, I'm pretty excited about what our group has done, and I hope you'll be too when you read the next revision, in the April Catalyst. One goal we wrote is to improve and restore our buildings.

That brings me to my third point. Going through the process with all of you, I've begun to feel that this church is extraordinary; it has a unique brand of spirituality, shared ministry, and connected community, all housed in an historic structure. We wouldn't be here if not for commitments made by others back in the 19th century. They felt building this place was worthwhile; in my mind, our congregation today is proof of that. Why shouldn't we show equal commitment to preserving and enhancing this place as an institution for those who come later.

My commitment is to find that larger, shared vision among us that will help us achieve the goals in our strategic plan. That includes finding the funds to repair and restore the steeple.

I wouldn't be saying this, by the way, if I were paying heed to my inner conversation. The obstacles are large. I don't know where the money's going to come from. But I have some ideas. And they've come to me from imagining what will happen here not after we reach our goals, but what we'll accomplish in the process of being successful.

Imagine the jam-packed services, twice as many members, activities every night of the week, thriving religious education, and outreach programs that have a positive impact on social and environmental issues. Fundraising to revamp our buildings and repair the steeple will be natural out-growths of the process. It's exciting to contemplate what's going to happen, not because I know it's going to happen, but perhaps because I can feel it happening already. I have a good feeling about the future here because there are so many people here with commitments that speak to each other. Let's hear some of them now.