solidthomas.com

I thought I’d take a moment to reflect on what the Gallup Organization believes are my signature themes…. my top 5 character/personality traitswhich, if they are to be believed, will tend to proliferate themselves in all aspects of my life.  I took this survey about five years ago, when I started with Stryker.  I’m not convinced that these themes are infallible.  That said, I don’t have any major disagreement with their analysis — In fact, I think some of these begin to describe me very well!

I’ve decided to break this article up into separate posts.  Today I’ll talk about one of the five strengths each post and the conclusion will be attached to the final strength.

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Hi everyone!  I’m “Solid” Thomas, and this is my new blog site which I promise to faithfully ignore and forget to post to as often as possible 🙂

Sitting at work... playing with camera phone...

If you’re wondering about the nickname, here’s the story.  Last summer I finally found a home for my faith — somewhere that I felt I could grow spiritually.  That place is Granger Community Church, which is located in Granger, IN about 15 minutes or so from where I live.  In about October of last year, I finally realized that the best way to feel comfortable at a church that size (5,000+ attendees per weekend) is to become involved beyond just showing up.  One weekend they offered a “VolunTOUR” which is an opportunity to take a guided tour through the facility and be shown the various opportunities that the church has for its members to become involved on-campus.   

This tour, given by Brian (a volunteer who occasionally plays bass for the worship team), was very eye opening for me.  It is amazing how much work goes into creating the atmosphere there which allows people to feel comfortable even on their first visit.  They need people who clean, plant flowers, mow lawns, teach children, sing, dance, play instruments, collect offerings, greet people at the front door, check kids in to their classes….  there are dozens of different jobs to do on a given weekend and they are ALL important!  Given my past working with the stage crew in high school, I felt like I would be right at home working with the technical arts team, so I expressed interest there and they took my name.

A few days later, I was contacted by Kim Volheim, the Creative Arts Talent Specialist.  Kim invited me in to interview me and give me a rundown of what specific needs they had on the tech arts side, and to see where I’d be a fit.  I told him about my history with stage crew — Lighting, flashpots, spotlights, set construction, etc — and he suggested that the spotlight history, in particular, made me a good candidate for an I-Mag Camera operator.  So, I signed up! (continue reading…)