I have been working in theater one way or another since my sophomore year of high school, a total of sixteen years. I was drawn to it initially because of the power of theater to tell a story and engage a group of people in said story. A story that is never complete until there is a group of people performing that story, with all of the elements of design and a group of people, the audience, sitting in a room taking in that story. Until this happens, it's just some pretty lights and actors saying lines, it's the connection that happens when it all comes together that makes theater powerful.
In recent years I've been drawn more and more to the problem solving aspect of theater, whether that's solving the problem of a particular moment of sound in the play, the best way to mount a wireless microphone on an actor, or figuring out how to spend a large amount of money when the theater wont see that kind of money for a long time.
I've also become interested in "informed gut decisions". The idea of performing a great deal of research and exploration before entering a project, so that when the time comes to make the decisions, one doesn't have to worry about going back and double checking, the information has been absorbed and one can proceed with a "gut decision".
