Backstory

I’m a graphic designer, wife, mom, lover of the creator and all of creation. To me, taking care of God’s creation and living the way He intended us to live is what being green and the move towards living sustainably is all about. As a graphic designer, I quest to find ways of telling the truth simply and effectively. I think that a lot of problems can be solved by good, clear communication.

I believe that God has created each of us for a specific purpose and it’s our job to figure out what that purpose is. Each of us has things that God has placed on our hearts. For me it has been the environment. And though we are a family in the marketing business, we could never have been considered tree huggers. But I’ve always had a love of nature. While I was in art school, I took Environmental Science as an elective just because I’ve always loved being in nature and amazed at the designs we find in all of creation.

A few years ago, I again felt that desire to do something with my skills as a visual problem solver to help the environment. So, I prayed that God would use me in that way. The following week I got a call from a consulting firm. The head of the firm had been the CEO of the Bush administration’s Energy Policy Development Group. They were changing the name of their firm and their focus to energy and environment and needed a graphic designer to design their new logo. (How they found me is another God story). I thought, “Wow, if I wanted to help the environment, I couldn’t get any closer to the top than that.” Clearly an answer to prayer.

Since then, I’ve educated myself on the issues—reading as much as I could, seeking out information and even retooled my logo, web site, and marketing material to reflect my commitment to the environment. I wasn’t sure what I would do exactly with all of the info I was reading but I felt called to it.

As I was reading about the things we can do as individuals to help the environment, it occurred to me that most of us already know what to do. We know we need to recycle. We know we should consider where our food comes from. We know we need to think about what happens to stuff after we throw it away.

The problem is that we don’t stop and think about these things moment by moment. We are creatures of habit and so we need to be reminded that we should stop and think about the choices we are making. And then it came to me….Stop. Think… it’s so simple…

The resulting image is a green stop sign shape with the words THINK instead of STOP.

I didn’t do anything with it right away. I felt that it was too obvious. Still, I thought it might be a good way to promote my design skills. As I shared it, people convinced me that it could be much more—that I could make stickers and T-shirts and plaster the neighborhood with www.stopthinkgreen.com.

And then it hit me. This symbol was God’s answer to my prayer for him to use me and my skills to make a visible and tangible impact – a prayer I had prayed out loud, in my car, just a few days before.

I know that by looking at the symbol, it’s just one small thing. But I see a lot of potential and am trusting that God will use it for impact. I feel in my heart that it’s His idea, it’s His project and he will let me take it as far as I am willing to follow him in it.

No matter what your beliefs are, I hope you will find some truths in my pages.

Thanks for visiting.

Dorothy Pesch Banzon