Welcome to the latest Tap-In! Our special guest is the perfect fit for today, Valentine’s Day, as her spirit is full of love, passion, creativity and unstoppable feminine energy. Welcome Mindy Tsonas — artist, writer, workshop instructor and hostess, and all-around inspiring person! What strikes me most about Mindy is her ability to live REAL in a mindful and authentic way and her mission to invite and empower others to do the same. And, for your Valentine’s Day pleasure, she fires up this post with a little sexy spicy story that you can enjoy as you nibble on your chocolates and sip your glass of red…Susan: I’ve been a fan and follower of your blog for many years. You’ve always put yourself out there with such authenticity, passion and vulnerability, telling your stories, and empowering other women (and men) to get in touch with their own ‘true north.’ You talk about being a Wish Alchemist. Tell us more about that.
Mindy: Wish Alchemy is a sort of life-magic that found me along my creative path over the last ten years. It’s a certain kind of physics that happens when you make big wishes out loud and then take the steps, both big and small, to help make them a reality. Aligned with inner truth and a daring heart, transformation happens… from ordinary to extraordinary. Real alchemy in the everyday. Proof of this is in the pages of my own journey every step of the way, and it has become a big part of my work to support women in discovering their own unique inner magic of making wishes come true.
Susan: You are very open about your unconventional marriage; how you and your husband have come to redefine your loving partnership. You have said, “I decidedly live unabashedly outside of the box, and the closet.” Tell us about this.
Mindy: The thing about authentic, creative living and Wish Alchemy is that it has a momentum and energy of its own. It keeps nudging you, wanting you to keep expanding and growing into the fullest expression of yourself. For me, getting brave in my creative life not only led me to finding my true artistic voice, but it led to other inner explorations including authentic sexuality. Somewhere along the way I learned to have hard conversations and get comfortable with my own vulnerability, which later led to being able to having these kinds of conversations out loud, with my partner. Once those doors were open, we stepped into a brand new place of re-defining and claiming what marriage was for us. We’d never given any real thought to it. We didn’t know we could, and so we did what most couples do and simply defaulted to the standard ideals of marriage. Twelve years in, that all changed. Our marriage truth includes a deep and unwavering commitment to each other as both a partnership and as individuals, which has meant exploring the boundaries of monogamy and shifting in the direction of a more monogamish and open marriage. It has also pushed us to come out in broader truths of sexuality, including my husband’s orientation as bisexual. It has become important to us both to be completely out about who we are, to be a positive voice in the world of non-normative relationships. One of the biggest misconceptions about being in an open marriage is that something is missing from the primary relationship, when in truth we’ve never been closer and the picture has never been more fully realized.
Susan: Your alchemical workshops and gatherings are full of sisterhood, art-making, and embracing a vibrant, authentic life. Give us a bird’s eye view into one of them.
Mindy: The Inner Alchemy Circles I host are full of such wild creative magic and deep inner wisdom! Every season we explore a different energy and theme. Through the creation of a personalized deck of Alchemy Cards using thoughtful prompts and intuition from amazing guides, every person discovers new layers of inner knowledge – the star stuff that’s already in our marrow. And there are always surprises, as the cards hold such power through the process of imbibing them with visual story and heart-centered truth. The decks that end up being created and shared in my circles are simply incredible, each with its own energy and light that becomes a sacred tool to be used and treasured forever! We circle in April around the element of Water and in the flow of emotions. I hope you’ll join me! And I’m thrilled a certain Tap-In hostess will be bringing her Fire to our July circle.
Susan: Yes! The feeling is mutual my friend.
Susan: I’m a subscriber to your Love Letters email where you share intimate adventures of your open marriage. Which adventure is your favorite so far? I’d love to share it here. Let’s turn up the heat for readers on this Valentine’s Day!
Mindy: Choosing a favorite story is like choosing your favorite child! I love them all for different reasons as they each reveal such different aspects of my exploration. Some are more narrative and in the nitty gritty, others are more thought and feeling experiments in the broader landscape of my sexuality. But they are all honest, and real, and unabashedly true. Here is one of the reader favorites:
{James}
We decided to meet at a local Barnes & Noble. It seemed fitting after the novella of decadent and probing emails we had already exchanged over the past couple of months, both of us with an affinity for expressing ourselves through the written word, a connection in and of itself that was very, very satisfying. It was fall, and the leaves were just beginning to turn. Change was in the air.
I arrived first. Not early, just shy of fashionably late so as not to seem too eager. I felt like a teenager, fidgety and awkward, out on a first date, and not like a grown woman out on an adventure of her own making.
From what we knew of each other already, chances were good that there would be something juicy there. After all, we had already laid bare a lot of the pretense that two people have to work through before figuring out if they are a match. It’s the chemistry that is always the big question – is it there or not? It’s not something you can ever plan for or even anticipate. Just a seed of it has to be there. I had my hopes.
I stood in the cafe line for a cup of tea and something to do while I waited, not really thirsty at all. The smell of books and din of ease around me was comforting. Doubtful many other people were here on a first date.
I sat down with my steaming cup, twirled the handle and dipped the minty teabag in and out of the hot liquid. Waiting. Nervous. It’s funny how on first dates there are always these deep wells of nerves – like I am the only one on display. But with James, I sort of was.
And then he appeared. We greeted each other politely, drinking one another in. He was taller than I expected, well dressed, well mannered. Extremely confident and self contained. Completely the opposite of how I felt. It was both unnerving and very sexy. He sat himself down in the chair opposite me, swinging a long leg over the seat back and plunking down unapologetically. He took up a lot of space comparative to his lean frame, and had a sort of presence that felt intimidating but like the safety of a wide wing-span at the same time.
With a bit of wicked playfulness, he told me he’d been watching me. That he’d been here all along, standing on the balcony and waiting for me to arrive when he saw me come in, buy my tea, and sit and stew in sweet anticipation. He was pleased with himself, savoring this little tidbit as the realization unfurled around me, and how it obviously made me feel. It was edgy desire, consuming, a shadow sort of fairytale for sure. He was always one step ahead of me from the very beginning.
Past all of the small talk, he wanted to go somewhere private to finish our conversation. It was more a request than an invitation. He stood up and held out his hand, startling me by grasping my wrist and tugging me toward the door. There would be no hand holding.
He gave me brief instructions and directions, hopped into his shiny, black BMW, and took off. All I had to do was try to follow his lead.
This was the beginning of the story of James.
Here’s the lesson —–> We have agency. Impossible, daring, delicious, wondrous things can be made into reality!
The gift of being an adult is that we can make our own choices, master our own dreams, actualize our desires, and make fantasies real…. without guilt, without shame, without any judgment at all. The life we want is out there waiting for us, if only we are brave enough to go after it.
And there is so much to discover! More than we even realized. So many new feelings to feel, sensations to allow, moments to savor…
Susan: I’m fanning myself over here Mindy.:-) And, readers, if you’d like to indulge in more of Mindy’s steamy love letters, you can sign up HERE!
Thank you Mindy for sharing!
Happy Valentine’s Day! XO
Read about her life and discoveries on her blog. Get a little more intimate with her story in her weekly Life, Unabashed Love Letters. Find out about artful and alchemical workshops and gatherings she hosts. Gift yourself with handmade art, tools or totems for a bit of her creative magic.
When not writing or making things with wild kindreds, you’ll probably find Mindy hunting and gathering unique treasures and stories, taking photos of everyday beauty, sipping dirty martinis with extra olives, tangled up in a sexy adventure, or barefoot on the beach chasing after her boys on the Plum Island shore.