To understand The Paper Seahorse, you must know Tona Bell. And if you knew Tona Bell you would understand that an adequate description of the force that is Tona must be told by someone else. She's just not focused on herself in that way. I'll do my best.

"I'm not suggesting that Faeries and Pixies actually exist. And if they did, I'm not saying Tona Bell is one of them."

It just that if you characterized these magical creatures as glimmering, and gliding through the world with and grace and purpose, ever in motion, pausing now and then to admire a blossom before fluttering off, leaving a a trail of beauty and enchantment in their wake, I might have to change my mind. This is what it is like to know Tona.

I know this first hand - Tona is my wife, and my partner, and my best friend, and I'm so very grateful to on a great journey with her for the majority of my time on this planet. Her abounding creativity and her ability to navigate the margins of the rational and the magical worlds, often delivers delightfully surprising results.

As a lifelong learner, she has much to offer as a teacher. People easily connect with Tona because her teaching style is immediate, present and from the heart. There are families from the neighborhood who walk together to one of her classes, and there are people who incredibly fly in from far away places to be part of a workshop or retreat. That still amazes us both! They are all seeking new experience, knowledge and connection. I believe that the spaces that Tona creates for people, whether its a designing physical environment, or a space for personal growth and creative expression, is a huge part of what brings the community together.

I believe Tona has the soul of an artist, the heart of a humanitarian, and the determination of a revolutionary. Through The Paper Seahorse, she discovered her calling as a teacher, allowing her to integrate all three.

Its inspiring to look at all the thousands of people she has helped find calm and balance in our digitally chaotic world by putting aside our phones for a minute and reconnecting with themselves and others IRL!

Tona says she has always been driven. When she was young she excelled in dance and if you are lucky over a cup of tea she may tell you about the time she shared a stage with Sammy Davis Jr. Through elementary school she lived in a rural central Florida town where her mother was the Librarian. This is probably the spark of Tona's love of books and reading, and of what keeps pulling her back to the benefits of a simpler, slower life. Her small and lovely world dramatically expanded when her father's job took the family overseas. Tona spent her middle school years in Puerto Rico and high school in the Philippines. I wonder if her immersion into strikingly different cultures had an influence on her curiosity and adaptability - especially when encountering people from diverse backgrounds. After college she applied those skills to rapidly rise to become a top account executive at, what was at the time, the "coolest ad agency" in town - the one with the legendary hot-ticket parties.

I met Tona when she was only 25, and I was an independent director / writer who just turned 30, and I quickly became enchanted. At the time she loved the fast pace and striving for excellence that her job provided, but the aggressively transactional nature of advertising left her feeling cold inside, and she often came home crying because she really wanted a job where she could help people. We joined forces and built our own production company - Tricycle Studios - that embodied our values. Together, we built a very successful new media company and became honored to work with some of the best known companies in the world. Making media that we thought mattered.

I admire Tona's ability to continually change, adapt and evolve through her life - like having the courage to leave her "corporate" job, starting The Paper Seahorse, and all along adding valuable practices like daily letter and journal writing.

In the beginning, The Paper Seahorse was created to fill the void left when the last true stationery store closed in Tampa. Tona and I both travelled extensively and went out of our way to visit some of the finest independant stationery and paper stores in the world. Tona had a clear vision for creating a space to welcome the digitally weary - those who found comfort in slowing down and writing, making or creating by hand. What she designed was her version of a world-class stationery shop and gathering place. Visitors are so happy when they step into the brightly sunlit 1917 craftsman bungalow that houses both workshop spaces and the Campus Store, and say things like, " I've found my people!" and "I already feel so much more relaxed." After that, more often than not, they would open up and share a story about a special person and how letters or writing connected them to each other.

Classes, workshops and meetups have been an essential part of Paper Seahorse from the start. Looking back, its impressive how many events Tona has hosted. Origami meetups, makers markets, zine fests, public typing events, the creation of a letter writers club, children's' letter writing, free community workshops, collaborations with not-for-profits; all of them delivered with her unique style of analog experience .

ona's growth as a teacher, speaker and facilitator has led to her being asked to teach at many places around the United States including at entertainment venues like Walt Disney World, art museums like The Dali Museum, and deliver the joys and power of mindful analog pursuits to the business sector like Pfizer.

Today, The Paper Seahorse community is growing. Tona's vision is to meet their underlying needs. They need more than a store. "People tell me they don't need more things; they crave experiences," she explains. The Paper Seahorse is evolving to become a social enterprise providing transformative experiences. The focus is on expanding classes, workshops, retreats and community events. At many of these, Tona will be asked to tell her story about how she created change in her life and learned to slow down and developed a better, healthier relationship with her phone.

Tona Bell thinks of what she brings to the world as a gift. Even though she is naturally shy, she shares her story freely because people relate, and when others share their stories she feels she learns and grows as well. Her journey reflects moments that so many people are feeling these days: a sense that despite doing most everything we are "supposed" to do, it just doesn't feel right. For most of us our lives are out of balance. So much of our waking life is spent in front of one type of screen or another - checking emails, working, scrolling posts, curating and presenting content of our lives that do not reflect how we truly live or want to live.

The question she might ask is: What are you waiting for?