Because you’re a writer, you probably don’t know what that word means. It’s not like writers have small vocabularies, it’s just that you probably can’t find the word ‘depersonalization’ in your copy of Merriam Webster’s Thesaurus. Besides, you’re probably too tired from reading all that Harry/Draco fanfiction to look it up in the dictionary. If you’re not, here it is anyways – “a sense of being unreal, hazy, and in a dreamlike state, sometimes accompanied by intense anxiety.”

Being ‘depersonalized’, or as doctors like to say ‘out of your mind’, is probably a common experience for you. Why wouldn’t it be? When you’re writing, you’re not actually lucid. You just think up the ideas and then your muse does the rest. Your muse is pretty much what writes the, um, stuff, you write. Your muse is the best. He does all the work for you.

Your muse should be of the sex that you lust after, but if you’re a YA Paranormal Romance writer it’s almost guaranteed that you’re a ‘mature’ straight lady, so your muse should be a flawless, Greek-god man, customized to your liking. Of course, it doesn’t have to be a guy, or even a human, but who wouldn’t want the person/thing they talk to while writing to be their lust object too?

If you don’t have a muse yet, it’s easy to get one. While they do sell kits online, and even though most of those ads are reliable, do you really want to pay a thousand dollars for a muse when you can create your own? No. So what you do is create one. Muses in their raw form aren’t really anything until you decide to sculpt them. Sort of like modeling clay. Yes. Picture your muse sitting in the back of your heart (the Egyptians were right, the heart does do all the thinking), a big lump of grey clay. Now picture yourself sculpting that clay, making the most original thing possible. Just pick one of the predetermined features from each category.

Hair

  1. Sensuous silky raven locks that pool around his head like dark sensual chocolate desire.
  2. Tawny gold hair that glints like a sensual gilded halo around his face in the morning sun, complementing his flawless face and glimmering eyes.
  3. Rich red flames that flicker around his ears, adding to his fiery sensual personality.
  4. A cascade of chocolate that adds to the sexiness of his signature smirk, deep brown and sensual.

Eyes

  1. Glassy green orbs, the color of freshly mowed grass mixed with antifreeze, highlighted with specks of sexy deep brown.
  2. Black sexy pools of ebony depths, like the fresh paint of a Harley Davidson.
  3. Sexy liquid chocolate, with flecks of caramel, like a Cadbury chocolate bar.
  4. Crystal blue, strikingly azure with hints of white sexy sea-foam on the right side of each iris.

Skin

  1. Pale, sensual ivory white like dew drops that shine in the morning heat.
  2. Richly tan, the color of coffee and milk, hot and sensual.
  3. Black. Sensual.

Lips

  1. Soft, creamy, dreamy heavenly delight, the picture of perfection.
  2. Perfect pink, like a toe-dancer’s shoes.
  3. Luscious, sensual, sexy and inviting, like the snake in the Garden of Eden. (Bonus points for Biblical references).

Personality

  1. Hot, sexy bad boy.
  2. Sweet, hot guy next door.
  3. Really well dressed hot guy.
  4. Exotic.

Okay, have you picked your muse’s characteristics? Good. Now it’s time to name your muse. Name him something sexy and sensual, like his eyes/hair/skin/lips. Or something you’d name a hamster, like Patch(es). That should do the trick. Got your muse’s name, looks, and personality? Now it’s time to start exploiting, I mean, using your muse.

Your muse should be your inspiration, thoughts, and writing. Well, some of the thoughts have to be yours, because otherwise you’d have to publish your work under your muse’s name. Ever wonder why authors publish under pseudonyms? Their muse was mad that they didn’t get any credit and forced the book to be published under their name.

You don’t want your muse to become violent, so you should care for it properly. You should feed it a daily ration of three slash fics a day, keep its cell fresh, and bring new sheets on Mondays. Your muse’s cell/habitat should be pretty big. You should probably dedicate a whole room to your muse. Paint the walls the color of his eyes, but instead of using regular paint, buy a bunch of those nail polishes with the glitter inside. This may seem like a waste of money, but studies have shown that ninety-eight percent of muses do better in a room that sparkles. Besides a bed (cherry wood is best), you should keep some whips and chains in your muse’s cell, properly secured. This is for when your muse is not supplying you with fresh ideas. These instruments should only be used in extreme cases, such as when your agent needs the manuscript of the sequel tomorrow and you’ve only written the first chapter. If you don’t feel comfortable whipping your muse, you can just copy and paste some of your or others’ fanfiction and change the names to your characters’ names. If you can’t find a fanfiction that fits, you can have an illegal alien you know write your book, in exchange for keeping their secret. As mentioned before, whipping your muse is only recommended for dire situations, so the latter two ideas are the best.

You should also buy your muse fancy clothes to wear. Some people may say this is ridiculous, but keep in mind that you’re the only one that can see/touch/taste/smell/hear your muse. And who doesn’t like fancy clothes? Since your muse probably looks about seventeen, like your protagonist’s love interest, you should buy him hip and trendy clothes from all the groovy stores the young’uns go to. If you can afford it, and if your muse’s personality is really well-dressed, then you should opt for stores like Gucci, Fendi, and Prada. If your muse’s personality is sexy bad boy, buy lots of black clothes from Hot Topic and/or Ambercrombie and Fitch. If your muse’s personality is sweet guy next door, then you should also go with Ambercrombie and Fitch. Ambercrombie and Fitch is a great store. If your muse’s personality is exotic, then you should buy him clothes from Abercrombie and Fitch. It’s a fucking great store. The clothing you buy for your muse must match his personality, because studies have shown that you can tell someone’s personality from what they wear. Your muse should most definitely not buy anything from Nordstrom’s, because then his personality would be ‘poor’.

You should spoon-feed and sponge-bathe your muse. Not only will this give you excuses for alone time with your muse, but it will allow you to develop a deeper bond with your muse (from which love may blossom!). Buy him expensive shampoo, conditioner, and body gel, and stock up on Old Spice products, because only hot men are allowed to use Old Spice.

You should talk with your muse on an hourly basis, even if you’re around other people. Put in a Bluetooth earpiece and pretend you’re talking to your editor. (P.S. – don’t actually hire an editor). In talking to your muse, you will discover all sorts of new things, like how to make your male love interest more of a loveable piece of shit, more ways to describe his physical features, and how to tell and not show (your English teacher was wrong). You will find yourself falling in love with your muse.

Sexual relations with you muse can be a bit of a sticky subject. Doctors agree that it’s not per se, “healthy” to fornicate with a being no one else but yourself can see, but as YA Paranormal Romance authors will all tell you, it’s perfectly fine. And you can’t get pregnant, so that’s pretty great too. Plus when you’re with your muse, you’re not technically you. Actually, you’re made of the same stuff that your muse is made of, that sculpt able heart/brain matter stuff. So you can recreate yourself when you’re with your muse. Some boring people like to be their regular self around their muse, but most will agree that it’s better to have dazzling eyes, flowing locks, flawless skin, a heart-shaped face, and curves in all the right places.

Don’t tell anyone about your muse. Many people will probably want to steal him, and that’s not good because your muse supplies you with only the freshest possible ideas on the market. Although if someone does try to steal your muse, it might cover up the fact that you stole/were inspired by that fanfiction you wrote about Harry Potter/Twilight/Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Where should you work with your muse? Somewhere non-conformists go, like a cemetery, or an abandoned house. If you don’t fancy that idea, take it down a notch and go to Chipotle or Starbucks. Or Starbucks. With all those things people say about Starbucks and writing online because they think it’s funny, it must be a good place.

You should always come impeccably dressed for work (outside the Muse Cage Container). I suggest wearing something perfect, because if your muse is anything like your designated love interest, he doesn’t love people that aren’t perfect and/or spineless. That’s another tip. You should listen to whatever your muse says. Don’t feel comfortable making those two “parabatai”, but your muse says you should? Do it. Don’t want the love interest to want to kill the main character? Your muse knows better. Here’s a sample of the documentary I’m writing about muses.

[Slowly fade in to a beautiful woman, tapping her pen against her flawless chin. There’s a stack of paper in front of her, along with a computer, which just so happens to be the one Stephenie Meyer let her borrow . . . She’s listening to some totally non-mainstream Writing Music, while drinking a latte, not noticing the annoyed girl behind the counter of the Starbucks, who has been watching this woman talk to herself from six to nine in the evening for the past month . . .]

BEAUTIFUL WOMAN: Hey, um, M’USE, I just got my coffee and, so, I’d like some, um, help with this chapter. So, Traffy a.k.a. Trafalgar, the female lead, has just had a totally epic dream and she realizes that she now has some new powers, and also her baby brother is locked up, but her boyfriend has been looking at Evilla DeMean, the slutty cheerleader, who is a demon in disguise . . .

MALCOLM’UPANISHAD SAUL ERATO: Just listen to me.

BW: Tell me, o muse, of that ingenious hero who travelled far and wide after he had sacked the famous town of Troy.

M’USE: Let me ooze into the exposed cracks of your diminutive intelligence, and the language will gush without restraint; my knowledge will plug you and the prose that results will be published, without need for editing.

BW: Great!

[Swirls of majestic color dance like over-excited trees in the cool summer sun as the M’USE and the Beautiful Woman trade brains. The only thing noticeably different about the BW is the fact that her eyes have changed from lovely pools of azure and crystalline blue to orbs of crimson red. But she is writing, hands tapping on the keyboard so fast that it almost breaks . . . Three hours later, the book is finished.]

Now, you young’uns without the muse bond I have with Malcolm will probably not be able to finish your book in three days. It may take you a few months, but don’t despair! The more time you spend with your muse the better you can get at writing.

Take this sentence for example: “Many cities did he visit, and many were the nations with whose manners and customs he was acquainted; moreover he suffered much by sea while trying to save his own life and bring his men safely home.” That ugly, shameful sentence can be “translated” into much more beautiful words with the simple help of a thesaurus and your muse. Ta-da! “Voluminous metropolises did he stopover, and various were the nation-states with whose comportments and customs he was conversant; moreover he felt pain much by briny depths while trying to protect his own life cycle and convey his kinsmen out of harm’s way family.” That’s much better. It’s a good idea while editing to just listen to your muse and his handy thesaurus. You know what they say, “a word a day keeps the critics away”.

Muses can also help you with things like plot, characters, and style. Since they are, by nature, imagination, you don’t really have to do any of the work. It’s almost like a demonic possession, except instead of a demon, you have a sexy bad boy/hot guy next door/sexy well-dressed guy inhabiting your body.

When pitching your novel to an agent, tell them nothing about your muse. If they think your work is good (most of them will send rejections, but they’re pretty much just jealous), they may try and kidnap your muse. If they’re jealous and think it’s bad, they may try to kill your muse, both of which can be detrimental to yourself.

The last thing I want you to do before you shut off your computer is take out a piece of paper. And a pen or writing utensil of your choice. At the top of said paper, write “Things I Need to Be a Writer”. Then underneath that, write “Muse”. Now check off muse. Have you checked off muse? Yes? Good, you’ve passed step two of becoming a writer. Have you not checked off muse? Then I suggest you start working on it.

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Comment

  1. Potatoman on 10 December 2013, 22:35 said:

    This made me lol so hard. I am looking forward to this series, i was wondering when I’d see another one of these articles. They just keep getting funnier and funnier. :D

  2. Royal_Terror on 11 December 2013, 01:04 said:

    Erm, the last sentence should be “checked,” not “check.”

    Some other errors I noticed:

    “Greek-god man” ( “Greek god-man. The word “Greek” is an adjective.)
    “Keep it’s cell fresh” (should be its)
    “While they do sell kits online, and even though most of those ads are reliable” (Not really an error, but it looks awkward. I’d eliminate the “even though”)
    “until you decide to sculpt them” (Shouldn’t it be, “until you sculpt them?”)
    “Their muse was mad that they didn’t get any credit and forced the book to be published under their name.” (You alternate between singular and plural)
    “your or other’s fanfiction” (I’m not certain, but I’m 90% sure it should be “another”)
    “Since your muse is probably looks about seventeen” (You inserted an “is”)
    “In talking to your muse” (Should be “While”)
    “ no one else but yourself” (Redundant)

    I just noticed those from casual reading. No offense meant, but shouldn’t you have edited this?

    In all other aspects, though, this is a great article. Are you going to write any more?

  3. Resistance on 11 December 2013, 09:29 said:

    I just noticed those from casual reading. No offense meant, but shouldn’t you have edited this?

    I probably should have been more careful with the “it’s and its”, although in regards to the other errors, I like to keep an informal tone, as if someone was talking. Next time I’ll take more care to watch out for extra adding of words etc. Thank you for pointing them out.

    This made me lol so hard.

    Can’t wait for another Noel spork from you.

  4. Potatoman on 11 December 2013, 10:57 said:

    Can’t wait for another Noel spork from you.

    Hopefully you’ll see one soon :)

  5. nitpicker on 11 December 2013, 11:19 said:

    Erm, Royal_Terror, a few corrections to your corrections.

    “Greek-god man” can actually be correct, if she wants him to be “a man who is like a Greek god” and not “a god-man who is from Greece”.

    “decide to sculpt” and “sculpt” are two different steps in the process. I’d assume Resistance chose that word for a reason.

    “your or others’ fanfiction” is something completely different from “your or another fanfiction” – “others’ fanfiction” is fanfiction by other people and fits the genitive case of “your”, while “another” would a) mean only one other text, not several (“another” is singular), and b) would destroy the grammatical parallelism.
    The apostrophe, however, needs to move one place to the right, as there is more than one other fanfiction writer.

    And “No offense meant, but” is exactly as bad a beginning for a sentence as “Not to brag, but”. If you had been able to resist that, I would have been able to resist nitpicking.

  6. Epke on 11 December 2013, 12:53 said:

    While they do sell kits online, and even though most of those ads are reliable” (Not really an error, but it looks awkward. I’d eliminate the “even though”)

    Nothing wrong with this sentence.

    I laughed so hard while reading this :D

  7. NeuroticPlatypus on 11 December 2013, 12:54 said:

    I think I’ve corrected the things that were actual errors/typos. Most of it, though, really is due to the informal tone, which is a legitimate style choice that works quite well in this article.

  8. Brendan Rizzo on 13 December 2013, 22:05 said:

    Another great article in this great series, I see.

  9. Royal_Terror on 22 December 2013, 00:06 said:

    Resistance, nitpicker seemed to think I was offensive. If I came off that way, I apologize–There wasn’t really that much wrong, and I wouldn’t have written anything if this wasn’t a literary criticism/writing/whatever-this-is website. It’s a great article, in any case.

    nitpicker, thank you for your corrections! My OP was late at night, and I wasn’t able to edit the post for a few days. I still disagree with you regarding “Greek-god man–“Greek is an adjective, and I’m fairly certain that adjectives should never need a dash to modify a noun(at least, I’ve never seen another example of that), and “god-man” needs a dash to show it’s a compund word.