The Nine Modern Day Muses (And a Bodyguard)
If you’ve never experienced a work by Jill Badonsky before, you are in for a treat with The Nine Modern Day Muses (And a Bodyguard): 10 Guides to Create Inspiration for Artists, Writers, Lovers, and Other Mortals Wanting to Live a Dazzling Experience. Fans of Keri Smith, SARK, and Julia Cameron will find this book to be a rolled up joyride combination of all three and more—a tome filled with creative prompts, inspiration, outside-the-box thinking, and guidance. The guidance, however, is not from any mortal being, but from the Greek muses—given a modern day update through Badonsky’s book. In Modern Day Muses, you will meet muses Albert, Aha-phrodite, Muse Song, Bea Silly, Lull, Spills, Audacity, Marge, and Shadow, as well as their bodyguard, Arnold (as in Schwarzenegger). You might think that it’s strange for an author to craft ten individual personalities to deliver her message—but if you do, you haven’t experienced the wildness and pure fun that is Jill Badonsky.
Each muse is in charge of specific creative traits and experiences. For example, while Lull is the muse of pausing, being grateful, and diversions, Bea Silly is the muse of dance, play, and laughter. There are muses for possibilities, getting started, channeling your dark side, imperfection, nurturing, passion, and much more. The best part of the muses, however, isn’t just the traits they stand for—and encourage in “mortals;” it’s how they actually help readers manifest these elements within their daily lives.
Readers will truly get to know each muse—by not only his or her traits, but also by their symbols, hobbies, favorite quotes, people who’ve been inspired by them, and even what cars they drive! After the introduction (which is always fun, and contains plenty of fodder for creative expression on its own), we are provided a way to channel that muse into our lives. This procedure involves an actual spiritual ritual—a ritual that is often very funny and fun to do, like a combination religious ceremony, play date, and jump in the ball pit—and several affirmations to focus on, write down, and celebrate. (I write mine in my day planner for that week, as well as sometimes in my morning pages.)
Following the invitation of the muse into the reader’s life, the reader can then move on to complete dozens of exercises with each individual muse. There are journal check-ins, brainstorming ideas, creative walks, and listing exercises. There are word associations, specific prompts for writing, drawing, or other artistic endeavors, and simple but powerful suggestions for thinking outside the box. Every single chapter is a plethora of artistic fodder, sure to prevent any reader from experiencing block within at least the next fifty years, if regularly used.
My favorite parts of Julia Cameron’s books are always the “assignments” she gives. Badonsky gives these assignments in such large numbers—I’m sure there are hundreds, if not thousands, in the book—and in such delightful, whimsical ways, that I can’t imagine ever needing to seek another resource for such introspective, fulfilling tasks.
Artist, writer, thinker, adventurer, sentient being—whomever you are, you need to check out The Nine Modern Day Muses. It will infuse your life with colors you never even knew existed, and introduce you to dimensions not found anyone else outside your own creative self.
