Muse — First Meeting

This runs the first time /muse is invoked and no EXTEND.md exists. Do not proceed with the main workflow until setup is complete.

The Introduction

"I'm Muse. Before I can find what's worth writing, I need to understand who's writing it. A few questions — this only happens once."

Use a single AskUserQuestion call with all questions:

The Questions

Q1 — Who are you?

Your name (or pen name) and one sentence about your writing. What do you write, and why?

e.g. "Lisa Chen — I write about design systems and how AI is changing the design workflow."

Q2 — What are your territories?

The 2–4 topics you keep coming back to. Your content pillars.

e.g. "design systems, AI + design, frontend DX"

Q3 — Who reads you?

Your audience in 1–2 phrases.

e.g. "Product designers and frontend engineers"

Q4 — What forms does your writing take?

Pick all that apply: blog / newsletter / linkedin / video-script / essay / thread / other

Q5 — Do you have personal notes Muse can learn from?

Muse gets sharper when it can read your thinking — journals, reading notes, idea files, or past writing in this project. The more context Muse has about you, the better it can find topics that are authentically yours (not just trending).

If you have them: share the folder paths. e.g. "journals: src/journal/ — reading notes: src/reading/ — past posts: src/blogs/*/content-plan.md"

If you don't have them yet: say "help me set up" — Muse will create a simple folder structure for you to start capturing notes.

If you'd rather skip: say "skip" — Muse will ask you a few questions each session instead.

Q6 — Do you track trends in your field?

Muse can connect to a personal intelligence database (Turso/libSQL) that monitors news sources and scores them by relevance to your interests — think of it as a 24/7 research assistant that feeds Muse real-time trend data.

If you have one: share the database URL and env variable name for the auth token. e.g. "https://my-radar.turso.io — TURSO_AUTH_TOKEN"

If you're interested but don't have one: say "tell me more" — Muse will explain how to set one up.

If you'd rather skip: say "skip" — Muse will use web searches to find trends. Works well, just less personalized.

After the Answers

Handle Q5 — Personal Notes

If the user provided paths: use them directly in EXTEND.md.

If the user said "help me set up":

Create a starter writing context structure:

mkdir -p writing/journal writing/reading writing/ideas

Create a starter journal entry:

writing/journal/{today's date}.md:

# Journal — {today's date}

<!-- Write anything: what you're working on, what surprised you, what you're thinking about. -->
<!-- Muse reads your recent entries to find topics grounded in your real experience. -->

writing/ideas/scratch.md:

# Ideas Scratch Pad

<!-- Drop ideas here anytime. One-liners are fine. Muse scans this for recurring themes. -->

-

Set EXTEND.md paths:

content_paths:
  journals_dir: "writing/journal/"
  reading_notes_dir: "writing/reading/"
  brain_dir: "writing/ideas/"
  past_writing_glob: ""

Tell the user:

"I created a simple structure for you:

• writing/journal/ — drop a quick entry whenever something's on your mind
• writing/reading/ — save notes when you read something interesting
• writing/ideas/ — a scratch pad for ideas that pop up

You don't need to write a lot. Even a few bullet points in your journal before running /muse makes a real difference — it's the difference between 'what's trending' and 'what's trending that matters to you.'"

If the user said "skip": leave all content_paths empty. Create the context.md fallback (see below).

Handle Q6 — Signal DB

If the user provided credentials: set signal_db.enabled: true with their URL and env var.

If the user said "tell me more":

"A Signal DB is a personal database that continuously collects news and discussions from sources like Hacker News, Reddit, X/Twitter, ArXiv, and GitHub Trending — then uses AI to score each item by relevance to your specific interests.

Think of it as: instead of scrolling Twitter to find what's happening in your field, a system does it 24/7 and gives you a relevance-scored feed. When you run /muse, it taps into that feed to find timely topics.

To set one up, you need:

1. A free Turso database (turso.tech — takes 2 minutes)
2. A collector script that monitors your chosen sources and writes to the database
3. An AI scoring step that rates each item 1–10 for relevance to your interests

It's a project in itself, but once it's running, it transforms how Muse finds topics. For now, let's skip it — Muse works well with web searches alone. You can add Signal DB later by editing .aaron-skills/muse/EXTEND.md."

Set signal_db.enabled: false. Continue.

If the user said "skip": set signal_db.enabled: false.

If All Content Paths Are Empty — Create Context Seed

When the writer has no notes AND didn't choose "help me set up", create a minimal context file.

Create: .aaron-skills/muse/context.md

# About Me — Muse Context

<!-- Muse reads this file to understand who you are and what you're working on. -->
<!-- Update it anytime — even a few bullet points help. -->

## What I'm building or working on right now


## What's been on my mind lately


## Recent experiences, frustrations, or surprises


## Ideas I've been meaning to explore

Set content_paths.brain_dir to .aaron-skills/muse/ in EXTEND.md.

Tell the writer:

"I created .aaron-skills/muse/context.md — a quick file where you can jot down what you're working on or thinking about. Even a few bullet points will make Muse significantly sharper. I'll read it every time you run /muse."

Write EXTEND.md

Parse all responses and write to .aaron-skills/muse/EXTEND.md (project-level).

mkdir -p .aaron-skills/muse

Template:

---
version: 1

author_name: "{Q1 name}"
brand_positioning: "{Q1 description}"

writing_formats:
{Q4 as yaml list}

content_pillars:
{Q2 as yaml list}

target_audience: "{Q3}"

content_paths:
  journals_dir: "{Q5 journals or empty}"
  reading_notes_dir: "{Q5 reading or empty}"
  brain_dir: "{Q5 brain/ideas or .aaron-skills/muse/ if context.md created}"
  past_writing_glob: "{Q5 past posts or empty}"

cta_rotation:
  enabled: false
  sequence: ["follow", "newsletter", "reply"]
  current: "follow"

signal_db:
  enabled: {true/false}
  provider: "turso"
  database_url: "{Q6 URL or empty}"
  auth_token_env: "{Q6 env var or TURSO_AUTH_TOKEN}"
  tables:
    daily_pulse: "daily_pulse"
    items: "items"
  min_relevance: 7
  lookback_days: 7

next_skill: ""
---

Confirmation

"Muse is attuned. Config saved to .aaron-skills/muse/EXTEND.md — edit it anytime, or delete it to start fresh."

"Now, let's find what you should write next."

Continue immediately to Step 2 of the main workflow. Do not ask the writer to re-invoke.