In regards to Bear's post, whilst I always get long-range ideas for stories, can envisage infinite different scenarios for where or what previous or current character actions could lead to, and like to set up potential possibilities drawn from those for future events well down the line that may or may not happen, in many ways I don't view what I get on the page as the result of creativity. Or even that I have a creative bone in my body.
The reason for that is I tend to often say that I learn/work by what I jokingly call 'osmosis' (it's the only term which comes close to being able to explain it) where I absorb information when not thinking about it, and ideas coalesce subconsciously in my head, only magically appearing as visible entities when forced to come out of hiding by me hitting the reply button and beginning to type. Up until then, apart from knowing what hook I'm going to try and finish off with for my partner to pick up on, as the one thing I do need to be conscious of is 'what end result am I/are we trying to achieve' before the other pieces can even begin to fall into place, I generally have very little awareness or intent of how I'm going to get there from their previous post, or what will happen in-between.
I think that's why whenever I receive a reply my initial reaction is always "I've no idea how I'm going to respond to that, this is all too hard, I can't do it," and can be struck with 'imposter syndrome', where I view all of my previous replies as somehow flukes with the next going to catch me out, before I put it out of my head and let my brain take whatever time it needs to do its work behind the scenes. It's the being able to let that stream of consciousness flow aspect which seems to work better late afternoon or evening/night, and that's the fun part, being as surprised as anyone to see what actually comes out, that makes everything else worthwhile.
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