When I embark upon a project, work or fun, I always spend a good deal of time up front just daydreaming about it. Sometimes I do this for months before I get anything down on paper. Over the years I have perfected the skill of prototyping in my head - thinking through use cases, what-if scenarios etc. The advantage of this is that it is much faster than anything else - but you have to be able to juggle a lot of stuff in your head at once. The result of this is that I can slowly build a complete mental model of the project in my head so that when I actually start the project I know exactly what I want to make, how I want to make it, what problems I will run into and how to solve them.
Work-wise this is sometimes a problem because co-workers seem to think that I often just sit and stare out the window, but when at last I get going they can't believe how fast I get things done.
Of course, great discoveries are often made while daydreaming. I bring to your attention this quote from Nietzsche:
"Not that one is the first to see something new, but that one sees as new what is old, long familiar, seen and overlooked by everybody, is what distinguishes the truly original minds. The first discoverer is ordinarily that wholly common creature, devoid of spirit and addicted to fantasy - accident."
When I've done work on music arrangements, I've found the best approach is to get away from instruments... go into a quiet room with a pad of paper, and imagine in my mind what the music ought to sound like.
Trying to hack it out on a keyboard results only in what I already know how to play, not what I really want it to sound like.
Perhaps this is why the deaf Beethoven was one of our greatest composers, because he was not limited by his own hearing to that which was already possible and achievable?
Work-wise this is sometimes a problem because co-workers seem to think that I often just sit and stare out the window, but when at last I get going they can't believe how fast I get things done.