Writing, Guitar-wise.

So in another post Tim said that typically songwriting doesn't come out of jams, but more out of riffs that have been worked on previously and then worked into a song. My question is, what does your process usually consist of when you write those initial pieces of a song? Any sort of pre-writing rituals you go through to get the creative juices flowing?

For me it usually involves finding a tuning that I'm into or maybe even a new one I've not used before which keeps playing guitar interesting. If I'm struggling to come up with anything for a long time I usually work on finding a tuning to keep things fresh and make things a little more unpredictable. Once I have a good tuning and have just experimented with it for a while, hopefully a few possible riffs or potential sections will appear. If not I tend to move on and change the tuning or use capos weirdly. I guess the mood you're in will greatly affect creativity so try to make sure you're feeling good; do some exercise and eat some chili to get some endorphins pumping!