The Truth About Creativity

Creativity is a fickle playmate that likes to play hide and seek with the best of us. I, like many artists, have discovered this first hand. In fact, many writers blame creativity, or the lack of it, for periods of forced writing and/or not writing at all, claiming the muse has just up and walked off without another thought. I've claimed this many times myself. So it leaves the struggling artist with the age old question... can creativity be harnessed?And in an extension to that, can creativity lead to truly original ideas?