A little off point of the original thread here but I've had somewhat of a break through with my own playing recently. I read an article from a teacher at Berkley College where he suggested that a good way to come up with original solos was to forget about scales and keys except for the notes at the beginning and ending of phrases and important transition bars. I already know very little about theory so this idea really appealed to me. And, I must say that if you can already play by ear it really works. Now I use feel only and have started to forget about the old runs and patterns and i'm starting to get a new sound that works for me. It sounds a bit out there but to make it work you need to have your licks up to a fairly high level in the first place and more importantly you need to have a very good ear and the feel of the fretboard. I find that it takes the stress completely out of playing and my improv has just gone through the roof (I always was one for the structured approach before this where I knew what I was going to play first). Anyway, this approach helps to get one step closer to being able to play anything you want and the speed of thought (eg you think it as you play it without analysing anything). Pretty cool - give it a go before you knock it!