I am a night owl. I love the quiet of the night hours and my creativity thrives then. I like to give full attention to a story I am building at least for three days a week. I set my own schedule and follow it through until a book is done and I get to type "The End".
Yes, I have incorporated places I have traveled, emotions I have felt. I also took sadness and grief and applied my emotions to sprinkling a lost loved one into a story, for me it was away to deal with those feelings. Often I write down real names of people I have met to possibly bring them to life in the written pages as well.
I write the endings first, so it is a process to work backwards to fill in the storylines. At least along the way I know how each story will end already.
