Understand what you mean -- different folks have different musical goals. I often get inspiration from existing material, although I rarely sample phrases. Even if I use someone else's drum loop I feel guilty or like the track is not 100% mine. What I will sometimes do is take part of an existing track I like, and start trying to reproduce it. Long before I get to a point where it is authentically reproduced, it starts to morph into something entirely different. But then again as a hobbyist only, I have the luxury of not needing to worry about quantity or quality of my output. If I spend half a day making something that I decide sucks, I can toss it and no harm done. But yes, like you said with synthesis it is very easy to get addicted to the technical aspects and if finishing tracks is important to paying the bills in anyway, it's best not to get too deep into them and just have a nice library of existing patches or samples.
One last thought though on the subject of samples vs synths -- Padshop can be thought of as more of a sample player than a synth. It's just that the flexibility of what you can do with the sample is something I haven't really seen elsewhere. Harmor let's you do a lot with samples but for making pads I think Padshop takes the title. It's one of those tools that fast tracks you from point A to B rather than require you to get into a lot of fiddly detail and lose productivity. By comparison I see Absynth as one of those "deep" synths that will consume your afternoon.
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