i spend the most amount of time layering my kick and snare. typically i use an acoustic (kick/snare) and layer it in with an 808 (because booty). every thing else that would be placed enhances a texture from the low mids to the high's (run a cut off 10k ish; snare). haven't really ran into phase problems yet, but i seem to do a good job in terms of attack, decay, leveling, sample start,pitch, eq, and stereo image(mono 4 days).

All these replies are good, if  you have a rich culture in music (like your ancestors), consider looking to the past. You can even apply this mindset to the past as a whole, there's years of great music out there that is applicable today as it was that time.

solid stuff.

reason (bit expensive since you have to buy a lot of the functionality. serves as a great secret weapon though).
reaper.
and i have ableton (probably going to stop at 9 because it does what i want it to do even at eight).

Reason is alright, thought it's not as precise as reaper and it doesn't offer what ableton has (even though you can get those same things with a bit of thinking), but i like it. I really started using it heavily a few years back and haven't wanted to change. I think the big thing i like about it is that it consolidates stuff for you with out having to go through separate menus. Plus it's really stable.

I would personally suggest getting a good pair of headphones. They'll run you about the same price as one speaker. Plus by the time you save enough money for monitors you would hopefully have done an incredibly insane amount of mixing on your phones, so that you can use them in an efficient manner. Not to mention you know what to look for when learning your speakers and how stereo imagine works if you spend a solid six months (over kill but eh) only working with headphones.

But honestly, i think for most people (including myself) you won't get the full picture until you actually drop some coin on the lowest high end gear you can get your hands on. i wouldn't go below the 350 dollar range on speakers and the 300 buck range on headphones. that's when you start getting into big boy land.

Beyerdynamics DT 990 Pro - Open studio monitor headphones. I've been using them for nearly 8 years and they are absolutely perfect for monitoring.

I recommend this sort of beyerdynamic because of them being open back. the dt770's were designed to mic a loud room.

Plus all of the models are extremely comfortable, for long periods of using them that don't relate to musical use, i tend to get nauseous.