I have stories in my head ( broad strokes). I can vividly imagine narrative moments in media res that I would love to do justice to by filling out the before and after. I create personalities in my head that I talk to and could transcribe. I know what themes and motifs I would like to touch... but every time I sit down to actually try and drag these imaginings into reality my mind goes blank. I sit, I struggle, I am at a crossroad amidst a blank void.
How do I learn how to give structure to this impulse to create fiction? Where do I learn how to create a program or methodology that allows me to take these abstract yearnings and give them a concrete form?
Any and all advice is greatly appreciated. Thank you for listening.
Yeah. Scenes, specific plot points within them, even a loose play-by-play of what happens. Whatever comes to mind, thrown down without regard for form or consistent style (I'd frequently just make bullet points that are themselves lists of smaller sentence fragments, for example). It's there to be rewritten so it doesn't have to do anything but serve as a reminder of what you thought of.
"It's there to be rewritten". A powerful sentence. A useful one, too.