My writing process is typically thus:

1. I will bang out a stream of consciousness first draft, getting everything that I think I want to say out of my head and into text;
2. I will then read over that first draft and realise it’s not right. The fact is that while I may have had an idea of what I wanted to say, the piece iteslf has no fucking clue what it’s about. In fact, it’s garbage. I suck and should never write again;
3. I must now leave it for a day. Or a week. Or a month. And then, if I feel up to it, I will come back;
4. Usually I select-all-and-delete, then try and write a plan to actually figure out what the piece was really about;
5. That “plan” ends up being the final draft

The mistake I often make, which leads to the worst pieces, is to think I can jump directly to 4, skipping the first three stages on the way. Just write out what I want to say. How hard can it be?

But the point is that the writing doesn’t happen in stage 4. It happens in stage 3. And you can’t skip to stage 3, since it’s a reaction to the first two stages.

When you jump to 4, you end up in 2 for eternity.

You can’t plan this stuff, you can only write it.