I think a lot of new writers get stuck because they're trying to follow someone else's perfect formula. Saw a post yesterday about a guy who spent six months building a spreadsheet of plot beats before writing a single sentence, and that just seems like a great way to never start. My approach was messier. I had this character voice stuck in my head, so I opened a blank document and just let her talk for a few thousand words. It was a chaotic mess, but it was a start. The structure came later, during edits, when I could see the shape of what I'd actually made instead of what I thought I should make.
Getting from that messy draft to something readable is where most people quit. You have to learn to separate the creator brain from the editor brain. I wrote my first draft in a program that hides the text as you type, which sounds insane but worked for me—forced me to keep moving forward without constantly deleting every other sentence. The real work, for me anyway, began in the second draft. That's when you look at the lump of clay you've got and start figuring out what it's supposed to be. Joining a small critique group was terrifying but essential; they pointed out pacing issues I was completely blind to.
Honestly, the technical 'how-to' stuff is everywhere—three-act structure, character arcs, all that. The harder part is the mental game. You have to accept that your first book probably won't be good, and that's fine. It's a learning project. The goal isn't to write a masterpiece on attempt one; it's to finish something, learn from the process, and have a completed object to build from. Mine is sitting in a drawer now, and I'm okay with that. It taught me how to write the one I'm working on now, which actually has a chance.