: Translating from mind to paper I've had a story developing inside my head for years (literally about 5 or 6 years now) but every time I try to put that story onto paper it never turns out

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Many writers have this issue. I think we should simplify this to something as innocent as a baby.

You give birth to the child, but you don't discipline it right away. You let it grow and become amazing, and then when its old enough to understand discipline, you discipline it. You wouldn't go around shouting at your newborn, would you?
You mustn't hastily punish your baby at an early age, you need to let it grow and see how it goes. Then, you can discipline it the way you want.

Your book is like the baby. You can't give up on something right away. What you should do, is you should put the idea on paper the best you can. You can try this, to help you not give up on your baby (your book):

My writing might be bad now, but that's because I haven't edited it and made it the best I possibly can. It doesn't matter if my first draft is bad, because I can go through and edit it.

For the first time writing your story, it DOES NOT have to be good. Because that, is your first draft - your first time going through it. When you go and edit it, you'll get rid of all those silly imperfections and tidy up all the unnecessary paragraphs and sentences, reorder events a bit, perhaps change structure, remove chapters. You'll do everything then.

I think the best way for you to appreciate the work you're doing, is for you to know that this is only your first draft. A blacksmith doesn't just run his whetstone along the weapon once to sharpen it - he does it many times. Think of the image in your mind as that final version of the weapon.

Conclusion:

Remember, you mustn't discipline your newborn.
You must acknowledge that this is only your first draft and not the final product.
Keep sharpening your weapon time after time until its as sharp as it is in your mind :)

My analogies were bad, but I hope this helped.

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Stop editing and reviewing your writing during the process! Self-review, especially in the early pages of a project, can strip away your momentum and keep you from ever reaching the finish line.

If you were running a foot race, you wouldn't stop every few yards to look back at your footprints and criticize their placement and symmetry. You would just charge on to the next step, ever improving your speed and stride.

If Nike made pens they would have "JUST WRITE IT" on their sides.

...and they would help a lot of stillborn stories get past their author's prenatal hesitancy.

What you are writing during this first feverish rush of words is called a "first draft". It is not meant to be perfect. It is meant to get you used to the discipline of writing every day. It is meant to be a gathering of the characters and scenes which will make up later version. The significance of those characters and the order (or inclusion) of those scenes may change in future telling, so don't waste any time getting any of them perfect. Just get them down on paper. Give them physical form today so that they can be a starting point for the real writing you will do tomorrow.

When I started writing, I believed that creativity and grammar were the only skills needed to successfully write. Now, neither of those fakers make it into the top three attributes of a productive author. That list now includes...

dedication to the current story, despite all distractions
the discipline to write every day, despite all distractions

and

an unnamed human characteristic involving the willingness to end a story, even while you are in love with its characters and full of ideas for where the action can go next.

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Start writing a diary. At the end of the day, you will be able to imagine and put down that stuff which you have already lived. That is just a simple trigger. Don't take it for easy because you will have to struggle a lot in order to find the correct words and its formations in order to properly describe everything that which you experienced, that which you felt, that which you understand, expression of your perception, display of emotions, however subtle they be, and everything that is happening around the central theme of your existence i.e. you.

You have already spent 5 to 6 years imagining, spending a few more is not going to be a vain investment perhaps. It will take time but practice, for sure, will help you fetch that mastery which you desire.

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