Wow, what is this, my fourth thread in two days in the same forum? Whatever.
When I write it's like navigating a maze. We had this 98 laptop once, and the screen saver was this brick maze that you went through at a dizzying speed, barely missing smashing into walls, and often times hitting deadends. That's me.
This might be a result of my panster tendencies. When I write I write fast, and with assurance. and when I stop it's complete. I come to a fork in the road, I whiz off in the logical direction, I take a shortcut through the woods, I race along a dizzying clifftop, I abruptly turn around in a complete U to go back through the woods and then... bang. Brick wall. It makes my head hurt, literally. I usually yell really loud, my smoking pencil coming to a sudden halt. I think about it to see if it's just a little bump, and if it's not I complain to whoever is in the room. That doesn't usually solve the problem. I'll spend days not writing at all, trying to find a hidden door, a rope ladder, an underground passage way or a tunnel. Sometimes it's a dead end. Sometimes I just don't know which direction to turn. Sometimes I just give up and go find something else to write and six months later I come back and it's plain as day. The door was there the whole time, and I couldn't see it. Then I pick up my pen and go whizzing off again, just as reckless as before. It's great fun.
On occasion, after careful consideration, I realize I took a wrong turn. Then I back up, page by painful page until I reach the point of error. Taking a different route I go spinning off down the tree of possibilities again.
I was talking about this subject with Jonathan in chat tonight. His style is a bit different. He doesn't speed, pays attention to road signs and therefore avoids falling off of cliffs and smacking into brick walls hard enough to break ones head. He describes himself as being plagued with flat tires, one after another. His journey is slow and steady, and more sure of arrival... eventually.
So there are two examples? (and I had to ask him to use his, since just one wouldn't have been enough to explain myself.) How about you? What does your road map look like?
Although I only ever thought if it in terms of brick walls and Jonathan added the concept of tires. Brick walls are the only way I can describe coming to a halt in my writing. And there are different kinds of walls. And I go on about them at great length to my hapless family. 
