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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/45701
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

 **I've always been a "prisoner of inspiration,"** but I've at long last come to understand/accept that there are technical, skill-based things that you can do to create those perfect scenes --you don't have to wait for the stars to align and your soul to speak.

First really understand your characters, setting and scene. You don't have to plot everything out ahead of time, but take some time to clearly visualize the place, the people, and all the events that happen in the scene. Next, find something that you really love in the scene, to make sure your enthusiasm stays high as you write it. Finally, **remember that your descriptions and dialogue should all be doing double or even triple duty**. They are (a) directly providing information, (b) putting us in the the mindstate of the main characters, with hints as to their mood, history, attitudes and desires and (c) creating counternarratives, substories, foreshadowings, allusions and so forth.

**You also don't want to be a "prisoner of technique,"** but if you do the work to bring things like this under your conscious control, it will expand your ability to reliably connect with the reader. My suspicion is that your previous scene was probably built on a lot of prep work that you might not even have been conscious you were doing.

Original score: 2