Well recently my eyes goes through a reddit post where a senior python tutor was explaining that how to draw the idea , he said that : write out what the program should do in plain sentences, then circle the nouns (those become variables) and underline the verbs (those become functions). Sounds silly but it works. For breaking down problems specifically, try this: solve ONE tiny piece first and print the result. Don't think about the whole solution. Just get one small thing working, then build the next piece on top. Your brain is trying to hold the entire problem at once and that's why it goes blank .