Reviewing with River

What I find interesting in reading the responses is; most like to sit down with an idea and write until the muse runs out or the story isn't going anywhere. The next step is to decide if the story still holds enough of an interest to go back and figure out the last choice and see if making a different choice leads in a better direction.
From what I'm reading that isn't the way you're doing it. The posts give me a familiar action that leads to the story running out of steam and it's relegated to the unfinished folder of dangling middles, dead end road blocks or just plain landslide and no where to go.
I have a story I wrote for the last Nano (2018) and I have it all the way to the ending climax. I couldn't decide what the characters should do. I wanted to jump to the end, but without some rescue, none of the main characters would be there. It's still sitting there.
My new nano (2019) is better. I have a plan and I'm at the point of the climax. I've discovered in this process I haven't quite built enough intensity to get to that point. I've got the coaster car to the last incline, but no one's on it.
Being a full blown panster won't get a complete, manuscript ready to publish (or even edit) It gets the basic idea down. The outliner may get so bogged down filling out pages the the muse got up an went home. There has to be that happy medium when you write until you can't then you pick it apart and outline each section until the muse jumps on your back and you stop and write more.
Have I fallen off the edge here? The muse struck so I just started writing.......