Such a good question. I have Silman's HTRYC book too and found it much of it confusing and difficult. However in your position in the first board, could a plan possibly be to clear the c-file, as your rook is on the same file as Black's queen? 1.Ne5 Nxe5, 2.dxe5 starts to clear the d-file, also attacks black's knight on f6, a main guard of his king.
What else is there - as you say, the QS pawns are protected and doing a good job, but pushing the KS pawns weakens your king...
Thats a very balanced position. Gotta do some suffling where you line up your pieces so that you can create some threats around the king. Maybe push that a pawn and create some weaknesses there. Chess is about executing ideas that you figure out or already know. Just try different sht and learn, we all find our styles.
Why is it hard? Well that's a deep question. Why is anything hard? Because its complicated and youre pretty new to it.
Thats a very balanced position. Gotta do some suffling where you line up your pieces so that you can create some threats around the king. Maybe push that a pawn and create some weaknesses there. Chess is about executing ideas that you figure out or already know. Just try different sht and learn, we all find our styles.
Why is it hard? Well that's a deep question. Why is anything hard? Because its complicated and youre pretty new to it.
I don't think asking why is it hard is a deep question at all, for example, if you were given a math problem it could be hard because you don't possess the background necessary in order to understand what is being asked and how to arrive to a solution, maybe you don't know a whole branch needed to solve it, if in case you were to know everything needed to solve it, it could be still hard because there may exist an assumption keeping you away from solving the problem. Or maybe when someone tells you to memorize a phone number, it is hard because or working memory can only hold a certain amount of elements, if you wanted to anyaways you would need techniques in order to memorize the number. In order for something to be difficult it has to exceed or capabilities and understanding of things, but there are levels to it, something can be so hard it causes anxiety or hard enough for you to at least have a blurry understanding of something but still making mistakes. So when I ask why is it so hard I'm looking for an answer as such, am I lacking background? Is there something im assuming that is making it hard for me? Is the way im approaching chess wrong? Should I be caring about how to form a plan on my current level or there are other things I should be focusing on? Is it hard because there are too many elements for me to keep track of?
And about the advice you gave me about trying and learn. How do I learn? Could you be more specific? Because analyzing games with game review hadn't helped, don't understand why exactly the thing listed as mistakes are mistakes, if I follow the variation given by game review it leads to a more pleasent position, but still I have to be able to know the reasoning in order to produce the moves myself, just because I know the solution doesn't mean I can produce it or that I had learned something
There are general rules about how to behave in the presence of imbalances.
Lead in development: attack early, cause problems
Material imbalance: helps you choose where to direct your attack, whether to open or close the position etc
Initiative: kick out opponent's pieces, take more space
More space: don't trade and bring your pieces to where you will attack, less space: try to trade off pieces to lessen enemy attacking chances
Control of a key file or square: utilise it- set up tactics, discoveries etc
Superior minor piece: if theirs, try to trade it off or dislodge it, if yours, cement it on an outpost or make preemptive moves to prevent it from being threatened
Pawn structure: target weak (backwards, doubled or isolated) pawns, fix your own pawn structure to be as solid as possible
If you don't see/can't think of any opportunities, look for opportunities to improve your position. If you don't see opportunities to improve your position, look for a move which doesn't make your position worse.
edit -- chess.com is showing your rating as 1000... so I didn't see you were rated a lot higher when typing this...
-
I read Silman as a near-beginner. The idea of imbalances was interesting, and a little useful, but my main critique is:
1) It wasn't of any practical use in games at my level (near beginner)
2) Even Silman says this is only part of the puzzle. Ideally the student analyzes 1000s of master games (an activity which is also not useful for near-beginners unless they're clearly annotated).
---
FWIW, at a glance, what I see in your hanging pawns position is that the d file is clogged with minor pieces. So I'd want to move that knight and bishop somewhere else.
From past studying I know the hanging pawns eventually (probably many moves from now) like to be pushed to give you more squares. For instance d5 would open your b2 bishop and also maybe your knight could use d4.
One idea that's maybe not mentioned enough to beginners is that long term plans don't exist in every type of middlegame position. Sometimes you're just going to make small improvements. In that position I'd focus on improving my pieces first, then if I run out of ideas I can try pushing some pawns.
I'll add that the engine somewhat likes 15.Ne4 and 15.Ne5, but it's not very sensible to trade when ahead in space. I'd play a move like 15.Bb1 or 15.Ng5, slowly increasing piece activity, and looking for a moment when pushing one of the center pawns might be useful.
This is a game I played with white, I tried to take advantage of black's doubled pawns
One thing they probably don't mention enough to beginners is that basing your entire plan around exploiting a pawn defect isn't very common outside of the endgame. In your particular position move 8 is far too early especially because black can simply move the c pawn, so spending 5 moves building pressure there doesn't make much sense when it can be undone in 1 move... that's not to make fun of you, I'm trying to clear up something that wasn't explained to you very well.
But let's say it was a minor piece endgame, and you're putting a lot thought and effort into maneuvering your knight and rook to pressure your opponent's shattered queenside... that would be very common high level play, and I'd applaud you for it 
On move 8 it's more about king safety and piece activity, and then after you enter the early mid-game it's about pawn breaks and/or infiltration. A weak pawn on c6 can definitely be part of your development because maybe you can develop and attack it at the same time, causing your opponent to spend a move or two on passive defense... but again, on move 8, it's more about short term goals... you can develop with an eye on the double pawns, but the doubled pawns aren't the basis of your strategy yet, at least not in that position.
Good Positional Chess, Planning & Strategy Books for Beginners and Beyond...
https://www.chess.com/blog/RussBell/introduction-to-positional-chess-planning-strategy
Pawn Play and Structure - for Beginners and Beyond…
https://www.chess.com/blog/RussBell/chess-books-on-pawn-play-and-structure
https://www.chess.com/blog/RussBell
This is a game I played with white, I tried to take advantage of black's doubled pawns
One thing they probably don't mention enough to beginners is that basing your entire plan around exploiting a pawn defect isn't very common outside of the endgame. In your particular position move 8 is far too early especially because black can simply move the c pawn, so spending 5 moves building pressure there doesn't make much sense when it can be undone in 1 move... that's not to make fun of you, I'm trying to clear up something that wasn't explained to you very well.
Don't worry I don't see it as you trying to make fun of me, is valid criticism and it helps me understand why I was wrong.
In my games I've tried to avoid simple developing moves because they don't amount to much and I end up with a position that is too dry, no real weakness, no real targets, just nothing for me to play. I only end up answering to oponents threats and that just ends up really bad for me.
I no longer know how I should go about playing chess. If I follow pinciples like developing and good piece placement, giving my king safety and such, it doesn't work in my games. So the thing you mention like "king safety and piece activity" and I don't mean to be rude, it is of no use to me.
By the comment you left before thinking i'm a 1000, yes chess.com shows I have that rating but it is in chess where you have days to respond, there was a time where I had many games at the same time and I ended up abandoning them all, it was too slow and boring. So i think now you know I'm around 1700 and I had spent a lot of time doing tactics so I have a 3000 rating. Knowing that would you have any advice? Some learning technique or book that you think is useful to me? It is more difficult for me to know what to do in positions with no weaknesses and no targets
This is a game I played with white, I tried to take advantage of black's doubled pawns
One thing they probably don't mention enough to beginners is that basing your entire plan around exploiting a pawn defect isn't very common outside of the endgame. In your particular position move 8 is far too early especially because black can simply move the c pawn, so spending 5 moves building pressure there doesn't make much sense when it can be undone in 1 move... that's not to make fun of you, I'm trying to clear up something that wasn't explained to you very well.
Don't worry I don't see it as you trying to make fun of me, is valid criticism and it helps me understand why I was wrong.
In my games I've tried to avoid simple developing moves because they don't amount to much and I end up with a position that is too dry, no real weakness, no real targets, just nothing for me to play. I only end up answering to oponents threats and that just ends up really bad for me.
I no longer know how I should go about playing chess. If I follow pinciples like developing and good piece placement, giving my king safety and such, it doesn't work in my games. So the thing you mention like "king safety and piece activity" and I don't mean to be rude, it is of no use to me.
By the comment you left before thinking i'm a 1000, yes chess.com shows I have that rating but it is in chess where you have days to respond, there was a time where I had many games at the same time and I ended up abandoning them all, it was too slow and boring. So i think now you know I'm around 1700 and I had spent a lot of time doing tactics so I have a 3000 rating. Knowing that would you have any advice? Some learning technique or book that you think is useful to me? It is more difficult for me to know what to do in positions with no weaknesses and no targets
I think you'll really enjoy looking into pawn structures... I read Soltis' book "Pawn Structure Chess" which for me is what ACTUALLY taught me how to make plans in any position. Others recommend Kmoch's book "Pawn Power in Chess" which is probably better but I haven't read it myself so I can't say for sure.
That plus studying some basic endgames... consider the fairly thin but very good Endgame Strategy by Shereshevsky.
Some people have given the opinion that endgames aren't very useful, but for me, studying endgames has helped me make middlegame decisions such as which pieces to trade or not trade, and which structures to go for or not.
Looking at your real ratings, IMO you're at the level where you're not making any basic tactical mistakes anymore, and so it becomes very valuable to start learning pawn structure and strategy. For me personally it was extremely useful, and I've heard similar stories from others who started learning these things at your level.
I've been reading Jeremy Silman's book How to Reassess your chess. I know there exists imbalances and you should do something with them. The thing is when I'm able to identify the imbalance I don't know what to do with it. I know there is an imbalance but now what do I do?
For example
That would be my breakdown, pretty superficial but is the best I can come up with. Now that I know the main imbalance is the hanging pawns, what do I do? What now? They are defendend, black can't play e5. I don't see anyway that black can put any more pressure on my pawns. How do I do take advantage of this? A pawn push would create too many weaknesses on my camp, there seems to be nothing for me.
I don't know what should I be going for here. The placement of my pieces don't look terrible and I'm trying to avoid mindless moves such as Ba1, it is not bad but there is no plan behind it. Black seems to have no weaknesses and I don't see any clear path to creating one.
But when I think I have found one, it seems that all my moves to complete it were bad. This is a game I played with white, I tried to take advantage of black's doubled pawns