CloverReef

@Praetor I attribute a good part of what I love about my own writing skill to a healthy exchange between writers. Twenty years of exchanging stories to beta and giving each other advice is the way I chose to evolve. It’s what works for me. It’s why I’m active on this site. Of course it wasn’t all good advice, but you learn to pick and choose what to take and what to shrug off. Doing your own thing is absolutely important too. I just prefer a balance of both. 

I wrote a bunch of tips here actually, speaking of which, although I couldn’t remember where they were so I had to go hunting for them.

Not only is there all that BS, but there’s also the massive variation in what works for whom. I recently went to a panel discussion in which 5 writers talked about, among other things, hashing out story ideas. Some of them absolutely needed someone to discuss ideas with; some just needed to say them out loud, even to a rubber ducky; and one said that articulating his ideas made him lose all interest in them.