Cold, is wisdom...

'Beauty is truth, truth beauty' said Keats, and the truest words I have ever heard or read in my so-far unsuccessful writing life.
Thinking about things as I do, always searching for the exact thought, the exact mood and word to illustrate my thoughts, I do sometimes wonder whether I'm doing things right, or whether I'm just doing things my way, which may cause me to do things wrong. I mean, can you stop yourself from doing the wrong thing when everything you do, become or create, is so subjective? In other words, how do you know that you know the truth about yourself, about what you do?
Of course, if you want to be original, or believe in your originality, then perhaps you can be afraid to take advice, or if not afraid then wary. In seeking advice, you may instead become someone else, or a projection of someone else. Like the plague, this must be avoided.
I do believe I'm more wary than afraid - I did wander through writer forums for a while and sought advice, knowledge, that was different from what I knew myself. Quite often, I would challenge what others said or did, in the search for knowledge. Looking back, I guess I didn't actually take much advice, filtering out stuff I disagreed with, or stuff that I just couldn't verify in my head.
Reading as many classics as I did (accidentally, as I didn't know what I was reading at the time and usually went from how they felt, as opposed to their standing in the literary world), I wonder if I only ever read what I wanted to read and was somehow forming an instinct of my own, and not an instinct influenced by other tastes.
For example, as a child, I was given 'Kidnapped' as a Christmas present. I could never get past the first chapter. I would rather have read Peter Pan over and over again, than go through a work like 'Kidnapped', which I must confess remains unread by me to this day.
Instinct.
That word again.
The biggest word in any writer's dictionary. The truest word. If you don't have it, you will write nothing. At least, you will write nothing of note.
Perhaps I will never write anything of note. Because I may not have the right instinct. But I do have one, I can see that. It has caused me to choose what I'm writing now. And to choose carefully who I will allow to review it.
If I'm right about what I'm writing, then I'm more than likely right about who will critique my work. If I am right about who will critique my work, then I'm more than likely right about my writing.
Instinct.
I hope I have it. I hope I have it right.