The first rule of writing is to understand, and eventually embrace the fact that there are no rules.
There are also no short-cuts. (Sorry, posers.)
Writing, like life, is ultimately all about balance. And how well you can maintain it. Or, how well you attempt to maintain it, because it’s a process, a discipline, a way of life.
For instance, one rule might be: never listen to anyone when they talk about writing, because whether it involves style or routines, one size doesn’t fit all, and part of the process is figuring out what works best (and even what works best can depend and might –and should– change depending on what’s going on in that writers’ life at any given moment).
That said, listen to everyone, because anyone who has done the work well (and perhaps those who have done it poorly and are speaking from experience, with a genuine desire to share, which qualifies as a short-cut of sorts, as we can –and should– learn from the wisdom others freely impart) has figured out something that goes beyond time and talent.
Speaking for myself, I can never get enough of writers opining on what makes them tick, describing their own successes and failures, what they recommend, what they admonish us to avoid, etc. Not all writers do this well, and I figure it’s similar to how some of the best athletes are not necessarily the best coaches. This makes sense at a meta level: it’s those that can’t do it who keenly comprehend what is lacking, while those who can do it (that combination of ineffable talent and sheer will) might not be able or necessarily inclined to figure out what it is, exactly, that they’ve managed to figure out.
Generally speaking, avoid anyone who insists you can do it if you listen to (i.e., pay) them, or anyone who treats the creative process like it’s something only certain special souls are called to engage with. It’s true that the ones who make it from dreaming to producing a book are special in the sense that anyone who puts in the time to master a craft is “special,” but anyone willing to put in that time and suffer through the necessary phases of awful to mediocre, the never-ending rejections, the humility to imitate the masters in order to cultivate an original approach (and many other things), has a chance. Art-making is, ultimately, an exclusive club, but everyone, in theory, is invited to the dance.
When it comes to the long game of serious and sustained writing, virtually every essay I’ve ever read by any celebrated author mentions persistence. Talent, yes; hard work, obviously. But the word that comes up over and over is persistence. (More on that, here.) Famous authors frequently talk about peers or students who possess unbelievable ability, but give up, get complacent, can’t handle the rejection. And the proverbial bell tolls for any writer, at any level, who can’t merely understand, but embrace the reality of rejection being the one unalterable thing. I’m unaware of any writer who doesn’t acknowledge not only that rejection is inevitable, but — if accepted and processed with a positive attitude — at times, useful. For one thing, it thickens the skin. For another, it’s not uncommon for initial failure to lead to opportunity, revision, improvement. Et cetera.
Needless to say, I know of what I speak. Oh, I know. I’ve experienced enough rejection that I can actually look back, with nostalgia, at the years when I saved each rejection slip (these were the not-so-great-old-days when writers printed poems and stories, put them in a large envelope with obligatory SASE, drove to the post office, paid to have them mailed to the desired literary magazine, and then waited weeks, or more often months, for that SASE to come back…rinse, wash, repeat), so that I might savor them once I eventually, inevitably, became a best-selling author. This was a practice I eventually discontinued, if for no other reason than to avoid being the first hoarder whose house became uninhabitable due to a pitiful topiary of rejection slips.
There are no short-cuts and few secrets, but one thing virtually every writer (and, likely, all creative artists) learns to master, beyond talent and discipline — and that thing is perseverance.