Showing your code, your essay or your song to someone better than you is scary and fast. Feedback is a shortcut.

You can spend three months on a problem somebody better spots in ten minutes. That is the whole trade. The slow route is not really about learning independently; it is about not being seen while your work is unfinished and obviously flawed. You are paying months of your life to avoid about four minutes of discomfort, and the exchange rate is terrible.

Send one unfinished thing to one person who is better than you this week. Ask for the two biggest problems rather than general thoughts, which gives them permission to be useful.