Advice: to take or not to take?

I have read a lot of blog posts since publishing my first book about everything from writing to publishing and marketing and one thing I have noticed more than anything; they can be very contradictory! I have been advised to write about what I know and then told to try something new in order to broaden my writing skills.Some say you should sit down every day and write something (oops I haven't written a word for the last two weeks!), others advise that inspiration does not come easy and that breaks in your writing can help to stimulate the creative process (Phew!).  I have been told to include as much dialogue as possible in order to help the reader better understand your characters - then I read somewhere else that lengthy conversations can be distracting for the reader?!
I'm so confused!

A long time ago (in a galaxy not so far away) when I was just starting out in the big, wide world of  9-5 and paying your taxes, I was offered a piece of advice by one of my work colleagues.  She was much older than me (well she was about the same age as I am now, but to the seventeen year old me she was ancient!), and she told me the best piece of advice she could give me was not to listen to any advice!  At the time I just smiled and nodded and thought, "silly old bat", but now I think I'm beginning to understand what she meant. There are all kinds of advice and by that I don't mean that some is good and some is bad I just mean that some is relevant to you as an individual and some of it is not.  You've just got to work out what is right for you and go with that.

Recently I have discovered the delights of Pinterest which has brought me a whole new avenue for the discovery of new blogs and quotes and today I have found my favourite so far;

"Better to write for yourself and have no public,
than to write for the public and have no self."

- Cyril Connolly

I love this!  It is so true!  I love to write, but I need to write what comes from the heart and not what is currently on trend.  Another little gem I found on Pinterest was this;

"If you don't see the book you want on the shelf, write it"

-Beverley Cleary

And, with that in mind I need to get back Ealdhun and the last volume of the Prudence chronicles!

I would love to hear what pieces of advice you have found helpful.

Kim