You speak of this as if it were a problem. I don't see it as a problem; I see it as a process—your process. It's the way your mind works, and nobody has the right to tell you that it's wrong. Sure, there are a lot of people out there, laying down "rules" and trying to enforce them. They're usually trying to sell books, or courses, or videos, or their services as editors … They (try to) make money by undermining an aspiring author's confidence in him- or herself and then hobbling said writer's creativity, and then bending it into something it never was meant to be and doesn't work, anyway. In general, these "experts" don't know what they're talking about: if they did, they'd be making a comfortable living by writing and publishing books that sell as well as the work of the best selling author you can name. Obviously they aren't doing this, else they wouldn't have the time or the financial need to push their other malarky onto the rest of us. They're not pundits, they're parasites.
The only "rules" any writer really needs are spelling conventions, punctuation conventions, and grammar. And even these aren't set in stone, but to be applied only to the extent they facilitate understanding. The rest of these so-called rules are just so much hot air. IMO.
I used to think like this. The first time I ever picked up a book on writing I literally threw it across the room in disgust - how dare pure art be reduced to W diagrams!
That negative and cynical attitude was the worst mistake I ever made, and held my writing development back by years.
Despite what we learned in school, creative writing is not simply about stringing words together and then correcting the spelling and grammar. Perhaps for Literary Fiction, where anything goes.
But not for Popular Fiction.
There are a lot of technical considerations when it comes to writing fiction, just like any other art: painting, photography, acting, music. It's important to know what those considerations are, even if you don't use them directly.
It also takes years of practice, learning, and experience to even begin to claim to be competent. Even successful writers say it's a learning process that never ends.
Yes, it's far, far easier to talk about how to write well than to actually write well. There are indeed books out there written by people who perhaps see a market to sell to, rather than writing from experience.
But there are also a lot of people with experience who try to share in it: Orson Scott Card, Sol Stein, Stephen King, Carol Blake, Donald Maas, Jeff Vandermeer - just a few of the agents, editors, and best selling authors I can name off-hand who have published books on writing.
Even Brandon Sanderson has allowed videos of his writing lectures to be put on YouTube to be watched for free:
Brandon Sanderson - 318R - YouTube
Ultimately the technicalities aren't about "how to write" as much as "how to write better".
As for "show vs tell", the topic of this thread - as a generalization, show is better in most instances, but there are clear cases where tell is better. Determining which works best for a particular piece requires practice and context, and understanding. The opening post offers suggestions that might help with making a judgement for that.
