In any field, you will be influenced to follow main-stream approaches. I don’t see that there’s any way to avoid that; you’ll need to be keeping abreast of arxiv papers, updates to programming libraries, and whatever wisdom the community can accumulate. I’d say that you should embrace the community, as I’ve always found it much more difficult to go it alone for reasons of inspiration, motivation, and desire to feel social approval.
If you’re concerned that you will miss critical insights while following someone else’s approach, set appointments for yourself to check-in with how you’re working. Take an hour every month or two every quarter to think through how you’ve been approaching your work, and how you should change.
In any field, you will be influenced to follow main-stream approaches. I don’t see that there’s any way to avoid that; you’ll need to be keeping abreast of arxiv papers, updates to programming libraries, and whatever wisdom the community can accumulate. I’d say that you should embrace the community, as I’ve always found it much more difficult to go it alone for reasons of inspiration, motivation, and desire to feel social approval.
If you’re concerned that you will miss critical insights while following someone else’s approach, set appointments for yourself to check-in with how you’re working. Take an hour every month or two every quarter to think through how you’ve been approaching your work, and how you should change.