I think the problem lies in terminology.
Reading the brief piece isn't offensive at all - just tailored to a readership that's still wearing its L plates. And why not? Before we end up with WW3 - again - 'learning' is indeed a lifelong job, like it or not, but there's a difference in the application context. Apply it to the situation of the neophyte and it's helpful advice; the same sentiment articulated to the old hand is just silly: nobody who has learned how to do whatever he has to do within photography thinks that he has stopped 'learning' but it isn't really seen as that (its just a linguistic conceit to try and force that issue): it's seen as trying out different directions. I hesitate to call them new ideas because I hardly think photography has even one anymore: it's all been done before - to the death, and decades ago.
The nub of it's this: when you already know perfectly well what you're doing, you can try doing something different (to your norm) and perhaps enjoy it - or not. That's not to say you are learning anything in any real sense of the word - just finding out if it suits you. Learning could possibly be applied to techical approaches (are you learning by doing something you know how to do but just haven't bothered doing before?), but hardly to conceptual resolve or intention; that's already alive and well in your head or simply absent, in which case stop trying to invoke it because it ain't comin'.
If there's one problem with this article, it's not actually within the article per se, but in the greater, external mindest that feels obliged to defend failure when failure is just as real as success. It's called political correctness, all right, but because it has reached a state of saturation acceptance withing some worlds doesn't make it an intelligent belief. It's a long-running fashion that, in time, will fail (!) by its own consequences. Trouble is, the casualties will forever be surprised and wonder why and where it all went wrong.
Failure can come from being in the wrong job, and even from being in the right job but the wrong town when you are trying to find your Golden Fleece. It can be your fault and not, but generally it is your fault: you should be aware enough to calculate the odds for and agin your project. Based on that calculation you then have to decide what matters most: your continued pusuit after whatever, or the application of common sense and a career change. Neither way leads to certainty - either can lead to lifelong regrets, of omission or of commission.
So yeah, life's a gamble and, hand on heart, would you want it any other way? Taken to the extreme; do you really want the date of your death?
