Then you have no idea my friend.
It's not about eating humble pie or anything like that. If you're pretty good you can say all you want and nobody can budge you. Of course, it hurts the social life, but going on.
I would say this, that to me being professional does not carry any prestige, just an occupation. Anybody could be professional: just invest. Of course, as applies in all sort of occupations, the old adage of : If you want to do anything for a living, you better be damn good in it.
wannabe or not...I have no idea. I haven't met a good photographer who went to that stage as you said: most of them couldn't be bothered and are more interested to finding a new way of doing things.
Too much humble pie has its own after effects. Imagine you just sucked in what everybody says and all the 'sifus' you encountered with. Honestly, you're not gonna get any better but instead be a copy, a confusing mix of all knowledge gained without any structural know how. It's better to instead go out and look in various media (e.g. books..pictures), and form your own theories and understanding of the subject matter.
That is why over at the critique corner, I insists telling a critique seeker that 'you should go at this angle and wait till sunset bla bla bla' is not going to help. Just tell that person what you think of the photograph , not tell him how to take a better picture.
As a matter of fact, I can't think of any 'good' photographers that was taught. They discuss, but they were never taught. Look outwards, not open mouth and swallow like a goddamn blue whale.
As for you using your equipment as a b*tchslap well I couldn't really say you're any better than him really.
