I'm not a professional writer - just a hacker who writes four to ten page
procedural documents from time to time.

Recently I've read several posts and replies that talk about using "empty
paragraphs" as though they were the scourge of mankind. Also, the
establishment of Styles rather than changing formats of individual words,
paragraphs or other portions of a document is treated as though it were a
sacrilegious abomination to ever use the Format command.

I'm trying to learn from the professionals and do as they suggest but I'm
undergoing a lot of emotional trauma over styles and empty paragraphs. So
what are the reasons behind the advice on these two topics?

Thanks for your patience with me! (And incidentally, I find the
word.mvps.org site quite helpful!)

Al