The summary sounds a bit dickish, but it's true. One must try, in order to not suck. Fail to try, and suck it will. Not exactly Confucius, but im not wrong.
In the hobby, people are obsessed with attaching names to things. So there are names for every brush stroke and "technique". Feathering, layering, wet blending, dry brushing, two brush blending, loaded tip, etc.. Interestingly, painting a picture on a flat surface, thats a "free hand". Most would simply call this painting.
Why do people distinguish this? What specifically is "free" about it? Why is it viewed with such a degree of reverence? The answer to all of the above is "don't know".
So far all I've been able to figure out is that if you don't try, then painting little pictures on tiny "canvases", will not be "easy" the first few times you do.
What I have also found, is that since the "canvas" is small, once you overcome the initial technical barrier, its actually very fun. Fun because it's small! It really is hard to cock up something that tiny, you can fix almost any part with a single brush stroke! What could be easier?
Fun because it adds so much visual information. It drastically improves the piece, and makes it undeniably yours.
Paint more "free",
HMP