thank you for sharing your feeling, i felt like i was there :D when i first started doing oils i felt the same way you expressed about smudging the paint. it just take practice to slowly develop an idea about how the paint works...like our handwriting, copying a word dozen times to eventually develop your own. i am quoting a book here but cant remember the exact words but the meaning behind that is sometimes we think we are not creative simply because we are expecting to finish a painting with one try.