/ic/ - Artwork/Critique

In my head I can see what he's saying, use the marks to guide your eye down parts of the body to focus on the action of the figure and there's a certain "flow" to the figure. Hampton says something similar too in his book.

However in practice whenever I try to do this nothing looks right, everything looks out of proportion or it looks like a bunch of scribbles. I have a far easier time just drawing the figures with as few lines as possible. Granted that also ends up stiffening the figure

Am I missing something here? Should I just practice with the latter until I'm more comfortable with anatomy and proportions, then do the former? Or is that a trap, and should I just grind my way with the former until something clicks?