I heard from so many readers on this essay of mine on Short Reads recently. (Thanks so much, btw!) It was originally published in Hippocampus, so I had the interesting experience of going through editorial suggestions from two sets of journal editors.
Image: original (abstract) art for essay in Short Reads
In both cases, I agreed that some suggested edits improved the piece. And in both cases, I pushed back on edits that, to me, changed the character of my meaning and intention.
The upshot is that we made the edits in the former category and did not make the edits in the latter.
Editorial feedback from others is valuable and, should we be fortunate enough to benefit from the notes of an intelligent reader, we should attend to it.
I don't mean “attend to feedback” as in make every change that is suggested but as in consider the suggestion carefully, then make a decision based on your own best judgment.
The key is that our best judgment needs to be our BEST judgment, considered carefully. We hold ultimate responsibility for our work. Not every change should be made, and not every change should be discarded.
Are changes ever made without your input? Yes, this happens. Almost always, the changes are due to particular in-house style. I do know of rare occasions, none of which are my own, when a piece of writing appears in print with much more substantive edits on which the writer was never consulted.
The least I can say about that is not cool.
Editors aren't going to hate you if you don't agree to what they suggest! I've personally had some of my best conversations about style in the back and forth discussions of whether something should be phrased this way or that way, or if a section should be moved or cut.
Of course, all of this is to say that your best course of action is to endeavor to continually transform yourself into the most qualified, most self-aware self-editor possible.