Careless or convoluted use of statements can make a program hard to read and maintain even if its global structure is well organized. You should strive for simple and consistent use of statements to achieve clarity of local program structure. Some of the guidelines in this section counsel use or avoidance of particular statements. As pointed out in the individual guidelines, rigid adherence to those guidelines would be excessive, but experience has shown that they generally lead to code with improved reliability and maintainability.