Is it good for a Chess player's development to actively seek endgames?

I suppose what I mean by this is, my personal style is not one that utilizes a lot of tactical combinations and middlegame wins. Very many of my wins are resignations from the threat of promotion in the endgame, that sort of thing.

It is my belief that by getting practice in endgames in this way, it will benefit me a lot more in years to come than it will to be doing nothing but seeking complications in the position and always striving for a decisive tactical combination. Not to say that I won't play one if I see that it is there, but you very commonly hear people saying they need more endgame experience, and even Karpov said that it is a common misconception that the average club player needs to be better at openings; they need to be better at endgames instead.

Thoughts?

In each stadium of the game you'll have to try to make a difference. Or in other words: not lose to much ground.

Somewhere Ive read that you got to study endgames first, then other things. This seems like good advice to me for a couple of reasons:

1) many endgames are not extreeeeemely difficult. In fact quite a bunch are easy to tell who's going to win. 

2) Once you know those 'easy to tell who is going to win' endgames, you start getting a hint in midgames on how to get to those situations.

Meanwhile you should also do a bit of opening and strategy and alot of tactics. You cant only do endgames. You'll have to know some opening and midgame principles. But knowing how to transpose to a winnable endgame is an important element in chess.

I think it's best to try and play good moves, not search for something specific based on personal bias.

In (early) midgame I am not always looking for tactics. Quite often when there is no obvious thing to do I just move my worst piece. Or I..

Well, read here:
http://www.chess.com/forum/view/general/quotsingle-line-chess-advicequot

Lots of nice principles you can use in opening and midgame. 

you are way higher rated than me so i guess whatever i can say would be pretty useless lol.

but anyway openings are important as well, and if you have big gaps than ofc you need to adress them, but whats most beneficial studying i really believe has a lot to do with playing style and inherent talent.

I really do believe that there isnt 1 shoe fits all and each and every person needs to have a personal training regime of what stuff he should learn

On the subject of developing yourself as a player, an endgame focus sounds great of course.  The caveat being as long as you're not doing it to the exclusion of everything else.  At some point endgames will become your strong suit and it will be time to round yourself out in other areas before continuing down that path.

In terms of natural talent and rating goals you may never have a need to study a certain area.  But in terms of development just be sure you're not ignoring other areas.

My $0.02

Didnt check his rating, that makes my advice kind of obsolete :) 

In my opinion it's a bit double-edged. A good example that comes to mind is this friend I have who likes endgames. His strategy in every game is simply to try and exchange pieces to get closer to the endgame as quickly as possible.

The problem with that is, exchanges aren't always equal. In the book Basic Chess Endgames revised edition, it states that in every exchange someone loses the exchange. What this means is, even if you trade the same piece, pawn for pawn, knight for knight, bishop for bishop, rook for rook, or queen for queen someone will always lose the exchange in some way, because each piece has a different influence on the game depending on the position.

So if actively seeking endgames, leads you to force exchanges without any disregard to the position, then it can have a negative effect. Exchanging off into a lost endgame will still be lost, no matter how good your endgame technique is.  On the other hand, if you recognize that you can steer a middlegame position into a clearly won endgame, then actively seeking it is the most efficient way to win.

Anyway, when both sides are playing well, and none are making any huge mistakes, then the game will naturally get to the endgame. So if you simply try to make good moves you'll eventually get there. However if your opponent makes a mistake then there's really no point to prolong the game if you can punish it immediately.