And every time I wonder if there's a better way to do whatever I'm doing, I look it up, and - lo and behold - I learn some cool new feature that I can organically introduce into my workflow.
Learning vim in this way has been immensely satisfying. I look at time spent in vim as an investment in my career as a software developer. For as long as I'm in this industry, I'm going to need to edit text. vim can do just about anything and everything; will run on any architecture, past, present, or (it's safe to assume) future; and has allowed me to reduce the amount of time that I spend doing repetitive editing tasks.
Also, something I wish I knew back when I was learning is `:set nonumber` to turn off the gutter and be able to copy things with the mouse (`:set number` turns it back on).
If I had known this, my experience wouldn't have been as bad as it was until I learned to use the registers.
Try out: l (line), n/p (next/previous instance of word), f (file)
Note that you can hammer these.
The next important thing I suggest is using buffers, splits, and marks.
Also make sure you understand the difference between u/CTRL-R and g+/g-.
Macros (q) are also useful. Also, v, V, CTRL-V for selections. And gv to re-select previous selected area and gn / gN to operate on the next/previous match.
As an example, my transition was something like this: I'd use a vim plugin, and use say 5- 7 basic actions + movements like `cw`, `c$` `i`, and keep it limited to that for a while. If you're frustrated, simple insert mode (`i`) is all you need to get back to your comfort zone. Pretty soon, you get those ingrained, and then start looking for other tricks to learn. A few years later, it's second nature and you're probably slightly more productive. Bottom line is that it shouldn't take you 2 months to break even, hopefully.