If you want zero-config portability, learn vim. It's installed everywhere and is very useful. But if you're set on emacs, here's some stuff that helped me.

The video on golfing is great to learn how to "think Emacs": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dE2haYu0co8

Avoid using Ctrl; either palm-press or map Capslock to Ctrl. http://ergoemacs.org/emacs/emacs_pinky.html

Don't lean heavily on movement commands, the easiest way to navigate around Emacs is searching. Instead of pressing C-p five times or even C-u C-p C-p, just search for the word you're going to with C-s.

Official reference card is good: https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/refcards/pdf/refcard.pdf

Steal heavily from other people's configs. Since you're new and you like org-mode see these two files: https://github.com/magnars/.emacs.d/blob/master/settings/san... http://pages.sachachua.com/.emacs.d/Sacha.html#org2b182a5

Hope that helps.