Not too long. I also began using Emacs with spacemacs, but it was buggy and slow. Then I just started with a completely pristine Emacs configuration and just added through use-package:

- evil for vi emulation

- general/which-key so I could define spacemacs-like bindings that start with SPC.

- ivy for quick search of buffers, files, etc

Then I added things on a by-need basis. I would say that the most important additions were magit for Git, projectile for quickly switching between project files, and some Rust packages.

This is now my emacs configuration:

https://github.com/danieldk/nix-home/blob/master/cfg/emacs.n...

Rust configuration:

https://github.com/danieldk/nix-home/blob/master/cfg/rust.ni...

(Sorry for posting Nix files, but it's pretty close to what it would look like in a regular init.el.)