I have been using emacs since around 2005. If you are looking to immerse yourself in emacs, then I highly recommend switching your windows manager to EXWM [1]. If you are looking to get over the learning curve, then I recommend buying the book Mastering Emacs [2]. If you are interested in learning new and creative ways to use emacs, then I recommend attending the next emacs conference [3]. Also, please join #emacs on librechat [4]. For IRC on emacs I really love erc-mode [5].
A bit off topic but a few years ago you posted about a calendar API, did you ever find a good one [0]? I was looking to use one too so was wondering if you wanted to discuss more about it and what your use case was.
[1]: https://github.com/ch11ng/exwm/wiki
[2]: https://www.masteringemacs.org/
[3]: https://emacsconf.org/
[4]: https://libera.chat/
[5]: https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_mono/erc.html