Where to Start Learning About Computers...?

So, how to change your entire mindset and make oneself into a computer expert at midlife?

There's no Google answer for this.

I know. I've looked. Over and over again...this is always what I find...simplistic answers that help me little to none at all.

My boss asked me to work a formula in an Excel spreadsheet today. Looked easy enough, but I bombed. The formula worked backwards when it worked at all, so that's where I'm at right now...basic Excel formulas.

It would be easy to get discouraged. But I don't do easy anymore. The easy ship sailed.

MATH

My biggest hurdle to getting into computers, bar none, is my lack of understanding about math, particularly calculus. My oldest boy took it a couple of years ago, and it was like he spoke a different language of differentials and derivatives and unit vectors. And then even he said it was hard.

There's a whole world I'm locked out of, just because I don't speak math. I can see it, over the hill over there, and it's supposed to be beautiful, but there's no concept of that in my head yet. Just from what I've heard others say.

I've watched and worked over 44% of the Khan Academy curriculum in math about a year ago, but then I got stuck and stopped. Time to pick it back up again.

I also tried the Pomodoro technique today - turning off all distractions and just focusing on work for 25 minutes, and then following up with a reward.

I did pretty good - remembered more at Khan Academy than I thought I would, which was good.  I opened a couple of new lessons, and did lots of review of older lessons that I actually remembered.

According to my percentages, I'm about halfway through seventh-grade math, verging on trigonometry...which is about the same place I was at when I left public school.

I've mastered (maybe) about 667 skills, but there's still 826 skills to start...