[joshlemer]

Long time vim user here, but I think that the best setup is to use a regular text editor, which has vim bindings. All major editors seem to have them, including Sublime and IntelliJ.

I think the biggest gains in using vim are the small navigation, copying, and editing keystrokes, and that there are little to no productivity gains of using other vim features like tabs and buffers, over say tabs in IntelliJ / Sublime. I am a little biased but I really think that being quick with the vim bindings really makes me a lot more productive at editing code than my non-vimming co-workers. When we're pair programming, it's usually me who does the driving because in one or two keystrokes I can do something that would take them 5+ seconds with a mouse.

So just install the vim bindings on your favourite editor and start picking it up bit by bit. You can start simple with the h,j,k,l keys for navigation, and i for insert, and use the mouse for the rest until you get up to speed.