I use Linux as a daily driver on desktop, and used it without X for about a week. As a result of doing this, I am equally comfortable in bash as I am in whatever DE I'm using.
Thats true - and I 100% agree. Would you know of any resources to read for a self starter so that they can execute better? I am right now simply googling errors and "how to do x" .. but I feel I am missing out on some obvious core concepts
I am not a software engineer by profession / education
What you're doing is what I did. I would say, OK, I need to do this now, look it up, study why it works, and do it. You may find this [0] useful as well, I did read it when I was starting out. The Linux tutorial and scripting tutorials are most related to what you want, but everything here is good.
I am not a software engineer by profession / education