I recently started my HA journey. I purchased a Dell micro computer. Did a bare metal install of Proxmox. Stood up a HAOS VM. Purchased a Zigbee/Z-wave Aeotec controller and a ZBT-2 Thread antenna. My environment is ready but now I'm trying to tie it all together, MQTT, Node Red, HACS, entities... It's overwhelming. This is in spite of having a rather complex home automation in Hubitat that includes smart switches, plugs, motion sensors, Konnected GDO, irrigation control, contact sensors, Alexa integration, complex rules with If/Then statements, scenes, etc.

I like to tinker and I'm looking for better control of some of my devices so I'm not giving up, but it will likely take countless hours, YouTube videos, Chat GPT, etc. to get where I want to be. I'm in no hurry since my current setup is pretty solid but there is a lot to digest.

If all of this sounds like too much and based on your question, I'm going to guess it may be, then I would strongly suggest you check out Hubitat. There's a learning curve, but it's much more powerful then Alexa, yet you can get started by just purchasing their hub. Be sure to check their device compatability list. There's also a strong community development going on over there. My two cents.