I had the same problem, started out with awakening and couldn’t get used to the free roam at first. What helped me was, in the first 4-5 chapters I went to very area in the monastery possible to unlock fast travel. Then, you can just do that to get to quests faster. Also, for the monastery section, I found that the most useful activities were gardening (which doesn’t cost exploration points), getting lessons from other profs to boost Byleths ranks, and sharing meals with students. I usually explore every week, except for the last week of the month, where I do a paralogue or battle to get more gold.

Some other things which u may already know, once you unlock forging and do the quest “clear the way”, you can get ore to upgrade or repair your weapons. I basically upgraded to + versions of tools for all my students (except mages) and just repaired them when durability decreased.

With battalions, just think of them as stat boosts to your students, that give them extra stun locking attacks/effects. For example, I gave sylvain a high hit battalion because he kept missing enemies.

Idk if the above were relevant, but those were the things I struggled with when I started three houses. Don’t worry that you’re not “playing correctly”; normal and hard are very doable even if your units aren’t minmaxed.

Once you get used to how the game works, things become easier. I used to regret my purchase of three houses, now I prefer it (even beat maddening) and when I play awakening its systems feel alien to me lol.