Building skills, knowledge requires time and consistent effort.
Building skills is like a marathon. Start small and do it daily and  
soon you will find yourself mastering the skill.
This is how my current pgplot learning is going on. In a few months  
time, I feel I am comfortable in it and building solid skills in  
creating gui based fortran programs.
My earlier attempts at it had failed since I wanted to run it like a  
speed race. I learnt something but nothing stuck.
This time, I gave pgplot the time and consistent daily practice and  
boy I am proud.
What is your take on this? How do you learn new skills?
If you are interested, I posted some of my work in pgplot at the  
following link.