I've been using neovim pretty much since I began programming. I had some initial setup and have tweaked it once or twice, but it's by no means been a source of sunk time for me. I recently had to switch to VSCode and had a lot of issues learning all the out of the box key bindings and not having the telescope and fuzzy find windows I was used to was a huge productivity loss for me. When I able to jump back to neovim it was such a huge relief.
I'm reasonably familiar with both and use them for different cases than each other. vscode at least is my text editor in the gui... but consistently growing :)
The time getting up to speed on something new shouldn't be used against something else that is already familiar.
Now if the new tool (ie., vscode) could import your neovim setup and get you an equivalent, that would be neat.
Comparing the sunk cost time for neovim vs vscode might be a more interesting comparison. Neovim definitely is a little more polished than vim out of the box so it's entirely plausible it's pretty close.
If a vim user wanted to learn something like vscode, they could just install a vim extension in vscode to navigate most of vscode in vim keys. Lots on youtube.
It's hard to use a web browser without a vim extension installed.
It's true if you have sunk the time to super customize a setup for you in anything (currently I'm working through my Aerospace setup), the part that I get caught by sometimes is that something I had to customize in neovim, might already be built into vscode, or something else, or vice versa.
Repetitions is about creating the muscle memory, similar to building the same keys with vim.
I'm lucky I was able to get to a place of comfort with vim when I had lots of free time.
It's great when I don't have my setup with me, but my setup with neovim was a step forward, but vscode still sometimes just ends up where I am, and I figure out how to get it behaving a little better.
I wish there existed an editor/IDE which would consist of a good editing model, good settings, programmability and extensive plugin system, but without arcane controls and language.
Basically take vim, remap keys so it becomes ms++, replace vimscript with ts, add optional regular vscode around it. This editor would kill them all, imo.
I guess my point was that, often times people say some tool (or language, or anything) is easier when what they really mean is that they are used to it.
The fact is, you use something because it resonates with you (or its the only resource you have) and then you get good at it, and then everything else becomes a handicap
