My advice is to take things slowly. First of all, magick woks at it's own pace. There is no need to race through the learning process or to race through rituals. Except perhaps in the case of having a limited time to do rituals before unsympathetic family comes home. That's just an example.

Second, I don't believe that one should be doing much magick when feeling ill. If you're not at your best, you're magick isn't likely to be either. Not only can the illness itself have an effect on your magick, any medication you might be taking can also wreck your magick.
Work with your mind. Using your mind for your magickal endeavors is like the benefits you get from exercising your body. Your mind is your strongest tool. Physical tools can be expensive or cheap, but no matter their price, they can come and go without our consent. It's quite frustrating to find a lovely bowl for offerings at a yard sale, then lose it during a move without ever even getting a chance to use it.

Think of tools as training wheels and your mind as a bicycle. After riding your bike with training wheels for a while, you were eventually confident enough to ride without them. After practicing magick with tools for a while, you'll eventually get to a point you can practice without them. If you're confident enough to try working without tools in the first place, you won't have to later train your mind to work without them. If you want tools, that's fine too. Sometimes we need the extra reinforcement.
