getting to harder content/trying to imrpove

[Valence]

The way you act the first time seeing a mechanic isn't that important, what matters is that you can analyze it after, try and see what went wrong, try to figure out how it's solved, and if you need to see it more, then you go at it again with those new questions in mind, and you try to figure out more and more of it every time. Going at it again blindly without any new information or idea isn't going to result into much progress. But spending your time talking about it in circles won't solve it either, so there is a balance to be found somewhere.

If you're following guides, it makes it easier to figure out how it's supposed to be solved since the guides solve it for you, so what's left is figuring out timings and finding your bearings with it, and then executing it properly.

Your example of colliding planets is literally abstract geometry tied to arena visual cues, and I do believe that kind of mechanic (seen more often those days) is its own can of worms because it relies on different mechanical skills than the rest of the game imo. They're found most often in extreme trials I find, like the star patterns in the first ex trial of Endwalker, or Gales in the Voidcast Dais ex. Also seen here and there in savage albeit more rare, like superchain theory in P12S. They can require you to solve a lot of geometry on the fly or in sequences.