I started playing with Arduino a few months ago. I knew nothing, I didn't even know it existed. All I knew was I wanted to put some lights in a guitar. I googled LED to start with, and as I got reading I stumbled on this cool little device called arduino. I haven't done all the examples yet, as my primary goal was to put some lights in a guitar. I have however, after reading and using google, along with this very important site, ordered more parts and pieces, of which I play with, following the examples, and try to change it up. I have almost got all the lights in my guitar, and my code is complete, and works on 8x8 grids.
I am a self taught… well just about everything. It isn't impossible to learn on your own, and you will get help on forums like this. People love to see other people grow and expand into something more, and most open source people are great for that.
That being said, If you cannot find an idea to motivate you, then yes go threw the motions and do the examples. When I started with Arduino, I had a few LED's, some jumper wires, a bread board, a mitt full of capacitors and diodes (of which I have only used 3 of), and a couple of resistors, which had little to no value for anything I was doing. I bought a switch and a potentiometer later, and I did what I could with the examples. Now I have a 24 sensor pack, a gsm shield, a sensor shield, 2 lcd button shields, an LCD screen. I haven't played with everything yet, but I am not stopping to learn. You do not have to have it all at once to start learning. You just have to want to.
Cadena step out on a limb buy an arduino and some parts, if you can afford to get a starter kit, do it. Show yourself what you can do. I know you can do it.