The only thing that used to hold me back was Notepad+. Try using sites like Alternativeto.net to find and test the open source alternatives to what you use on windows first to see if they're good enough.
I am debating mint vs arch. It's been a minute since I fucked around with arch. Dunno if I want to "get into it" with arch or just do a plug'n play distro and take it from there.
I need to gtfo before Win 11 comes crashing down on my life.
I highly suggest Mint. Fucking around in Arch is actually nice but mint is more "windows like". You should experiment with Arch once you get more comfortable with Linux in general, or you like reading documentations a lot. You can dual boot a linux setup(on maybe a 50-100GB partition?) first to check if you like it or not.
If you do plan to get mint then get Mint Debian edition(LMDE 6 "Faye"). Better to be free from any corporate influence(Canonical, IBM etc).