Hi, new here

So I work as an IT Manager - this is just a title, I manage myself - I have worked in System Administration since 2000ish - I currently manage Azure AD, Azure Sentinel, multiple 3rd party security & network platforms, multiple MDM solutions, Windows, Mac, & Linux systems, create policies, procedures etc etc. That may sound like a very interesting job to a lot of people, for me personally it's awfully boring, tedious and does little to challenge me. 

A mate I have known for years, has advised (he's been telling me to do this switch for nearly as long as I have known him) that I switch my career to Software development engineer, and to study Python Development, Postgres, AWS, and the usual tools (GIT, Terra, IaC, etc etc)
Over the last few months I have been "studying" (apologies I can't think of the right word) Python on codecademy.com and find it fun & interesting, I spend 4-5 hours of my working day to doing this (as I said my current job is tedious and lacks challenge, so 99% of issues are solved in seconds to a minute tops), I have job recruiters damn near humping my leg to give them consent to let them whore my resume to their clients, but all these jobs are for Senior tech leads, IT ops Manger, Senior Infrastructure Engineers roles, for a lot of money, one of these roles is paying north of £120k, the rest fall with in the £75-80k marks - all more than I make now - and I have little want to move to a job just for money, I need something to challenge me.

My question is, less about where to go or what to aim for and more towards, should I be learning Python and AWS sysops (I have little knowledge outside of my own messing around on AWS, and will probably look at either Developer and or Devops certs) at the same time, or should I continue to learn one thing at a time. I realise this is preferential to each person, but at the current rate, I could be looking at next year if not more till I could be in a position to apply for Dev roles.

Note: I'm working on a portfolio site of Code work, just waiting till my foundational knowledge is a bit further along