When you start out you need the theory to make sure you dont have any bad habits . Songs help you with this . After learning the basics what I did was pick out songs with different chords and styles .and cherry pick lessons For instance Bob Dylan songs are great for barre chords . Johnny cash songs are great for Boom chick style Blues songs are great for learning shuffle and swing beat Right now I am learning travis picking as theory but i find it difficult so I balance it with songs so I dont get frustrated For me personally i forget some of the more complicated theory thats why I pick certain lessons and then learn songs

i can play along to quite a few songs in performance mode but if you take away the scrolling feature i cant remember one song . The trick is to memorize the song I am currently in the process of trying to memorize about 20 songs I can play along to . I find that once I memorize a song it really gives me a feeling of accomplishment Since I cant sing I still rely on the videos for accompaniment Once you have a repetoire of songs that you memorize then delve deeper into theory and learn more complicated songs. Also it helps to have goals in mind For instance songs that are harder but not beyond your grasp. Then you might also pick out songs that you want to learn but are currently way out of your reach For me that would be classical gas or the lead to freebird and figure out what you have to learn to get there.

Hope this helps