Perplexed by application logic

[Talengix]

Greetings,

I am new to GnuCash and there's plenty to like about it. However, I am
confused by a couple things. First of all, all of the 'transferring' of
funds between accounts seems like a vicious circle. And if I don't want to
define a transfer my transaction ends up in the dreaded IMBALANCE-USD
account. Here is the typical scenario for me: 1) Funds received originate in
an INCOME account. Why doesn't GnuCash automatically update ASSETS since
money is an by default Asset, right? I think so since the reports properly
show it that way 2) So next I have to manually transfer every INCOME item to
my Checking Account in ASSETS. That seems a bit unintuitive to me but at
least my reports look right. There should be a way to configure the INCOME
accounts to automatically update specified ASSET accounts 3) Next I need to
pay a bill so I enter the payment in the Account ledger of the recipient
which is subcategory under COSTS. This is where I am stumped. This amount of
course by default winds up in the IMBALANCED-USD account. But I don't
understand that because it is not my money anymore once it is paid. So I why
is it still there? Running transactions reports etc show double my costs
because I have the actual cost plus the equal amount in the IMBALANCED-USD
account. I wish there was a way to configure this software so that all
payments under COSTS are final... that is, simply deducted from my
INCOME/ASSETS and gone forever (like my money really is when I make a
payment). Am I missing something? If I look at the getting started tutorial
they use an example of buying groceries... but the example does not go into
enough detail. What happens after buying groceries and the money is
transferred to the market? It should be gone, right? Mine ends up in
IMBALANCED-USD.

I would be grateful for any advice helping to understand what's happening
here because I really GnuCash otherwise and want to continue using it.
Cheers, Kevin