Question

sb should tell me what to do first here, it's greatly appreciated :)

Answer 1

do i divide them by 2 first or sqrt both sides first

Answer 2

2(x-3)^2 = -40?

start by dividing both sides by 2

(x-3)^2 = -20
then take the square root of both sides. since you'll have sqrt(-20) on the right side your answer should be in terms of i. on the left side you'll have (x-3) so you can simply add 3 to both sides to isolate x.

Answer 3

@Mercury thank you sm !