Have you read the first part of the book, and done the exercises there? These really helped me to get in touch with the cards on my own terms. In fact, now that I've identified and written my impression of my "most appealing" and "least appealing", I'm going on to write down my impressions of all the cards before I continue reading or do many readings with them.
You also need to just sort of stay loose with these, and not depend on book meanings.
Nevada (Also new to FO, but LOVING them!)