[steven]

I'll give another broad answer.

If you are at a little bit above a basic level of Japanese or beyond, then I suggest watching a lot of TV programs that have natural conversation in them. Better still, listen to actual Japanese conversations, if you have the means of course. That worked better for me than studying from a lot of books.

My suggestion is this- rather than looking up and remembering rules from a book, spend time listening to natural use which will allow you to come up with your own kinds of rules. These aren't the kinds of rules that you can explain-- it's one of those things where you say "just 'cause". From there you can study from books to solidify your intuition. I spent years trying to learn from books without any great or even decent results. I'm sure having a background of reading those kinds of books helped with my listening though. Once I started taking listening seriously I picked up simple conversational Japanese in about half a year.

That's not to say Kyle's suggestion is a bad one by any means however. In fact, his suggestion might work better for you than mine. It depends on what kind of learner you are- which is the most important part of this whole thing.