This is my exact approach - get familiar with the vague concepts and where you might use them, having lots and lots of these concepts to dig through in your hea

This is my exact approach - get familiar with the vague concepts and where you might use them, having lots and lots of these concepts to dig through in your head can be extremely helpful - then go back and learn in detail when it seems like one might be applicable to a given situation. In defense of the other people here - often doing this properly involves a bit of a dense pre-read to make sure you can at least understand where these might be applicable. With a totally new area to you there's a big learning curve there.