The big difference for me was turning on pointer acceleration and pushing the sensitivity way up, to the point where just placing a finger on the stick starts the pointer moving. That way you're not actually using very much pressure, and it makes using the stick much more comfortable and intuitive.
Having a decent cap on the thing also helps: my first TrackPoint (about ten years ago) was on a third-hand laptop, and the rubber had decayed to the point where it was squishy and sticky. Not very pleasant to use :)
I used to find it completely unusable until I finally discovered the proper way to use it (probably when I started to touch type) which was quite an epiphany. I wanted to share just in case you hadn't yet discovered it.