What was difficult for me was getting my hone flat to begin with, and after that trying to figure if I was making any progress.
I had to lap my stone 3 times before the pencil marks came off in an even manner. Before that there was a slight hill in the center, which meant that I could get all the pencil marks off, but it still wasn't flat.
Honing wise, it wasn't hard. I just read the wiki and did what it said. No pressure, X strokes, watch the water (this is what gave me the first clue that my stone wasn't flat after my first lapping.)
What was difficult was that the 12k is so fine, it didn't feel like I was doing anything. Thinking about it again, I think the norton 4k/8k would be a better choice to start out. 8k is already polishing level, and 12k so much finer its hard to say if I was doing much. I ended up doing about 30 strokes before stopping. It did shave much better afterward, so that was satisfying.