Here's how I learn kanji: I read manga. I usually pick up one kanji per chapter (provided I'm only reading one or two chapters a day). It's nice cause when the characters are going on about some topic using the same kanji, you read it over and over for a few pages, and so it gets implanted in your memory.
Also, I find it's usually not worth memorizing readings, but just to know words that use the readings. If you know 不安 and 必要, then you can (correctly) guess the reading of 不要, without having memorized the readings seperately.
And you must absolutely use components when learning kanji. It's much easier to know that a kanji is made of up this component over that component next to this component, rather than independently memorizing it a a whole.