Not sure of what you are actually removing from your plant to propagate, but they only need about a day to callous and then plant in some mix. For me, I would just cut the head off, if there is a long enough stem and root it and new plants will grow from the naked stem. Given enough sunlight, it freely grows all over the place! I've never cut mine; it is about 2 ~ 3 years old.

Thanks, bikerdoc. That seems to be the best way to propagate it...there are already some baby plants growing where I removed leaves during my fruitless attempts. I'll try one more time later today and post a few follow up photos in the next couple of days should I be unsuccessful.