Please don't take these as disagreement, just thoughts on my experiences. I haven't found it to be that bad, but I'm not running a node that is receiving boosts and streaming from podcasts and video, that's a huge burden in that case. For the average user it's not that crazy. Being able to pay directly from my own node for almost everything is awesome.

1. Self sovereignty comes at a cost. (initial time effort can be big if you're not technical, find someone who can help that's done it before. On the plus side you'll learn a lot about computers/servers/bitcoin)

2. It's not about the money you'll make (cause you wont), it's about ease of personal use. Also, get good solid routing friends that aren't going to ditch you.

3. Definitely understand that you'll need in and out liquidity, but it depends on how much you want to send/receive overall, plan accordingly. If you have friends, partner up and then have one BIG node each with a good sized channel (each person should have a different provider), so you get touch points all over the lightning network with only a hop or two away and enough that multiple people can send through it.

4. TOR can be a nightmare at times. Run a TOR/Clearnet connection through a VPS (so you don't dox your home IP) and your connections will be solid. (Pleb-VPN is a good option, for example)

5. Running with Voltage may be easier, but it will likely cost more as there is a monthly fee.