I tried maintaining my own lightning node and found it onerous, and did make me appreciate how easy centralized services make it look.

I have frequent seasonal power outaged and in consequence my channel partners punished me with unilateral closures. This experience, the fees, the necessary knowledge, and maintenance involved made me hope for an improved layer 2 to see instant cheap and anonymous payments become easier to truly self-custody and operate.

As a result lf this experience I learned to appreciate again Bitcoin's base layer.