How to build up understanding

Now the mechanism is clear, it is possible to find some answers on pressing questions. 

What is the best way to make progress? Analyzing master games must logically be the best. I don't think you need to invent the wheel everytime yourself, so I advocate to follow grandmasters when they analyze master games. Personally I like videos of grandmasters who analyze openings into the middlegames very much.

What is the reason to analyze your own games? That has a totally different purpose. You do that to reveal your weaknesses.

It is easy to develop unrealistic expectations. Ideas like "chess is 99% tactics" can easily put you on the wrong foot. First you must know what to do. Only then it make sense to figure out how to do it.

What to do is for instance to saddle your opponent with an IQP and then to trade all pieces. In order to force exchanges, you need to use tactics. Fairly specific tactics.

Openings are about conquering the pivot points on your lines of attack. How to battle for squares require fairly specific tactics.

To know the what without the how is just as useless as to know the how without the what.

After plateauing for a long time you need to work on the how and the what in unison. The first few meters of a just launched rocket are slow too. It takes an immense effort to take off. But once you are off the ground, efforts start to accumulate. And so does the speed.

It is easy to underestimate the efforts that are needed. I replaced all my openings by five new openings. That is pretty ridiculous, with hindsight. Of course you can play the London when you only know the first three moves. But in order to get an edge against an opponent, you must know something that he doesn't know. Otherwise you are simply predictable. And it is not sufficient to just know the what without the how, as said.

So you need to be a bit patient with me to show any progress. But I can assure you that I have taken off.