Some people talk of knowing it is a dream from a general dream feeling and then there are also things like Hukif's Gravity RC (many people find it difficult to get it producing regular gravity based LD's but one student noted how it helped them to be more mindful in general and may have aided having lucid dreams through the increased mindfulness). I haven't put enough time into either of the above myself unless you count the feeling of boldness that often pops up before a good number of my lucid dreams.
That second idea would also be beneficial to your waking life, like your mindfulness practices, as you mentioned before. I like that you are experimenting and enthusiastically coming up with different approaches that you want to try. One quick advisory though: I do recommend keeping good notes on what is producing results for you (in waking and dreaming) so that you don't lose track of something that was working well while pursuing new methods. Basically, record what was working in detail here or elsewhere and then experiment all that you want.
Keep up the great work! :)