Like you said yourself, the main roadblock is that you WILD right before you sleep. If you don't mind wasting a bit of sleep, then WILD when you wake up in the middle of the night. Or switch to DEILD.

Focusing too hard on the colors wont help either, just passively observe it until you are in a lucid dream.

Acceleration is common during hypnogogia and sleep paralysis.

You could try doing breathing meditation, that's what I use to relax and calm down.

If you have any more questions, just ask. Make sure to check out the wiki for some great tutorials on WILDing.