If you mention the make and model of your monitor, maybe someone can mention the Brightness setting they use to get close to the 100-120 luminance. The recommended luminance can also vary somewhat depending on your working environment illumination. The brighter your surroundings are, the brighter the monitor can be in general terms.
Where an overly bright monitor will impact you the most is with your matching of prints. The brighter the monitor, the more disappointing your prints will look in comparison.
One possible/future upgrade option is to purchase Color Eyes Display Pro at $175 (software only). This will work happily with the Spyder3 puck, so you can keep that.
<http://www.integrated-color.com/cedpro/coloreyesdisplay.html>
(Hi Freeagent. I had to hunt for the Color Eyes Display Pro you referred to in the other thread. So, here's where it is! Having spent a chunk on the Spyder 3Pro (and all the other gadgets, hardware and software I'm purchasing) I'm trying to find economic means of addressing some of these issues. I should have just bought the Elite! Lessons learned.)
BTW I read Eric Chan's piece, and it's excellent. For those who don't frequent the ACR forum, he's on the ACR engineering team.