Beating lower-rated players consistently?

If you're rated 2199 at age 12 then yes, there's a very good chance you can be 2200 at 30.

If you learn chess at 30... well, there have been MANY topics about this on the forums, and not 1 person has been named yet.

Yes, patience and quiter positions whereby the weaker opponent makes many of the decisions. Extremely sound advice

I am nowhere near your level, but I also tend to beat higher ranked players. I beat a bunch of 300 level rated players and 420 last week, while today, a 145 beat me, but then I won a game against another 300 player. I think a lot of it has to do with the challenge you are experiencing. No challenge, and you don't feel a whole lot of reason to play well. I also tend to copy playing styles. I do it subconsciously. Also the worse players tend to play moves that defy explanation, and countering them can be difficult, because it is one crazy move after an another. Of course at your level, they aren't playing like that, but in the lower then 200 rank, it routinely occurs.

In most games, there are a few critical moves. Sometimes, these moves can swing the outcome of the whole game.

For example: you could outplay your opponent the entire time, then misplay a critical move. Suddenly, you've lost your advantage - even though you're clearly the stronger player.

This is the nature of chess, and it's why you can't rely on being more knowledgeable or experienced. You have to play every move to the best of your ability.

Get lazy or distracted once, and you could pay for it with a loss, even if all your other moves were superior.

Yes, my worst problem is my attention, and I can miss critical moves. I was just playing another 350 about 2 hours ago, and I was clearly winning. Then I lost the Queen, and they dismantled me fairly fast. Still earlier today, although losing to players rated below a 150, all morning, I actually put a 550 into checkmate. Note: my rating this afternoon was only a 180, so I have no idea how I pulled that off. They made a fairly serious blunder, so that was probably why. Perhaps I'm over thinking this, but my games are so much better when I play better players. I seem to be a lot more focused and attentive. 

I have turned off the rating feature, so that I can learn how to play all ratings. Of course mirroring a bad player won't work. I'll just have to play tight attentive chess.  It did't see to take me very long to learn how to beat some higher rated. Hopefully I'll pick up ideas how to play the lower ratings fast also.

Definitely. I am only a beginner of a few months, and nowhere near your level. I still only rated about 150, but I can routinely beat players rated 300, & 400. I even beat a 523 once.  I am improving all of the time, but keep losing against the lower rated players. I've even lost against a player rated 112 once. I think these losses are a large reason my rating is so low. It's probably because they make odd moves, that don't make a whole lot of sense, that completely play wt my head IDK. Now I'm sure that I also do, but not like they do. I try to play unrated games, so that I can practice more against the beginning players w/o fear of penalty when I lose. I'll admit it, I just  enjoy games against better players more. The challenge seems to put my brain into hyper gear. Question, zezpwn44 when you were only at my level, did you have the same experience? I don't think I'lll ever be at your level, but I just have a feeling that as I get better this experience might follow me.