I just wanted to give an update. I ended up cycling my tank by dosing 4 ppm ammonia every day, and doing WCs so that nitrites never really got above 4ppm. I didn't stop when my tank was officially cycled. I continued a few more days until on the last day it went from 4 ppm ammonia to 0 ammonia 0 nitrites in less than 19 hours. I added 20 tetras, 2 corys, and a zebra pleco one day and then 5 ~3" discus the next day. (I added 4 more corys a few days later). Now it's almost 3 weeks later and they are just finally starting to really get comfortable and most of them are actually eating in front of me as soon as I put food into the tank. So until now I may have been feeding less than I will normally because they weren't so interested in eating, but on the other hand the food has been sitting around longer than it normally wood. I've been doing 30% water changes 2-3 times a week, and also vacuuming the bottom (which ends up being about 8% WC) occasionally in between WCs. I've been monitoring water parameters. No ammonia or nitrites, and nitrates under control.
So as I thought from the beginning, I would think this would be a good way to go.