Does anyone actually maintain a detailed monthly budget after reaching a comfortable income, or do you just automate savings and spend the rest?

Pay yourself first. I save 20% of my salary as priority. The rest goes to bills via GIRO. I spend the remaining either on stocks or daily necessities.

Both

It is good to stick to a budget, and consistently tracking expenses (be it manually or semi-automated) builds consistent habits and instills discipline, so that you are actually aware of your spend. This also gives you a very real baseline dataset to review your spend categories later on!

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But if you look at it hard enough, budgeting is very retrospective, whereas one should actually have clarity and/or define how does money/income enable the live that you want!

Yes. After you reach it. Maintaining your budget is how you know you can afford the next house, the next investment. Oncenit is a habit, you will know the power of knowing your accounts.