Rotate your lift, don't repeat it

The brain gets used to things. Hedonic adaptation is the technical name, and it's why the raise stopped feeling like a raise. Evidence: decent The same thing happens to whatever you use to shift a flat mood: the run, the pub, the box set. Used the same way every time, it fades.

In a ten-week experiment, people did small kind acts each week. One group was told to vary them; the other repeated the same act. The varied group came out happier; the repeat group ended below where it started. Evidence: decent One study, reported in a book chapter, measured at the end and not much after, so the number is soft. A separate three-month study of 481 students found the same without an experiment: the ones who kept varying what a good change gave them held the lift longer. Evidence: decent The direction fits everything else known about adaptation. The wider theory behind it, that what you do on purpose is the lever that lasts, is a synthesis of other work, not a trial in itself. Evidence: decent

Practical version: three lifts, not one. Rotate. When one stops working, it isn't broken. You've used it three times running.