Hedonic Treadmill

Psychologists call it hedonic adaptation: you get used to everything. That new car smell fades in two weeks. The bigger apartment becomes normal in a month. The premium gym just becomes "the gym." Your brain resets its happiness baseline, so you need the next upgrade to feel the same boost.

This is neuroscience, not a flaw. Your brain normalizes your surroundings so it can focus on what is changing. So each upgrade brings diminishing returns — the third new phone thrills you far less than the first.