The lift without the parcel

Chapter 2 listed what the lift is made of. There was a sense of being in charge, something to look forward to, some novelty and a reward. Chapter 6 added what the evening may have been short of underneath, which was rest, company or the feeling of having finished something. If those are the real goods, the useful question is where else they're on sale, and for how much.

Start with being in charge, because there's a finding here I promised to come back to. In the experiments by Rick and his colleagues, making shopping choices reduced sadness whether the choices were real or hypothetical. People who chose and didn't buy got the benefit. The sense of control came from the deciding. Paying added nothing to it.

That changes what browsing has to mean. You can look at the bags. You can compare the pockets and pick tan over olive, and have the whole twenty-five minutes of being the one who decides. Then, where you'd normally tap to pay, you write the bag on a list with today's date and close the tab. If Rick's finding holds outside the laboratory, you've had a good share of the lift and spent nothing. Chapter 15 turns this into a method.

It won't always be enough. Sometimes what you need is to be in charge of something real. In that case a small job of your own, begun and finished inside half an hour, supplies it better than a checkout does. You could fix the drawer that sticks, or send the email you've been putting off. It has to be something you chose, and it has to have an end.

Looking forward is the easiest of the four to supply. Kumar's studies found that waiting for an experience was more pleasant and more exciting than waiting for a possession. So put something in the diary. It could be a walk with a friend on Sunday, a film on Thursday or a day trip next month. It needn't cost much. It needs a date, because people look forward to dates. If the next fortnight is blank, that alone may be why you're on the sofa looking at bags, and ten minutes with a calendar will do more than a parcel.

Novelty is there for the taking as well. Leif Nelson and Tom Meyvis found across six studies that a break in a pleasant experience made it more enjoyable afterwards, because the break undid some of the adaptation. People didn't expect this and avoided the breaks. Applying it to possessions is my own step, but I think it holds. Put some things away for a few months and then bring them back. The jumper you haven't seen since March is close to a new jumper, and it's free. Libraries work on the same principle, and so does swapping with a friend.

Reward was covered in chapter 9. Choose it ahead, tie it to the effort and enjoy it at the time.

As for what the evening may have needed underneath, I'd only say that each need has its own plain answer and none of them is a shop. If you're tired, go to bed early, which won't feel like much and will do a good deal. If the day's been lonely, a ten-minute phone call will do more for it than any parcel.

There's a fair objection. "All of that is more effort than one tap." It is. That's the shop's great advantage, and I won't pretend otherwise. But the tap only looks effortless because its costs come later and get paid by somebody else. That somebody is you in a fortnight, with less money, one more object and the same evening to get through.