A message, a video, a purchase on your phone, a notification. Each one is a small dose of pleasure that arrives in a second, with no waiting and no effort. The problem starts when that becomes the only way we know how to feel good - that's when the effect flips. That's the thesis of Marian Rojas Estapé, a Spanish psychiatrist, medical doctor and author of books that have spent years translating neuroscience into the language of everyday life.

In an interview for the podcast "Tengo un plan," she draws a distinction that sounds simple but hits hard: not everything that brings pleasure brings satisfaction. "Satisfaction has a lot to do with whether what I've achieved cost me effort. If it didn't cost me effort, it's not satisfaction - it's a reward," Rojas Estapé says.

A reward has one advantage: it doesn't require waiting. Any goal that takes persistence, on the other hand, means enduring stretches where you still don't have what you want. That very waiting, she argues, is part of the satisfaction, because it changes how you value the result. "Everything to do with satisfaction has to do with effort, and we live in a culture that runs from effort. Anything that requires effort today - I don't want it, and I run from it. I want an easy reward. That drives me deeply away from happiness," she says.

Ironically, the Balkans are a region with waiting in their blood: counters, queues, "come back tomorrow." But patience with the state isn't the same as patience with your own brain. In the first case we wait because we have no choice. In the second, the choice is in our pocket - and the faster option almost always wins.

Four weeks without the thing that hurts you most

The solution she proposes isn't to give up pleasure, but speed. Rojas Estapé cites American psychiatrist Anna Lembke and her book "Dopamine Nation," which describes so-called dopamine fasting. "You can't fast from dopamine completely, because you'll get up in the morning and there'll be something pleasant. But you can fast for four weeks from whatever harms you most - alcohol, or a social network you're hooked on. The first two weeks will be hard. What happens in the brain? When your phone is taken away, the brain reactivates, wakes up, comes back, reconnects - and you're once again able to enjoy the small things in life."

Emotional intelligence coach Iksi Avila offers something even simpler: slow down. "Take your time, slow down, regulate your breathing and close your eyes if you can. Pay attention to your body. How does your skin feel the water? Do you notice the change in temperature? How many flavors can you recognize? It's incredible how much more you can feel when you're aware." A shower, a meal, a walk - the same experience, just without autopilot. Attention doesn't change what happens, it changes how you experience it.

Avila also recommends writing - no technique, no style, just putting on paper whatever is taking up space in your head. Instead of immediately reaching for a new stimulus to distract you from an uncomfortable emotion, you stay with it for a few minutes and give it shape. The same goes for creativity: cooking, drawing, photography, playing music. "Creativity is one of the things that brings the most satisfaction, and that satisfaction grows when we combine it with gratitude. When we create in order to give, we allow ourselves to be creative," she says.

Nobody's claiming four weeks without Instagram will make you happy. But the idea is worth something precisely because it's boring: there's nothing to buy, no app to download, no subscription. Maybe that's why nobody advertises it.