How do you get Happy as an Audiophile?

I’m going to start answering my own question now that others have chimed in.

For me, DIY was important. I got to make exactly what I wanted. It’s like cooking your own meal. I find I am 100 times less critical of my own speakers than I am of anything I'd buy.  Not forcing you to go this route, just explaining my own path.

Giving up on cables. I found pure silver wiring from Parts Connexion that was loads better than basic, and yet good enough. I make my own.

Room acoustics. I found that a lot of the reasons I wanted to keep changing speakers were not solvable by new speakers but by having room acoustics that helped me see through my room.

Giving up on imaging. It’s not that I don’t care about imaging, but given a preference I prefer hearing the acoustic recording space, and smooth tonal accuracy over being able to feel musicians in my room, or attempting to place each violinist. These items are often in conflict and I made my choices. This is also related to giving up on cables. I found too often I was giving up musical experience for imaging.

Kind of related to all of this is I gave up on mining for details. There’s always some piece of gear that accentuates a different band of music than what I own, and for the moment it feels like I would "rediscover" my music all over again if I switched, when all I’m doing is switching one set of highlights for another.

@erik_squires Good OP and interesting last response! 

+1 on the room acoustics point. I've found that some of the greatest improvements in overall satisfaction come from having friends who've ignored treating their rooms take a few basic steps to control side wall and floor reflections and experiment a bit with speaker and seating position combinations.

Going in a different direction, my happiness JUMPS when I share unknown music with friends and it brings a smile to their face. Jaws drop, followed by "I have to get that recording". Cheers,

Spencer

The reason of this conflict is that passive material treatment in general adress more the imaging and position in space than the Tonal accuracy... Active acoustic control adress more the tonal aspect than the location of sound source in space...

I dont have this conflict at all with my audio system because i use passive material treatment and active mechanical control with Helmholtz resonators...

Why this is so ?

Because the right balance between absorbtion-diffusion-reflection make imaging optimal...by taming reverberation time in particular...

But to adapt the room FOR the speakers specs i used active mechanichal equalization were my devices are part of the room in a permant way introducing by their location different pressures zones that optimized for my specific ears the way the speakers deliver timbre tonal microstructure experience...By driving each speakers first wavefront for my 2 different ears by the dyssimetric locations of the Helmoltz resonators near each speakers and around the room...

You are spot on about the uncessary upgrade of speakers most of the time by ignorance of acoustic and psycho-acoustic basic facts...

Room acoustics. I found that a lot of the reasons I wanted to keep changing speakers were not solvable by new speakers but by having room acoustics that helped me see through my room.

Giving up on imaging. It’s not that I don’t care about imaging, but given a preference I prefer hearing the acoustic recording space, and smooth tonal accuracy over being able to feel musicians in my room, or attempting to place each violinist. These items are often in conflict and I made my choices. This is also related to giving up on cables. I found too often I was giving up musical experience for imaging.

@sbank 

my happiness JUMPS when I share unknown music with friends and it brings a smile to their face. Jaws drop, followed by "I have to get that recording"

That one also brings me great happiness, when I'm on either end of that scenario...

Win the 7 digit lottery !