Earlier this week, I rearranged my office furniture. The changes weren’t major – no tools, paint, or shopping required. I just rotated my desk 90 degrees, moved my file cabinet from the right hand side to the left, and reshuffled the short deck of my three potted plant companions. The entire process, including cleaning that cache of dust underneath the monitor and rejiggering my surge protector, took about 10 minutes. The benefits began almost immediately.

When I sat down at my new workstation, it was as if the fog in my mind had been replaced with clear alpine air. The afternoon stretching ahead of me was exciting, not dreadful, and I approached my tasks with a fresh, eager enthusiasm. From my altered perspective, I saw my surroundings differently. I found myself consciously appreciating the way the light fell across the floorboards–the same light and the same floorboards I’d been ignoring for years. As the day wore on, I discovered a liveliness and pleasure in work I’d been slogging through just hours before.

If creativity were bread, routine would be the flour. It’s the substance of the thing, the structure, the heft. Without it, there’s no loaf, just hot air. Excitement is the yeast. Alone, it can accomplish very little. But given a structure to take hold in, to work on, to enliven? Transformation. Magic. A product much greater than the sum of its parts.

Fortunately for those of us who hold routine dear, even near-homeopathic doses of excitement seem to work as well as bone-rattling jolts. Something as simple as rearranging a desk or swapping out a piece of art you’ve stopped noticing can reset mental clarity nearly as effectively as a multi-day retreat or top-to-bottom remodel.

Feng Shui—the Chinese tradition of harmonizing environments with their surroundings and inhabitants—suggests moving 27 items in the home at the New Year for good luck. I can’t guarantee that refreshing your space will bring wealth, health, or fortune, but I can tell you from experience that even a modest rearrangement can breathe new life into a routine going stale. And there’s no better time than now, while 2019 is still opening its eyes and looking around for the first time, to take advantage of a new perspective.