Establishing an Unreachable Baseline

"Chords, vibrations, and harmonic ecstasies echoed passionately on every hand, while on my ravished sight burst the stupendous spectacle of ultimate beauty."

- "Beyond the Wall of Sleep" by H.P. Lovecraft

An experience is so extreme that it makes all previous similar experiences that would have once invoked such a reaction seem bland and a pale imitation of the perfection that the victim has tasted (be it literal taste or figurative).

Maybe someone heard a joke, and it's so funny that nothing else can make that person laugh. Or someone went into the Land of Faerie and in typical tourist fashion, decided to try out the local cuisine and now because his standards are so high, everything else he tastes would be like a normal person tasting sawdust -- and there is a good chance he considers regular food so unpalatable he will probably choose to simply starve if denied access to fairy food.

Regardless of what the experience is, though, it has spoiled the subject for anything lesser. And if denied any more chances to experience the lofty heights he once attained, the victim may well find life not worth living -- or at best a drab and grey place with little to recommend it.

Note that although the text above (mostly) frames the trope in terms of pleasant experiences, this isn't exclusively the case. Someone might see an Eldrich Abomination that was so terrifying that this person lost the ability to feel fear from comparatively mundane sources, such as getting charged by a grizzly.

See also Tough Act to Follow. Compare Sense Loss Sadness, Orgasmically Delicious. By contrast Go Mad from the Revelation typically leaves an psychological impact beyond the assessed potency of sensations. By contrast Brain Bleach, causes unending non-physical discomfort, even after the event that caused the experience has passed.

Tabletop Games

 * In Warhammer 40,000, followers of Slaanesh do something like this to themselves, causing them to seek out ever increasingly intense sensations.

Western Animation

 * In South Park (Animation), Cartman can't laugh after seeing people with faces that look like butts.
 * It is inadvisable to stand on a perfect level surface in Rick and Morty.

Web Original

 * A researcher at the SCP Foundation did this by requesting the perfect drink from SCP-294. He then committed suicide. "I'm sorry, but at this point everything's just one big letdown."

Web Comics

 * The Oglaf story "Zoorp" (Link NSFW).

Real Life

 * Mark Rosewater said getting a VIP Disneyland Tour can do this to a family (with regards to Disneyland).