I only do tinkering once. After that, it usually stays that way for as long as the option/setting exists and doesn't break.

For example, in 1996 I tweaked the buttons on Total Commander's main button bar (was called Windows Commander back then). I still use that same button bar today, 30 years later. Only some icons had to be replaced. I try to do the same in Linux, but...

There are some programs where this just doesn't work. Firefox for example has a bad habit of deprecating settings and adding new ones (with wrong defaults, because... money probably). It needs tinkering all the time.