The spirit in which you take any one of these steps, especially in the earliest
phases of your project, should be highly tentative. As you move through the
problem-solving process, you will probably keep changing your problem definition,
your menu of alternatives, your set of evaluative criteria, your sense of what
evidence bears on the problem, and so on. With each successive iteration you
will become a bit more confident that you are on the right track, that you are
focusing on the right question, and so on. This can be a frustrating process, but
it can also be rewarding-provided you can learn to enjoy the challenge of search,
discovery, and invention.