If necessity is the only mother of invention, then every new invention presumably reflects an intense and urgent need. Yet doesn't experience teach us that when we respond too hastily to such impulses, we only end up creating a new kind of trouble and thus a further need for an additional invention? Isn't there such a thing too, as the kind of creativity that is spurred by a gentle understanding that a better alternative must be possible?'If at first you don't succeed, try, try and try again.' So goes the old adage. By muttering such maxims to ourselves, we achieve incredible feats of endurance. Yet are all of these really necessary? Are there not times when we wrongly persuade ourselves to keep suffering circumstances that we ought to seek freedom from?