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The Nature of Problems - Part 5

A problem cannot be recognized as a problem until someone realizes there is something wrong: It may be something we don't know about a situation, and a mental "red light" goes on warning us that we should know this. It may be something that is out of place—or seems to be out of place. Or it may be something we have put into a situation which, upon later examination, does not seem to fit exactly. The Gestalt school of psychology refers to this type of "feeling" as the principle of closure—the efforts of the mind to "close" or complete an incompleted figure or pattern.

A simple manifestation of closure in action can be observed by watching the average "doodler": if he should, for example, doodle a series of parallel lines, then cross them with even one line at right angles, chances are he will go on to complete the pattern by crosshatching the entire design. Or if he should start a spiral drawing, almost inevitably he will complete the entire spiral before letting his pencil proceed to other patterns. If inter­rupted at his doodle, he will, at the first opportunity, go back to complete the pattern that has been set up in his mind. All this, of course, usually involves subconscious thinking, but it does demonstrate the operation of the mental mechanism.

In making deliberate use of this function, it is important only to remember that it is there and that it is operative. When you begin to get a "feeling" that something is wrong, your mind be­comes sensitized to the "missing" element that will complete the pattern and make the situation "right." As long as you can avoid developing a fixation about some one missing element in particu­lar—which would cause you to overlook others you may also be missing—your mind will be able to work with you in indicating the general direction you should go in pinning down the real problem.

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