[gms7777]

I think it may also be missing a step 0, which is "Identify that there exists a problem". I find that this is often an entirely distinct step from Step 1, which is it's own hill to climb.

I'm in CS research (with most of my work being applied to biological problems), so I'm a few steps removed from pure math, but I can completely related to this. It's why I find writing grants so difficult -- because they generally require you to identify and describe the problem and propose some potential solutions. But that's like 90% of the work for the whole thing!