Why Bother Explaining Simply?
With every passing year, I become only more convinced: to explain complex things with simple words, this is not a talent. It is a trial. Especially for those who spent years hoarding knowledge, covering themselves in terminology like a coral reef covers itself in lime. And now? Now they are genuinely surprised why a normal person doesn't understand their "masterpiece" of a sentence.
And how should a person understand, if you talk like you are defending a PhD in a closed club where even God needs a pass? People rarely understand speech that sounds like a collection of engineering spells. But the specialists? They just blink their eyes, offended: "But I explained everything!".
If you are talking to normal people, and not to your colleagues from the factory, be so kind - take off the armor. Remove the tone, the arrogance, and, most importantly, don't make people extra nerves. Specialists love to complicate things, as if it gives them a discount on importance. They see a simple thought - and immediately they wrap it in seven layers of terms, three diagrams, and one beautiful English word that they simply cannot live without. And then we are surprised: "Why does nobody understand?" They won't understand. Because you are not explaining; you are reading a protocol for a missile system to a junior who just walked through the door.
To speak simply - this is not "lowering yourself to the level of the interlocutor," I beg of you. This is about respect. It is about the fact that you are capable of pulling the essence out of your professional and academic junk (pardon the expression), and not dropping a magic carpet of terms on a person’s head. Not every person is Noah; an ark from what you have said, it will definitely not build.
The Two Dictionaries of Every Man
Before we discuss how to explain, let's figure out what we are explaining with. Every person, even a child, has two dictionaries working at the same time.
The First is the Everyday Dictionary. This is the language we live in: we speak it at home, we argue in line, we watch movies. This dictionary is different for everyone - we watched different cartoons, ate different food, our mothers yelled at us differently - but it is incredibly effective. Globally, this is the language of "uncommon but effective": different words, but the result - understanding - you get it fast.
The Second is the Professional Dictionary. Usually, this is created not for life, but to simplify communication between professionals. And because of this, it is "common but non-effective": the words are shared by everyone, but to leave a thought in the listener's head? This it cannot do. Why? Because this dictionary is a compromise. Every term refers to another term, which refers to a third. If you are not lucky enough to know all the rules in advance, you risk getting lost in two phrases. Professional language doesn't think it needs to explain itself. It assumes you already signed the membership card, passed the check, and are ready to listen to long monologues about high matters. And this is where our problems begin.
Why Professional Language is a Trap
Professional language, no matter how smart it looks from the outside, works like this: all participants made a deal that this set of words - these are our holy symbols. And now we will exchange them, pretending we understand what is happening. But there is a nuance: these words are indeed common (common), but to understand anything without the whole context? Impossible (non-effective).
Professional language is, in essence, a big self-referencing system. One word points to another, and so on to infinity. This is not bad - this is how any profession works inside. But the problem arises when we try to explain something to a person outside this circle. It hears sounds, but it sees no sense. For him, your conversation is like looking at a ship's telegraph: arrows move, lights blink, but what does it all mean? Go know.
How Meaning is Built
To understand why a simple person doesn't get your professional language, we need to look at cognitive linguistics. We have George Lakoff (who says meaning is built by images), Ronald Langacker (grammar is a way to "view the scene"), and Charles Fillmore (every concept lives inside its "frame").
If we speak like humans, the meaning of any term is built like this:
- There is an IMAGE you invoke in the head.
- There is an ACTION you perform with this IMAGE.
- There is a FRAME - a situation where this is even possible.
When you say a term, you’re throwing someone a compressed cube. To make it human-readable, you need to uncompress it back to IMAGE, Action, and Role (shortly, t‑IAR). That's all. These are the three bricks under every word. A professional term is just a few of these bricks pressed into one word, like a cube of compressed tea. A professional throws it - the cube instantly unfolds into a huge meaning. A junior throws the same cube? For him, it stays a rock. And that is why, when you talk to a person outside your field, you must unpress this cube back into parts: show the IMAGE, explain the action, define the frame. Then the meaning becomes available.
Terms as Compression: What is t-IAR?
If we speak humanely, any professional term is a compressed suitcase. You know, the kind of suitcase you close on the third try, pressing the lid with your knee. Inside - images, operations, connections, roles... but outside - a neat sticker: one short word. And we expect another person to understand this suitcase, open it, and say thank you. But it doesn't work like that.
To understand, let's take a simple formula from Lakoff, Langacker, and Fillmore:
Term = IMAGE + Action + Role in the system.
In formula-like style: t-IAR (term = IMAGE + Action + Role). Look at this not as a formula, but as an instruction on how to correctly unzip the term.
So, if you want to explain something, you must:
- Give an IMAGE - so person sees the object.
- Give an ACTION - so person understands what to do with it.
- Give a ROLE - so person understands why we need all this.
And only then can you mention the term. Not the other way around! Most specialists do it backwards - and then they are surprised they are "not understood".
Example #1: The Pythagoras Theorem
Here is a beautiful mathematical spell:
"The length of the hypotenuse is equal to the square root of the sum of the squares of the catheti."
For a junior, this sounds like instructions for launching a spaceship. Why? Words are there, meaning is not. The suitcase is locked.
| Concept | Image | Action | Role |
|---|---|---|---|
| Catheti | two sides of a triangle | meet at a right angle | create “right-angledness” |
| Hypotenuse | the third side | pick the one opposite the right angle | the longest side |
| Square of a number | abstraction | multiply a number by itself | prep for summing |
| Square root | abstraction | find the number that squared gives the sum | finish the computation |
Human version:
Let's break it down via t-IAR:
- Catheti: Two sides of a triangle. They meet at a 90 degrees angle. They make "rectangularity." This literally means "perpendicular" in Greek.
- Hypotenuse: The third side. The one opposite the right angle. The longest one.
- Square: Multiply a number by itself.
- Root: Find a number that, when multiplied by itself, gives the total.
Now, let's say it like a human:
"In a right triangle, the longest side is the one opposite the corner. To find its length, you have to:
- Multiply each of the other two sides by themselves,
- add the results together,
- And find the number that, if you multiply it by itself, gives this sum."
The meaning is the same. But now the person doesn't run away in terror.
Example #2: "Interface"
Everyone has heard the word "Interface." Everyone is sure they understand. But ask them: "Explain it?" And the person starts talking about buttons, menus, API, cursor movements... someone will definitely mention the "brain interface." Because "Interface" is a Mille-feuille (aka Napoleon cake) of seven layers of meaning.
Let's unpack it via t-IAR:
| Component | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Image (I) | A border, a touching point |
| Action (A) | Exchanging commands/data/signals. |
| Role (R) | Makes interaction possible and controlled. |
Human formulation:
"An interface is the place through which two sides can exchange commands or data so that they understand each other."
Simple. Transparent. To the point.
Applying t-IAR to real interfaces:
User Inferface
| I | A | R |
|---|---|---|
| screen, buttons, gestures | click → send | make control understandable to humans |
Human formulation:
“It's everything a person tells a computer to do and receives a response.”
API - Application Programming Interface
| I | A | R |
|---|---|---|
| methods, endpoints | request → processing → response | standardize interaction |
Human formulation:
“This is a way for one program to ask another to do something.”
Mechanical interface
| I | A | R |
|---|---|---|
| fasteners, gears, connections | connect → transmit motion | ensure compatibility |
Human formulation:
“This is the place where one detail conveys the action of another.”
That's it. Without any professional jargon, the meaning becomes clear immediately.
A Memo: How to Explain Like a Human Being
If you want to be truly understood, and not just have people nod politely out of respect for your rich inner world, start with the simple things.
Start with an image. Paint a picture for the person, even in his head, if you don't have a napkin. Then explain the action - what we do with it. Then show the role - why this whole construction exists.
And only after that, when the person has grasped the essence, can you pronounce the term. Not sooner. Because if you throw the word first, without the image, you are not explaining - you are loading the person with a ZIP-archive it cannot open.
This is not simplification. This is not "lowering standards." This is normal human communication. Throwing professional noodles on people's ears - this is not wisdom. This is professional laziness.
Don't work on people's nerves. Don't pretend you are hard to understand because you are an expert. Real experts can explain everything without jargon, without a pose, and without trying to show they are from a "higher caste of knowledge.".
- First, paint a picture.
- Then explain the action.
- Then say what it's for.
- Only then, say the term.
Never throw a term-cube at a person without unpressing it first.
In this world, maybe three people fully understand what you want to say. Two of them are long retired. And the third one? That is you. So don't make life difficult for yourself or others: speak like a human, explain like a person to a person, not like a term to a dictionary. Do this, and you will have happiness, respect, and normal work communication.