Most of us will probably admit that we tend to blame others when they misunderstand what we’re saying.

“I’m a smart and well-informed human being with a generous soul, merely seeking to show others the path forward,” we tell ourselves. “I can hardly be blamed if fools and willful idiots refuse to see the way.”

Alas, a slightly more honest appraisal suggests a somewhat more complex reality—one in which each of us is a bit less brilliant than we might like to imagine while the audiences we engage with are less uniformly ignorant than ill-informed and often distracted.

Put another way, dear reader: When others fail to understand your ideas, it’s often (brace yourself!) less their fault than your own.

Experience teaches that in many cases, misunderstanding actually comes down to what the esteemed psycholinguist (and provocative prose stylist) Stephen Pinker calls the single biggest barrier to clear writing: the curse of knowledge.

How Can Knowledge Be A Curse?

The curse of knowledge is a cognitive bias in which people who already know something tend to erroneously assume that other people already know it, too. To make matters worse, the better a knower already knows something, the harder they find to it to imagine the perspective of someone who doesn’t already know that thing.

The curse of knowledge creates trouble in all sorts of domains.

1. In Education: A seasoned professor who has spent years studying a particular subject struggles to explain basic concepts to beginners because she’s forgotten what it’s like to be inexpert. The students quickly tune out and begin to google and/or giggle.

2. In Technology: A software engineer uses complex terms and jargon while explaining a new app or software to non-technical users, who therefore fail to understand her. She regards them as pathetic and dense. They regard her as annoying and nerdy.

3. In Healthcare: A doctor relies on Latinate medical terminology to explain a condition or treatment to a patient, without realizing that the patient might not understand these terms (or, say, know “Latinate” from “Greek”).

4. In Nonprofits: A nonprofit organization working on climate change struggles to explain the importance of its work to potential donors or the general public, because they are so deeply immersed in the subject that they forget that others are a lot like parents in an early Will Smith song (i.e., they “just don’t understand”).

5. In Social Work: A social worker has difficulty explaining the complexities of the social-service system to someone seeking help for the first time. They understand the byzantine system perfectly, and forget that, for newcomers, it’s every bit as confusing and overwhelming as the multi-millennium history of Byzantium (which Istanbul was before it was Constantinople).

6. In Policy Making: A policy maker struggles to communicate the need for a new policy to the public, as they are unable to simplify the technical aspects of the policy into language that the average person can understand. Meanwhile, their political enemies begin calling it something that sounds distinctly nefarious to their base (like, say, “Obamacare”).

Across all of these domains, the curse of knowledge causes well-intentioned would-be communicators to inadvertently create confusion, frustration, and even distrust in their audiences. And it can happen to you, too, dear reader, precisely insofar as you–yes, you!–have unique experiences, expertise, and knowledge to share with the world.

Where Does this Curse Come From?

While the finer points of neuroanatomy are beyond my expertise, the explanation for the curse of knowledge seems to lie in the way our brains process and store information. As we gain knowledge and expertise in a particular area, our brains create neural connections that make it easier and easier for us to access that information.

This efficiency, however, comes at a cost. Our brains become so accustomed to retrieving some information effortlessly that we forget what it was like not to have that information “already in mind.” Such forgetfulness undergirds the curse of knowledge, as we thereafter struggle to put ourselves in the shoes of someone who has never yet imagined what we already know implicitly.

In addition to predisposing us to false assumptions, the curse of knowledge reduces our ability to accurately predict how others will interpret our words or actions. We often assume that our intentions and meaning are clear to others, forgetting that they lack contextual knowledge we can call to mind quickly—whether it’s the name of an ancient city, a slightly less-ancient Will Smith song, a healthcare policy debate, or something that’s already in your mind but not in mine. This can lead to misunderstandings, miscommunication, and even conflicts in both personal and professional relationships.

How Can I Avoid this Curse?

Avoiding the curse of knowledge (or at least mitigating its effect) is vital to effective communication and to many types of writing. Here are five strategies that every would-be high-impact communicator can employ:

1. Practice Audience-Directed Empathy: Explicitly try to put yourself in the shoes of your readers or listeners. What do they know? What don’t they know? What might they find confusing? If and whenever possible, ask someone who can serve as a proxy for your audience to help you answer these questions up front.

2. Simplify Your Language: Avoid jargon and overly complex terms. Use clear, simple language that’s easy for anyone in your audience to understand. “But wait,” you say, “won’t different people in my audience have different levels of experience?” Of course. Try not to leave any of them out without a good reason—or reckon with the fact that you’re being exclusionary (and possibly a jerk).

3. Use Analogies and Metaphors: Analogies and metaphors can help explain complex concepts by relating them to something more familiar. They can serve as a bridge to help your audience connect new concepts with familiar experiences.

4. Adapt Your Communication Style: Different people understand information in different ways. Some people prefer detailed explanations, while others prefer a broad overview. Try to adapt your style to match the needs of your audience, bearing in mind (again) that audiences may contain multitudes.

5. Use Visual Aids: Visuals can sometimes communicate complex ideas more simply and effectively than words. In other cases, they can help deliver key ideas in memorable forms. For example:

* Note: Albert Einstein never said this. But we’ll cover fake news and misattribution another time.