How do you communicate a concept like, say, amortization, so that any educated person can understand and relate to it? In Mihir Desai’s experience writing The Wisdom of Finance, with its ambitious, stated goal of “discovering humanity in the world of risk and return”, it involves a lot of perspiration and a bit of inspiration. There are no shortcuts, but there are a few consistent principles—chief among them: find the right stories.Explore different teaching anglesIn highly technical fields, ideas are often hard to grasp—both for outsiders and people in the field.Think about the underlying concepts of a complicated phenomenon. Can they be made simpler by non-traditional means?Rather than attack the idea head on, ask: Can I map the idea to the ways people might apply it in their own lives? Can I explain the idea with storytelling? with literature, history, and philosophy?Establish an organizing principleCrystallize your core set of ideas and then separate them. This becomes the ...