Explaining Your Work

There are people who, when you ask them to explain their current project, will always use the exact same wording. I think you should be able to explain what you are doing in a dozen different ways, for different audiences and in different circumstanes. One way of getting yourself unstuck on a project is to explain it in an email to someone who is not in your direct field, or someone who is not an academic at all. You don't even need to send the email.