While we may strive to be kind and compassionate in our communication with people, we’re bound to fall short sometimes. And one of the ways we do that in conversation? When we condescend, or talk down to, the other person.

We’re being condescending when we speak to someone in a way that implies our own superiority, said journalist Celeste Headlee, author of We Need to Talk: How to Have Conversations That Matter.

“It generally involves some kind of haughty tone, but condescension also almost always involves a passive-aggressive behaviour,” Headleetold HuffPost.

“In other words, when you are condescending to someone as in, ‘Bless your heart,’ you are putting on a false persona of kindness but beneath that is that clear message of superiority. You’re treating them in a way that shows that they are an inferior.”

Chances are, you're probably using some of these patronising phrases. Here's why you should avoid them.

The tendency to talk down to others may have to do with trying to elevate our own social status, Headlee suggested.

“Our survival has always depended on our rank, our status, within a community,” she said. “We need to be in a safe place within a community because it is through belonging – it is through community – that human beings survive.”

Every conversation we have involves “impression management” in one way or another, she explained, “meaning that we are constantly managing the impression that we make on others”.

“So people condescend because it’s a way – whether it be conscious or not – that we can establish our rank above another person,” she said.

According to Southern California psychotherapist Elisabeth Crain, speaking to others in a condescending manner can often be “traced back to underlying insecurity or an inflated ego,” though she acknowledges this also happens when a person is just having a bad day and isn’t cognisant of how they’re coming off.

We all slip up from time to time, but generally we want to avoid communicating in a condescending way because it’s insulting and demeaning to the other person.

“Nobody likes being condescended to. No one likes being told, ‘You’re of lower rank than I am,’ or ‘I’m superior to you,’ which is essentially the underlying message of condescension,” Headlee said.

And secondly, it’s just not an effective........

© HuffPost