What’s the simplest possible layperson explanation of the P vs NP problem?

“[HN] is not your personal army”

You know the answer when you see it, but finding one takes forever.

In carpentry, the cuts to make for a strong joint. Say it already exists in the literature. But if you don't know about it, you have to try all kinds of different combinations. (If you did know, it's easy to verify: it's accepted practice.)

Experience (mistakes)--or tribal knowledge--enable heuristics to work around P vs NP.

Something like that?