The gap in advanced English

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Have you ever been on the tube in

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London? You'll have heard this.

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>> Please mind the gap between the train

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and the platform.

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>> And it's funny because at your level of

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English, it's not grammar and vocabulary

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that's your main concern. It's the gap.

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Your intellect and your thoughts, your

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your personality is up here, but your

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English is here. You can hold complex

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conversations. You can explain yourself,

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but you simplify,

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you adjust, and you hold back. Not

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because your ideas aren't strong, but

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because your English won't stretch to

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where your thinking already is. It's

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that quiet irritation of knowing how

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much work you've put in, and yet English

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still doesn't feel fully yours. That is

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the gap. You are fluent. You can

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communicate, but you are not completely

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free to be yourself in English the way

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you are in your first language. And I

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only have one thing to say about that.

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Welcome to C2. C2 is the level where

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English stops feeling like something

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you're using and it starts feeling like

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something you own. You can follow almost

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any accent.